“The power of a man is like a bull’s charge, while the power of a woman moves aslant, like a serpent seeking its prey. Know the particular properties of your power. Unless you use it correctly, it won’t get you what you want.” His words perplexed me. Wasn’t power singular and simple? In the world that I knew, men just happened to have more of it. (I hoped to change this.)”

Indian-born American author and poet

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is an Indian-born American author and poet, and the Betty and Gene McDavid Professor of Writing at the University of Houston Creative Writing Program. Her work has reached readers across fiction and poetry, and 107 quotes from her appear on this site. She is best known for Arranged Marriage, her short story collection, which won an American Book Award in 1996. Two of her novels and one short story were adapted into films, extending her reach beyond the page into cinema.