Introduction
Desirable Daughters is a novel by Bharati Mukherjee that seeks to illustrate the intricate relations that exist between the Indian caste system and the Western experiences of the immigrants in an effort towards reconciling the world views regarding the feminist gap between the two cultures. In a bid to reveal the intricacies of the caste system in India, Mukherjee delves deeper into the nature of three sisters in the novel and the circumstances they find themselves as they try to fit in different societies. From the outset, it is worth noting that the three sisters from Calcutta belong to the wealthy Brahmin caste hence they have been brought up as noble women. Accordingly, they have been in schools where they have been educated in English by Irish nuns and have been able to interact with people from different cultural backgrounds in the cocktail parties that they have been able to attend in the company of their parents. The character of the three sisters reveals the difficulties that one encounters in a different culture. Accordingly, the cultural conflict between India and America is considerably difficult to reconcile. The ultimate purpose of the novel is to expose the identity crisis among the Indian immigrants in America. Throughout the novel, one is able to understand that character, cultural conflict, and the author’s purpose through the closer understanding of Tara’s flashbacks in contrast with her new experiences in America. The character of Tara Lata and her two sisters Parvati and Padma, wrestle with the themes of conflict between individualism and the society, native versus foreign cultures, the destruction of self, and self-discovery, which reveal the character and conflict between cultures while also giving a purpose of the narrative.
Character
Having been brought up in a proper Brahmin family in India, the three sisters have to adhere to a strict culture that disregards the feminine interests while promoting masculinity. For instance, Tara is in an arranged marriage since her father chose a husband for her. However, as the three sisters interact more with the Western culture they find it difficult to abide by some of the aspects of the Indian culture. Chu, while discussing the plight of the women in India observes thus. “Mukherjee Blurs the distinction between someone like herself, a member of an Indian elite, well groomed in British colonial education, and ad a peasant woman”(Chu 130). There is also the use of recollection or flashback where Tara Lata presents the stories of her sisters and her experiences within her Brahmin family back in India. The freedom that Tara has in America also makes her recall past experiences in India where she and her sisters were not allowed to express themselves freely along the Ballygunge Park Road. In this regard, Tara recalls how her daddy and mummy found her “the only man in the world who could transport me from the enchanted garden of Ballygunge to Stanford” (Mukherjee 81).
The above thesis is apparent in the characters of each of the three sisters. With regard to the themes of destruction of self and self-discovery, it is apparent that the three sisters gradually do away with the cultural aspects associated with the Indian caste system. This is evidenced by the fact that Tara is eventually able to destroy her arranged marriage by divorcing a husband that her father chose for her and subsequently goes on a quest to find her own lover. Tara’s reason for filing for divorce is that she is no longer interested in being married as evidence given that she obtains a no-fault divorce. In this regard, Gupta notes, “She gives divorce to her husband because the promise of life as an American wife was not being fulfilled while she knew that divorce was a stigma for woman in Indian society” (Gupta 4). Such ground for divorce is virtually unheard of within her Indian caste where divorce rarely happens and even where it is allowed it is a concealed affair. Tara is so delighted after the divorce because she has regained her self-determination to the extent that she celebrates by being promiscuous. The fact that she celebrates shows her willingness to discover more about herself. Accordingly, the fact that she also has a homosexual son and she tolerates his sexual desires as evidenced by the indication that she allows her new boyfriend to live with her are some of the things that reveal how Tara is determined to disregard the strict Indian culture that would consider such behavior unacceptable in favor of the Western culture that focuses more on the individual while ignoring the Indian culture that is focuses more on the society than individual. Although the three sisters have different love lives and careers, they are aware that these aspects are likely to be thwarted by the expectations of their parents and the Indian culture. This is precisely because their lifestyles are considerably leaning towards the Western way of life which is different from the lifestyle of Indian women belonging to the Brahmin caste. In this regard, it is worth noting that even though Parvati has decided to remain in India, her love life is different from other women in her caste in the sense that her marriage is from a love match. There is also the aspect of emotional destruction that is apparent within the family as each of the sisters has to keep secrets in order to maintain peace within the family, otherwise the family will be subject of social shame within the Brahmin caste if the sisters’ way of life is discovered.
Conflict
Conflict in the novel emerges from the difficulties in the struggle to merge the native Indian culture with the Western culture. For instance, Lata struggles to accommodate foreign cultures such as the feminist culture that is prevalently American because the traditional Indian is considerably different therefore the two cultures are incompatible. For instance, when Lata divorces she is able to find another man in America but such a thing would prove virtually impossible because the “chances for marrying again are lost forever, because no man wants what another turns down” (Whitson 289). Through Tara’s flashbacks it is worth noting that the traditional roles of women in India are a direct opposite of what the American feminism espouses. An instance that reveals a cultural difference between the perception of women in India and America is the marriage of Lata to a tree where a ritual is carried out in order to alleviate the earlier predictions of a Hindu astrologer who had made a prediction to the effect that the married life of Lata would last for a short time because of her malefic traits (Mukherjee 5). Ultimately, the American feminist culture would perceive such predictions as superstitious and therefore something worth ignoring. This is precisely because the American feminism is based on the historical and scientific knowledge therefore if the predictions of an astrologer are to be given consideration then the person predicting must prove the prediction through scientific means. Such differences create conflicts that Lata and her sisters struggle to confront in the course of the narrative.
