Palace of Illusions

“Nor could I be particularly delighted by the virginity boon, which seemed designed more for my husbands’ benefit than mine.”

Even the gods favoured men over women, or that’s what Draupadi thought in this retelling of The Mahabharat, The Palace of Illusions by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni.

It’s true though, in fact a lot of the boons the women gained throughout the epic were more beneficial to the women’s husbands than they were to the women themselves. Be it a boon of a hundred sons or a boon to ask kids off gods, they were all boons made to complement the husbands’ faults and interests.

Most Indian readers are already well acquainted with the plot of Mahabharat. Through various adaptations and retellings it has passed the lips of both young and old. The flavour is the same, but sometimes even the spoon it's fed by can change the food's taste. 

What if a man could change the world? Someone like Arjun, who defeated various Maharathis in the battle, sounds heroic! And what if a woman was destined to change the world? Like Draupadi born of the flames of revenge like her brother Dhrishtadhyumna and yet… she was just a woman. 

Of course a person living in the age where the epic was passed down by mouth might or might not disagree on this, but today, a woman who can change the world is seen with scorn and suspicion, and that’s exactly what the author has tried to capture as she wrote Draupadi, banned from the knowledge hubs and weapon lessons her brother was privy to. She was alienated by her own father, and everyone was scared of her. Why was that? But the sad thing was, she was also losing her brother, her only solace in that cold palace to the world of “men”. When all she wanted was love and companionship.

One interesting thing, (spoiler alert), was the fact that Draupadi was crushing on the one brother she couldn’t have. That was honestly quite amusing. But controversial opinions aside, I cannot blame her for that interpretation considering how the Pandavas treated Draupadi, gambling her away in a game of dice, watching without moving when she was publicly humiliated. That was not how men in love behaved. (Personally. I am not a big fan of the emotional infidelity, but to be fair it is kind of a complicated affair with her having 5 husbands and each of them having other wives). 

Something else I was surprised by was the interpretation of Arjun’s character. In every other adaptation, he has been portrayed as this valiant perfect warrior, the main character of the entire story, but this story dealt with him as a jealous hot headed jerk who always misplaced the recipient of his anger. It’s a refreshing and unsettling take that forces readers to question how much of heroism is just a matter of perspective.

This book sent me on a spiral, questioning morality, the point of existence as well as what my place in it was as a writer, a human, and a woman. Would I forever be defined by my relationships with certain men, like Draupadi, quite literally the daughter of Drupad.