55 pages • 1 hour read
Anita DesaiFasting, Feasting
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1999A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Red Meat and Diet
The contrasting role of food and diet within the novel’s two prominent families both develops the appearance of masculine authority and exposes the limitations of its communal control. In India, food and diet are a way to project status within the family. For example, Papa refuses to eat the orange until his wife prepares it with utmost ceremonial precision and systematic perfection. Mama “divides each segment” and then peels away all the “pips and threads till only the perfect globules of juice are left” (23). This ceremonial orange peeling not only reinforces Papa’s symbolic power within the household, but it establishes an image of perfect structural order and symmetry to accompany that power.
While Papa’s power seems unlimited on the surface, Arun’s vegetarianism reveals the limitations of Papa’s authority. So desperate to project power and status, Papa’s insistence on serving meat within the household is an outward sign of his social progress and advancement. Once limited by humbler circumstances and forced to subsist on a vegetarian diet, for Papa, “a meat diet had been one of the revolutionary changes brought about in his life…by education,” which, like “cricket and the English language” are outward symbols of his social elevation (32). By refusing to eat meat, Arun rejects the symbol of Papa’s social advancement, and overcomes all of Papa’s attempts to impose that status on Arun by force-feeding him cod liver oil (33).
Later, in America, Arun confronts another fatherly figure, Mr. Patton, who attempts to impose red meat on his family in the form of barbecues. For Mr. Patton, red meat is about sustaining a narrow and superficial image of American familial tradition; however, his attempts to enforce this image and to contrive the appearance of family unity are utterly impotent. His children refuse to share the meal in spite of his complaints and commands; Arun refuses his offering of red-meat in spite of his public pressure and disapproval, and most of his expensive steak is wasted and unclaimed, left to blacken and burn on the grill.
Ceremonial Symbolism
For the Patton family, shopping and barbecues are the closest substitute for familial ceremony and ritual. Mrs. Patton spends her days in a perpetual cycle of shopping, stockpiling groceries, and then returning home to stuff the fridge, freezer, and cupboards “with enough broccoli, bean sprouts, radishes and celery to feed the family for a month” (185). Ironically, her husband and daughter refuse to eat much of this food and like Mr. Patton’s meat, much of this food inevitably goes to waste. In practicing the religion of mindless consumerism, Mrs. Patton, with her Shop Till You Drop T-shirt, attempts to achieve authentic connection—“the bond between man and woman, between woman and child, brought ideal consummation—but her attempts to buy happiness, as if it could be found next to the chewing gum in the checkout aisle, only lead to hordes of meaningless junk. Food that is “clean, bright, gleaming, without taste, savor or nourishment” (185). Thus, the weight of every stockpiled shopping cart only reveals the meaninglessness of her daily consumerist rituals.
While ceremony in the Patton family reveals a fundamental paradox—an over-abundant food supply coupled with spiritual starvation—ceremony within Mama and Papa’s family attempts to drown social injustice and silence protest through ritual. This ceremonial function is perhaps most glaring during the riverboat funeral for Anamika at the end of Part I. The family members gather on the boat and lower the jar of Anamika’s ashes into the Ganges River in a ritual intended to symbolically unify life, death and rebirth by rejoining worldly remains with the eternal stream and cosmic current. Though beautiful in its symbolism, the Ganges River funeral ceremony literally buries Anamika’s ashes and figuratively swallows her tragic death in its current. This irony creates a problematic tension between Uma and the rest of her family, a disturbing union between the holy and the unholy. Gathering at the riverbank in the final stage of the ceremony, the worshippers dip their jars of water in the river and then empty them over their heads as the priest intones the final prayers. Onto this backdrop of sacred worship, Uma raises her jar and empties out water which “catches the blaze of the sun and flashes fire” (156). This unified image of fire and water re-enacts Anamika’s tragic murder by liquid kerosene and open flame. It is both the fulfillment of a beautiful sacred ceremony and a horrifying and ugly allusion to an inter-familial and cultural crime perpetrated against a lovely, talented and innocent woman: Anamika.
Mira-Masi’s Lord Shiva Idol
The Lord Shiva idol represents the ultimate goal of Mira-masi’s quest for spiritual fulfillment. Mira-masi is the novel’s purest example of self-determination and uncompromising values. When she loses her original Lord Shiva idol, the worldly symbol of her sacred piety, she determines to reclaim him: “I will find him. You wait and see. I will not stop travelling, from one city to another from temple to temple, ashram to ashram, till I find him” (139). Though she does not find the original lost idol, she does discover a new version, and in claiming it, realizes her spiritual goal.
Uma’s Poetry Book
Uma wins a volume of Ella Wheeler Wilcox poems at the Christmas bazaar, on one of the happiest days of her life. This book becomes a periodic, temporary form of escape from the routine drudgery of her home life. In poems loaded with rich imagery—“rosebuds…sky, and sea” and visions of flight and freedom, “wild waltzes” and “bassoons” attuned to the passionate celebration of life—Uma finds temporary joy (135).
Melanie’s Bulimia
Melanie’s bulimia, a self-inflicted pattern of sickness, is the ultimate consequence of a life full of weight but devoid of substance. Spending her days ceaselessly munching on peanuts and chocolate bars—the junk food that she substitutes for her mom’s food—is the visible and disturbing culmination of pain and suffering caused by parental neglect. Refusing to eat her mother’s scrambled eggs, Melanie’s pain comes to the surface at the breakfast table: “what do you think we all are—garbage bags you keep stuffing and stuffing…I’m not going to eat any of that poison” (207). Ironically, Melanie’s response to her mother’s inattention and vapid consumerism is to stuff her own body like a figurative garbage bag with literal junk food in a dangerous cycle that screams of desperation and a need for real parental attention and intervention.
Anamika’s Scholarship Letter
Anamika’s letter from Oxford is the pinnacle achievement of her family. Anamika is the most beautiful, smart, graceful and admired woman in her family. Her accomplishments in school are outstanding enough to earn her a scholarship to one of the world’s greatest universities. Tragically, Anamika’s parents do not allow her to attend Oxford, and they lock her scholarship letter away in “a steel cupboard” (69). Instead of using the scholarship to advance their daughter’s education, they use it to advance her marriage prospects. As a result, she marries a wealthy and equally educated husband; however, his accomplishment masks his arrogance and cruelty. This cruelty culminates in a tragic murder and cover-up perpetrated by her husband and mother-in-law. It is only after this death that Uma reminds Anamika’s mother, Lila Aunty of the nearly forgotten letter: “The letter from Oxford—where is it? Did you burn it” (152)? Mama quickly shames Uma’s speech into silence, but the question of Anamika’s unfulfilled potential, symbolized by the Oxford letter, lingers on in tragic fashion.
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