You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
anjali_wen 's review for:
The Namesake
by Jhumpa Lahiri
It is impossible for both immigrants and their children to avoid the experience of alienation. Immigrants are alienated among the culture, the customs, maybe even the language of their new home. Simultaneously, a chasm opens up between them and their country of origin; relating to childhood friends and family becomes difficult in light of their new lives and experiences. For children, there’s a persistent disconnect between them and their background, their heritage. How are you meant to honor your origins when you’re born and raised in a country on the other side of the planet? For both parent and child, alienation from one another is maybe the most acute, painful, unrectifiable.
My father recently expressed to me that he was surprised how distinctly un-Indian I turned out to be, despite looking the part. For my part, I was bewildered that he’d expected anything else. He had, after all, chosen to move to North America and begin his family on a continent far from where he had grown up.
In ‘the Namesake’, Jhumpa Lahiri perfectly encapsulates the particular and nuanced experiences of first generation Americans, especially those hailing from Asian families. If I were to expand on every part of the novel that evoked my own life, this review would be nearly as long as the book itself. Here are a few points:
- The contrast between American frigidity + individualism vs Asian warmth + communalism
- The fear and guilt of capitulating too much to either culture, American or Asian
- The additional guilt of finding refuge in your friends’ and partners’ white families, white customs
- The occasional disdain for one’s own heritage, coupled with fierce defensiveness as well
- Growing up within a patchwork community that acts as a lighthouse against broader society
- And of course, the modifications impressed upon your name, wether they result from your choice, or the inability of those around you to pronounce it
I’m filled with much gratitude to Lahiri for this titan of a novel, that puts ink to so much that I’ve been feeling for so much of my life.
My father recently expressed to me that he was surprised how distinctly un-Indian I turned out to be, despite looking the part. For my part, I was bewildered that he’d expected anything else. He had, after all, chosen to move to North America and begin his family on a continent far from where he had grown up.
In ‘the Namesake’, Jhumpa Lahiri perfectly encapsulates the particular and nuanced experiences of first generation Americans, especially those hailing from Asian families. If I were to expand on every part of the novel that evoked my own life, this review would be nearly as long as the book itself. Here are a few points:
- The contrast between American frigidity + individualism vs Asian warmth + communalism
- The fear and guilt of capitulating too much to either culture, American or Asian
- The additional guilt of finding refuge in your friends’ and partners’ white families, white customs
- The occasional disdain for one’s own heritage, coupled with fierce defensiveness as well
- Growing up within a patchwork community that acts as a lighthouse against broader society
- And of course, the modifications impressed upon your name, wether they result from your choice, or the inability of those around you to pronounce it
I’m filled with much gratitude to Lahiri for this titan of a novel, that puts ink to so much that I’ve been feeling for so much of my life.