Anita Desai and her novels have been an enigma for decades. The topic “ICONS OF WOMEN IN ANITA DESAI’S SELECTED NOVEL – “Cry , the Peacock” deals with the inner conflict of the women characters. Through out her novel, Desai focuses on the personal- struggles of Anglicized, middle-class women in contemporary India as they attempt to overcome the societal limitations imposed by a tradition – bound patriarchal culture. The philosophical mood, the realization of a grand design, the presence of unsaid, un-articulated realities – all these have forever teased the mind of the discerning reader. As we read her novels, the thrust has been more on psychological and intellectual facts of her fiction, rather than social, cultural or physical areas.