The Mistress of Spices by Chitra Banerjee DivakaruniSwaying and pulsating with pipey-hot spice descriptions, syrupy-emotive narrative, portrait-worthy characters and beautiful storytelling, The Mistress of Spices is a novel by Chitra Banerjee Divakurni, the Indian-American writer and poet. Tantalizing, enchanting, charming and bewitching, the novel is a work of fiction, most-appropriately falling into the category of magic realism fiction.
But apart from all things magic, the book also ripples with romance, and croons with the fragrance of feelings like courage, intuition and following one’s heart.
The novel, fundamentally is rooted in the connection that plays between human mind and the psychological healing power embodied in different Indian spices.
The Mistress of Spices is a novel depicting the story of a young woman who is born gifted with certain magical powers. The story takes the reader through a spectacular journey of how she navigates the discovery of her magical powers, stumbling and tripping into the rollercoaster of emotions that her gift brings to her, both pleasures and pitfalls.
The woman’s name is Tilo.
As a child, Tilo was kidnapped by a pirate gang, who destroyed her village and took her away in their ship. They thought that her magical power would bring them good luck.
Unaware still of her true magical power, Tilo escaped the ship when the pirates were asleep, and discovered herself on the shore of some mysterious land.
As she was lying half-unconscious on the sandy ground, she noticed that a motherly woman was examining her hand with utter curiosity.
Later on, she came to discover that this place was ‘The Island of Spices’ and this motherly woman was called by the names of ‘the Old One’ and ‘the First Mother’. The First Mother was a powerful witch who knew everything about the magical power of different spices. On this island, she taught and trained her students the craft of harnessing magic and how to cast spells with the magical power of spices.
Every spice has a meaning. Every spice can be used to cast a certain spell. Every spice carries a secret magical power which can be used to trigger both healing and destruction.
As time goes on, Tilo turned out to be one of the most intelligent students of the First Mother. The First Mother seemed happy about her, but at the same time she cautioned her for her future. Upon examining Tilo’s hands that day, the First Mother had told her that her hands were singing with spices, but they were also singing with danger and destruction. And Tilo must never deviate from the rules if she was to prevent this destruction from happening.
At the end of their training, the First Mother asked her students that now they’d need to pass a test. Each student would have to step into the Shampati’s fire. The fire would not burn them, but only take them to their respective destinies. In their new lives, they’d lose their youthful beauty and each student would be called as ‘The Mistress of Spices’.
She told them that a Mistress of Spices shall only use their magic to help other people, and never for themselves. They must never look at their reflection in a mirror. And they must always follow all these rules, or else, they’d lose their magical power.
The First Mother warned Tilo that even though she was as brilliant as a diamond, but she was a diamond with a crack, and it would be hard for her to resist the temptations of her desire. And following her desires would only bring her destruction.
Also, the First Mother told her a tale about her name’s origin, which features in the book as a story-within-a-story.
This is what she tells her.
The name ‘Tilo’ is based on the Hindi name (til) which refers to the sesame seed spice.
Furthermore, the spice name ‘til’ is derived from a Sanskrit word Tilottama. Tilottama was the name of a goddess in Indian mythology. Tilottama goddess was bejewelled with an enchanting, rapturous beauty. However, she was cursed that she could never fall in love. But once, she did fall in love. And true to her curse, her body became bent and twisted. Her beauty turned into ugliness. And she was evicted from the heaven of gods.
The First Mother warned Tilo, that just like Tilottama, a Mistress of Spice could not desire or fall in love, or else she’d lose her magical powers and bring great destruction to the world. She told her that,
“When a mistress of spices loves someone she should not love, then all the people she loves will be destroyed.”
Promising her that she’d follow all the rules of her magic training, Tilo stepped into the Shampati’s fire. Soon enough, her body was swallowed into the ocean of fire lolling with tongues of blazing flames.
The fire took Tilo to her destiny. In this new life, she found herself in the city of Oakland. She had lost her youthful beauty and now resembled a middle-aged woman, her face creased with wrinkles, even though in her heart she was still as young as before. Here she was a businesswoman operating a store named ‘Spice Bazaar’.
In her store, she sold an assortment of spice powders, pickles, tea powders, spice herbs, spice mixes and Indian spice snacks.
But this was no ordinary spice store. In every packet she packed for her customers, she also whispered words of magical healing spells.
Her purpose was to use the magical power of spices to help people. Throughout the day, many customers visited her store. They purchased spices, some of them got their palms read by her and others talked about their everyday life.
Among all these people, some of them were the regular shoppers in her store.
