Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

I came from a traditional family, and it was an exciting but challenging transition to move to America and live on my own. The world around me was suddenly so different.

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

My favorite part was when my grandfather and I would make a special trip to Firpo's Bakery for red and green Christmas cookies and fruitcake studded with the sweetest cherries I've ever tasted. Usually Firpo's was too expensive for our slim budget, but Christmas mornings they gave a discount to any children who came in.

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

I am buoyant and expansive and uncontainable--but I always was so, only I never knew it!

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

I did not think I had a story to tell…Moving to a very different culture and learning to live on my own made me see the world much more clearly…. I thought about India more than I had ever before. I realized what I appreciated about it; the warmth, the closeness of extended family, the way spirituality pervades the culture. But I also recognized problems [with regard to] how women are often treated.

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

When I wrote Arranged Marriage, many of the women in that book were isolated...That isn’t so for women coming here now. They have access to generations of wisdom, from recipes to how to bring up children to husband problems. There are also fewer chances of abuse, because domestic abuse flourishes in isolation. We are seeing less abuse, at least in the newer generation. There is more accountability.

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

It has definitely influenced my writing. I put appropriate Bengali words in among the English ones because I want that weaving of languages. Concepts from Bengali are sometimes difficult to translate but I want them to have a role. It’s complicated. How do you bring them in without putting little explanatory notes? How do you write so you are at once inviting everyone into your book but also creating a special texture that people of your language background would especially appreciate?

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

We even had a different word for Christmas in my language, Bengali: Baradin, which literally meant 'big day.'

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

My favorite part was when my grandfather and I would make a special trip to Firpo's Bakery for red and green Christmas cookies and fruitcake studded with the sweetest cherries I've ever tasted. Usually Firpo's was too expensive for our slim budget, but Christmas mornings they gave a discount to any children who came in.

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

As I remember my grandfather and those Christmas mornings he gave for a little girl's pleasure, I know that often a big life starts with doing small things.

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

As for being pawns, aren’t we all pawns in the hands of Time, the greatest player of them all?

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

We even had a different word for Christmas in my language, Bengali: Baradin, which literally meant 'big day.'

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

As I remember my grandfather and those Christmas mornings he gave for a little girl's pleasure, I know that often a big life starts with doing small things.

— Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni