The Conch Bearer Analysis

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is one of the outstanding Indian English writers of the modern century. Most of her works like The Mistress of Species; The Conch Bearer etc. contain the Magical Realist elements. She has written in unique style that blends with magic and reality. The Divakaruni’s works are largely set in India and the United States, and often focuses on the experiences of South Asian immigrants. She writes for children as well as adults and has published novels in multiple genres, including realistic fiction, historical fiction, magical realism and fantasy. The novel The Conch Bearer contains almost all the elements of magical realism, fantasy threads intertwine with spiritual teaching. Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni says that “Magical

In the first chapter, there is a description about his interest in magic. His mother brought to him when Anand’s father sent a money order that first month:

It was titled Persian Fairy Tales. He had spent many blissful hours reading about a magic apple that could cure you of any disease if you smelled it once and a telescope that could show you anything in the world that you want to see (4).

During his miserable conditions he wished “as he had done many times secretly in the past year that someone would give him a magic apple like the one he had read about and a magic telescope”(4). The only he could make Meera better and could see where his father was. But his mother ensures that such things could happen only in the story books. One day an old man came to Haru’s teashop, where Anand worked. Even in the first sight, he was very sympathetic towards the old man. He addressed him “grandfather”.

When Anand gave food and took him gently by arm, he felt it a slight as feathers. The old man looked at him. “His eyes were blue? Green? Shimmery brown like the eyes of a tiger?”(11). He felt something like an electric current tingled through him when the old man looked at