For instance,
One of her most regular customers was Lalita. Lalita was a middle-aged woman who had an abusive husband. Tilo gave her the spice packets of turmeric (haldi) for love and fennel (saunf) to strengthen her mind.
Her second regular customer was Haroun. Haroun was a taxi driver but he was often attacked by local Americans for his nationality. Tilo packed for him black cumin (kalo jiro) for protection against evil.
Kwesi, an African-American was another of the regular shoppers in her store. Kwesi ran a martial arts school and he would often visit Spice Bazaar store to buy packets of spice mixes to cook delicious Indian pakoras for his girlfriend.
Jagjit, a school boy, was another of the shoppers. Jagjit often visited her store alongwith his mother to buy sabu papads and other things. Jagjit was a traumatized child who was bullied at school and ignored by his parents. Tilo gave him a packet of cinnamon (dalchini) for friendship. However, a literal twist to her spell, he became friends but with a mischevous gang of violent drug-addicted boys in his school. To help and save him from bad company, Tilo gave him the spice packet of Indian Madder (manjishtha). She believed that this spice would bring calmness of mind to him. She also offered him a poster of Kwesi’s martial arts school, suggesting that there he’d be much better off with his friendships.
Besides these, another elderly man was the most frequent shopper in her store. He was the grandfather of a young woman named Geeta. While he visited the store to buy some spices, he told Tilo that his family was going through a disturbing scenario. His granddaughter Geeta wanted to marry a Mexican man but her parents Raamu and Sheela were against their marriage. And so, Geeta had left the home to live on her own.
Tilo gave his grandfather one of the most powerful spices – the thorn-herb (kantak) mixed with golden honey.
This is how Tilo spent the days of her life helping people with the magical power of spices she had learned.
After having helped many of these people by solving their problems and healing their sorrows, Tilo found herself slipping into the valley of forbidden love, as a young American man named Raven, also a frequent shopper, stepped into the store.
Raven seemed to display more interest towards Tilo than towards the spices he was there to buy. Tilo wanted to avoid him at any cost. At first, she thought of giving him a spice packet of asafetida (hing), which was the antidote for love. But all she could offer him was a packet of spicy papad snacks, spiced with black peppercorn (kalo mirch). The magical power of peppercorn spice caused Raven to feel open-hearted, candid and frank. Instead of running away from the shop, he started sharing his life-story with Tilo.
When she couldn’t muster the will to resist her desire for him, she set herself on the verge of breaking all the rules of her magic training, one after the other.
At first, she stepped out of the store to meet Geeta. Breaking the rule that a Mistress of Spice could not leave her spice store.
Next she broke the rule by using the magic of spice to get back her youthful beauty. She used the King of Spices (makaradwaj) to conquer time.
She even ordered a mirror for her store to look at her reflection.
But most of all, what happened was that, she made a packet of red chilli powder to deliver to Haroun, as he had been attacked by some Americans in a terrible accident. But red chilli was the ‘Spice of Anger’, ‘The Spice of Destruction’. The moment she realized this, she threw away the spice into an ocean but she knew that since a spell was already cast, it was too late.
That night, the ghost of the First Mother appeared and in a haunting appearance enraged at her that since she had broken the rules, she would now have to bear the punishment for the same and Shampati’s fire would soon arrive and take back Tilo to the Island of Spices. She ordered Tilo to close the store and to get ready for stepping into the fire.
As per the instructions of the First Mother, Tilo put up a heavy sale in her store, selling everything at big discounts and closing her store forever.
That night, she gathered all the leftover remains of the spices in her store, arranged them in a heap, whispered the prayers, and sat there waiting for the fire to take her back to the island.
The next morning, as she woke up, there was an earthquake in the city. Strangely enough, the fire had not taken her back.
Raven came to save her. Together they were about to leave the city which was in a massive rubble, and go in search of their paradise, Suddenly, Tilo stopped. And said to him that she had decided that she wouldn’t go. She would rather rebuild her spice store and help the people of the city. This, she told him, was the real paradise!
The story dances with a medley of spices, spices which are metaphors representating emotions…
Feelings and emotions are temporary,
just like the motley of spices
and just like the unique flavours they seem to exude as their effect;
All the magical power that may reside
in either these spices or the emotions that they trigger,
is fleeting too,
but the magic that resides, springs and bubbles within our hearts
is imperishable independent of the ingredients of our everyday life!
The story of Tilo is a flavoursome reminder that the real magic is within our heart. So, follow your heart and be magical!
Thank you & Wonderful day!
Neha
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