Between Myth and Memory: A Traumatic Memory Reading of The Palace of Illusions

Niya V Raj

doi:10.36948/ijfmr.2025.v07i05.58875

Between Myth and Memory: A Traumatic Memory Reading of The Palace of Illusions

Author(s)	Ms. Niya V Raj
Country	India
Abstract	Trauma, as meaning suggests is a deeply distressing or disturbing experience of a person, mentally or physically. This research paper explores the novel, The Palace of Illusions (2008) by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni – The Indian-American author and poet – through the theoretical framework of traumatic memory, describing how individual and collective trauma are embodied and narrated through the female consciousness of Draupadi. The novel is a feminist retelling of the Mahabharata, which recreates the epic from the perspective of a woman whose existence is defined by displacement, humiliation, loss and trauma. Focusing on the ideas of Cathy Caruth, Dominick LaCapra, and Marianne Hirsch, on the traumatic memory, in personal life, historical recollections and intergenerational arena, this paper argues that the novel represents trauma not merely as an event of the past but as a continual process of remembering and reliving, shaping identity and agency of not only Draupadi but every women in the world. Draupadi’s fragmented recollections, her recurring visions of fire, and her obsession with honor and vengeance become manifestations of post-traumatic repetition and memory haunting, where the boundaries between myth and memory collapse and blurs into a thin line. The narrative voice, swing back and forth between assertion and rupture, reflecting the cyclical structure of trauma that resists reconciliation. By intertwining mythic temporality with psychological realism, Divakaruni reinterprets epic memory as a site of gendered suffering and resilience. The paper employs textual analysis and close reading to trace how trauma is inscribed through symbols, dreams, and silences, revealing the novel’s deep engagement with the politics of remembrance and identity. Diving deep, this paper contends that the novel, The Palace of Illusions (2008), transforms Draupadi’s story from one of divine destiny into a testimony of feminine trauma, where storytelling becomes a mode of survival and reclamation of self within patriarchal mythic discourse.
Keywords	Traumatic memory, The Palace of Illusions, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Feminism, Myth, Identity, Traumatic memory, Oppression and Patriarchy
Field	Arts
Published In	Volume 7, Issue 5, September-October 2025
Published On	2025-10-25
DOI	https://doi.org/10.36948/ijfmr.2025.v07i05.58875

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Between Myth and Memory: A Traumatic Memory Reading of The Palace of Illusions

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