ELTWeekly Vol. 5 Issue#37 | October 21, 2013 | ISSN 0975-3036

Abstract:

The novel One Amazing Thing a fiction by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni offers a wide scope of aesthetic exploration of cultural study. It begins with visiting strangers in the visa office in a city. The city is not mentioned anywhere in the novel. However, development of the novel tells, it is somewhere in America. A devastating earthquake occurs there and the visa office building collapses. Nine strangers of varied background and culture trapped there because the exit is blocked by rubble.

Article:

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni brings together nine persons in a visa office. These nine persons are Uma Sinha (an Indian origin), Malathi (a south Indian girl and clerk in the visa office), Mr. Mangalam (officer of the visa office), Mr. and Mrs. Pritchett (a Caucasian couple), Jiang (Chinese old woman), Lily (Jiang’s granddaughter), Tariq (an Islamic young man around his twenty) and Cameron (an ex-army man). Cultural conflict reflects in the visa office because remained people after earthquake are all from different cultures. They have been trapped there, and forcefully they have to stay with the people of the other cultures. They are together in such a precarious situation, but because of differences in culture, many conflicts occur. Moreover, Uma finds out to kill the boredom and to relax the mind from the fear of consequences of the earthquake. She suggests everyone to share one amazing thing from their own life. These stories also deal with some cultural conflicts like, the story of old Chinese lady Jiang, the story of Tariq, Malathi’s story of class-conflict, etc.

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