The conflicts that emerge between the Indian culture and the foreign cultures, especially the American one, also bring to the fore the different ways in which different societies are structured. For instance, in the Indian culture, it is apparent that the happiness of the community supersedes the happiness of an individual. This is notable given that Indian women are expected to be supportive of their husbands at all times, regardless of the circumstances. The author informs the reader that the only way a Hindu woman can only reach a state of grace is by being submissive and worshipping the husband in a manner that one can worship a god. Accordingly, the narrative reveals that an Indian woman who does not have a husband is considered a social outcast. This aspect becomes apparent when Tara’s father feels obligated to marry off her daughter noting that her fate would be much worse if she remained unmarried because she would then experience, “a lifetime’s virginity, a life without a husband to worship as god’s proxy on earth, and thus, the despairing life of a woman doomed to be reincarnated” (Mukherjee 14). As such, the individual aspirations and needs of the women within the Indian society are subordinate to the needs and aspirations of their male counterparts and the society at large. Singh notes thus, “In India, the happiness of the individual is subordinate to the collective good of his/her community” (Singh 65). The elevation of the men over and above the women is the main objective of a patriarchal society and is typical of the Indian society as seen in the characters in the novel. However, it is important to note that the three sisters no longer abide strictly to the pure Indian culture given that they have they have gradually been influenced by the liberal American culture that considers some aspects of the Indian culture primitive.
Purpose
As the three sisters from Calcutta struggle to get rid of some of the oppressive Indian traditions, they also struggle to accept wholly the liberal external cultures that seek to provide them with a sense of liberation from the seemingly primitive native culture. The purpose of the narrative is to reveal how the struggle to merge different cultures can sometimes lead to aspects of self-destruction and self-construction in the sense that the three women have to destroy their pre-existing ways of life as they gradually construct new identities that are more liberate based on the Western feminist notions. Mukherjee recalls how the Indian culture is a form of “impenetrable bubble” where “Anyone entering or exiting was carefully monitored” (Mukherjee 44). As such, in order to reconstruct their identities, the Indian characters in the novel have to renounce some of the Indian cultures that emerge as oppressive to women and embrace more liberal cultural aspects that erode the very aspect that make them uniquely Indian. Consequently, the interaction that Lata and her two sisters have with the American feminist notions exposes cultural conflict in the course of changing identity from the Indian traditions to the Western feminist notions that allow self-discovery. It is informative that the three women do not consider themselves as being in quest of their own identities. This is apparent when the narrator recalls thus, “we honored the priorities. There was no rebellion, no seeking after individual identity” (Mukherjee 44). Nevertheless, in due course the three themes of self-discovery, Indian tradition, and Western feminism are closely related in that when the three sisters decide to abandon the Indian tradition in favor of western feminism, they do so as individuals as they embark on discovering more about themselves rather that the community that they have been part of. . Ultimately, the depiction of elaborate details regarding the challenges that the three sisters encounter as they confront their past and existing culture, the author also ends up revealing the vulnerabilities of the Indian women within the patriarchal society. The ultimate purpose of the author is to expose the identity crisis among the Indian immigrants as they try to incorporate their Indian cultures into the American culture and vice versa. This crisis becomes even more pronounced when Tara observes, “I'm not the only blue-jeaned woman with a Patina shawl around my shoulders I don't belong here” (Mukherjee 79)”. Ultimately, Miller sums up the enormity of challenges relating to immigrants’ identity and geography in Mukherjee’s novel by noting that “female identity is often linked to an imprisoning home” (Miller 65). In particular, Miller is of the view that the initial story of the Tree Wife brings out the significance of religion and the Indian caste system with regard to a gendered identity (66).
Conclusion
While the novel is focusing on an Indian family, the author manages to provide vivid insight regarding the Indian culture in contrast with the Western culture thereby revealing the gap between the two. Mukherjee reveals the conflicts between the Western and Indian cultures as she narrates about the love life and the careers of Lata and her sisters. Accordingly, the conflicts that emerge reveal the purpose of the author, which is to try to expose the plight of women within the Indian caste system and how it affects the manner in which the system manages to oppress girls and women by ensuring that they do not have enough information to explore their identities. This aspect is obvious when a stranger, Christopher Day, exposes the effect of community and the challenge of being Indian in a foreign country. From the stranger, Tara realizes that her knowledge of life is considerably limited and that the Indian culture is to blame for her ignorance. It is from Tara’s perspective that the reader is able to understand the author’s purpose, which is to show that there is need for the Indian women to strike a balance between the Indian culture and the Western individualism.
Works Cited
Chu, Patricia. Assimilating Asians: Gendered Strategies of Authorship in Asian America.
Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2000.
Gupta, Purnima. Gender Biases and Resistance in Bharati Mukherjee's Desirable Daughters. An
International Journal in English3 (4), 2012.
Miller, Katherine. Mobility and Identity Construction in Bharati Mukherjee’s Desirable
Daughters “The Tree Wife and Her Rootless Namesake”. Studies in Canadian Literature (SCL/ÉLC), 29(1), 2004.
Mukherjee, Bharati. Desirable Daughters. Hyperion Books, 2003.
Singh, Santosh. Desirable Daughters: Assimilation of Culture & Transformation of Identities.
The Indian Journal of Basic and Applied Research 1(3), 2016. http://www.ijbar.co.in/paper/02IJBAR2016V3.pdf
Whitson, Kathy. Encyclopedia of Feminist Literature. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2004.
