A reader’s information for “The Covenant of Water,” Oprah’s guide membership decide

Oprah Winfrey has chosen “The Covenant of Water,” written by acclaimed creator Abraham Verghese, as her latest guide membership decide. 

To delve deeper into the themes and intricacies of the novel, readers can discover the next studying group information crafted by Jennifer Baker. The information additionally gives options for additional studying.

Studying Group Information by Jennifer Baker

1. The Covenant of Water begins in South India on the flip of the 20 th century on the eve of an organized marriage. Initially, the younger bride and her a lot older husband are anonymous, whereas these round them are named. What impact does this create in your introduction to the principle characters and the way they evolve over time? When the bride is bequeathed the title “Large Ammachi” (p. 64) by her stepson, how does she develop into her title?

2. Large Ammachi finds out about “the Situation” that runs by way of her new household by way of dramatic tragedy, regardless that her husband and JoJo’s aversion to water was evident early on. What influence do the circumstances of “the Situation” have on the selections every technology makes for his or her future?

3. In what methods does the novel represent an “epic”? What different genres do you determine within the novel?

4. For Digby and Philipose, expectations are handed all the way down to them from their moms. Digby’s mom tells him, “It is solely you bein’ high o’ the category that will get me by way of this hell. I dream o’ yer success” (p. 87), whereas Large Ammachi thinks of her son, “How great if his cussed dedication become a quest to treatment the Situation!” (p. 229). How are Digby and Philipose regularly suffering from alternate paths, even after discovering their obvious callings? Do these males come to phrases with their choices?

5. Professions come to outline lots of the characters in The Covenant of Water: there are medical doctors, writers, home employees, and different laborers inside these pages. How do the attributes of those characters replicate their work, in addition to come to outline their passions and personalities? Who’s allowed to decide on a occupation freely within the novel, and whose futures are foretold from their start?

6. In what methods do diagnoses change the trajectory of the lives of the characters? Do some characters expertise a concern of being ostracized, both for themselves or for these they care about? How do characters view these labeled or seen as “troubled” all through the novel? Do these labels seem to inhibit characters, or permit them a distinct form of freedom from neighborhood requirements?

7. Talk about the wedding of Elsie and Philipose. What traits of every character might have contributed to the rifts of their relationship? How did the couple and people round them try to fix the wedding?

8. Contemplate how geography impacts future for these characters. From Parambil to Madras to Scotland, Verghese’s characters usually discover or search refuge away from their unique shores. In what methods is a way of residence and belonging threaded all through the novel, and the way do characters like Large Ammachi, Digby, Elsie, and Mariamma connect with or disconnect from the locations the place they had been born and the houses the place they finally settle?

9. How does grief manifest for Digby through the years as he witnesses the decline of the ladies he loves? How does this evaluate to durations of grief for different characters?

10. Each Elsie and her daughter Mariamma face discrimination of their skilled pursuits. How do these girls push again towards the misogynistic cultures they face? In what methods had they been assured that they deserved to pursue careers as an artist and a physician, respectively?

11. A hospital within the Parambil neighborhood is an ever-present want, particularly as preventable losses recur all through the generations. What impediments—monetary, social, bureaucratic—prevented the hospital from being constructed? Does the eventual building of the hospital appear to be a part of the future of the household at Parambil?

12. All through The Covenant of Water, varied characters act as caretakers and display therapeutic talents. In what methods does therapeutic intertwine with the follow of drugs for the salvation of characters?

13. Spanning about eighty years, The Covenant of Water depicts a number of political and environmental occasions that influence the characters in several methods. How do the politics of the world round them result in the diverging philosophies of Mariamma and Lenin Evermore relating to how you can assist their folks and nation at massive? Which environmental occasions do you assume had deep repercussions for different members of Mariamma and Lenin’s households through the years?

14. How does Verghese illustrate the adjustments and consistency of segregation and the caste system in India over the a long time? Did you discover parallels between the remedy of lepers by outsiders of St. Bridget’s and the caste divides of the characters within the areas they reside all through South India? How are the tensions of caste and sophistication resolved, if in any respect?

15. How does the establishment of marriage evolve over the course of the a long time within the novel? How do the relationships and marriages on the finish of the novel evaluate and distinction to that of Large Ammachi and her husband?

Options for additional studying:

The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers

A Burning by Megha Majumdar

The Night time Watchman by Louise Erdrich

Homeland Elegies by Ayad Akhtar

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

How Lovely We Had been by Imbolo Mbue

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi 

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee 

The God of Small Issues by Arundhati Roy

A Home for Mr. Biswas by V. S. Naipaul