The Past

The author uses the structure and form of Such Big Dreams in order to establish and enact her thematic explorations concerning the past. In the novel’s narrative present, Rakhi is living in Bombay’s Behrampada slum and working at Justice For All. Despite the nominal stability of her life, Rakhi remains haunted by yet unresolved traumas from her past. In the novel’s earliest chapters, Rakhi attempts to hide from this past by ignoring it and refusing to talk about it. However, as the novel progresses, more and more of Rakhi’s memories begin to make their way onto the page. These memories appear in the forms of flashbacks, which the author intersperses with the surrounding numerical chapters. Written in the past tense, the flashback that appears between Chapters 8 and 9 presents Rakhi’s memories of former conversations with Guari Ma’am. Shortly after bringing...