I am often sceptical picking up works of fiction inspired by scriptures because there have been notorious writers in the past accused of Taking creative liberty that can apparently be called too much. I am one of those people who incline towards the belief that religious scriptures are not subject to artistic liberty, even though I often feel torn about wanting to accept the notion of creative liberty as well. There have been works in the past which took inspiration from Indian scriptures that have impressed me such as the Immortals of Meluha series by Amish; and I picked up this book by Chitra Banerjee diwakaruni because a dear friend recommended it strongly.
To summarise in one sentence, this book is the narration of the epic Mahabharata from the point of view of Draupadi with a strong infusion of modern day feministic values into her personality. I feel like this book can elicit polarised opinions and while I am fully capable of one of those, I’m ensuring that I am looking at as many facets of this whole experience as possible and attempt to provide a holistic review.
‘The Palace of Illusions’ manages to cover the story of Draupadi from her birth to death. For us who have grown up learning the Mahabharata, the story is nothing new and the element of curiosity lies only in the point of view. This book is arguably the first one that attempts to accentuate Draupadi’s typical feministic features to perhaps make her more relatable to the female readers; the modern ones at that. Given that the point of view itself is the point of interest, the whole book feels more like Divakaruni has encashed the readability of the Mahabharata and used it to carry out a worn out experiment.
With this idea, the book humanizes the characters from Mahabharata to the extent of them seeming like characters from a teenage drama. Draupadi is that restless little girl who feels like she does not fit into the world that she belongs in, feels an urge to question all the traditional norms and has an inclination to always get into trouble. She behaves more like Bryce Quinlan in Crescent City than the most powerful woman of Dwapara Yuga. This presentation of Draupadi is new and we don’t know how much she was actually like this; but since the book openly declares that it has taken creative liberty, we can allow ourselves to adapt to the tone of the narration. I do feel like an awareness that this book is more a work of fiction rather than an interpretation of the Mahabharata is very important. Initially it was quite uncomfortable for me because the humanisation of characters from the epic reduces the element of grandeur that we have grown up associating it with, especially with the characters of Lord Krishna, Yudhishira and Bheeshma. So I felt some friction at the beginning before I could fully accept the tone of the novel and begin enjoying it.
In complete honesty, the story of Mahabharata is in itself a strong point that makes any other technical factors such as narrative style, language, tone, and point of view quite irrelevant. Same happens with The Palace of Illusions because the readers quite easily delve into the story without paying much attention to other factors in the book. This being a major advantage for the author, it feels like Chitra Banerjee has made the most of it and ignored a number of aspects that she has ambitiously proposed in the Prologue.
A major part of the book revolves around Draupadi’s relationships with her brother Drishtadumnya and Krishna. Lesser focus is given to her relationships with her five husbands. This might be in order to shift the focus from the fact that she is conventionally recognised in the scripture majorly for having five husbands and not as an independent human being. Her relationships with her brother and Krishna were independent of her connections to her husbands and played a great role in defining her personality. She did have a great personality. Seemingly she was a master manifester and often smoothly manoeuvred through the turmoils in her head inflicted by the eventful circumstances in her life. Even though her husbands were at the centre of all the events that took place in her life, the book focuses mostly on her relationship with Arjuna, a little bit as Yudhishtira’s Queen, And barely with her relationships with Bheem, Nakul and Sahadev. Her five children are barely passing references in the novel and only gain little importance when they are killed unfairly by Ashwatthama at the end of the war.
(Spoiler ahead, though one of creative liberty and not factual)
An interesting point of creative freedom taken by the author is proposing that Draupadi was in fact in love with Karna, who was Arjuna’s greatest rival. The Pandavas being unaware of the fact that Karna was their oldest brother; they persistently loathe him for everything he was and intended to eliminate him at Kurkshetra in order to weaken Duryodhana’s stance. Their wife, however, was rooting for him to stay alive and perhaps accept her as his wife too. This adds a touch of spice to the novel that I personally don’t know what to do with. As much as I enjoyed reading the twist unfold, I don’t see what Chitra Banerjee was trying to do with it. It doesn’t seem to have added any depth to Draupadi’s personality. Instead, it has made her look like a girl with wandering eyes. Worse still, Kunti attempts to almost bargain with Karna to spare the rest of her sons in exchange of having Draupadi as his wife too. I wonder if the creative liberty went too far in connection to Draupadi’s relationship with Kunti because it felt more like a reading a cheap saas-bahu daily soap script.
That said, Chitra Banerjee has had good intentions for Draupadi’s character and that shows. She showcased her as a woman with some powerful thoughts that shaped her into an important, self-assured woman. Despite the numerous questions she had, her relationship with Krishna was her solace and guided her through her difficult life. The story in The Palace of Illusions has no problem reading itself and that’s its best part.
I’m not very convinced about the creative liberty taken with an Indian scripture here, yet again. As much as Chitra Banerjee intended to voice Draupadi’s character and make her the centre of the epic, Draupadi’s strength and the grandeur associated with her character is undermined. I accept fully that this personal opinion can be taken with a pinch of salt and the book can still be recommended as a worthwhile experience. To each his own.
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