Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies

I found Jhumpa Lahiri's "Interpreter of Maladies" to be a subtle yet layered and detailed collection of short stories. Lahiri's extensive attention to the idiosyncrasies of her characters gives the stories an intimate and personal feel. The juxtaposition between Indian/Pakastani and American culture is the central theme of the work, and the way Lahiri depicts it through the eyes of several different types of characters helped my understanding of and identification with the work. I particularly liked her usage of understatement and subtle repitition to distinguish her characters and help to illuminate their emotions and motivations.

The story "Interpreter of Maladies" was one which i felt was very representative of the collection as a whole. The way in which Mrs. Das view Mr. Kapasi as an Indian elder figure, while he views her as a young American object of a sort of lust, exemplifies the "clash" between the two cultures which Lahiri herself seems to be a product of and which the work's characters deal with constantly. I liked the way that the entire family seemed detached from their experience, and even the parents act like older siblings, begrudging and unwilling to assume responsibility for their own children. Another strong suit of the stories was the way that Lahiri left many of them unresolved, perhaps to a stopping point, but never brings her works to fruition. This gives the collection a very open-ended sense about it, and speaks to the vulnerability and sense of loss which many of her characters experience.

Overall, i very much enjoyed Lahiri's work. I thought that a few of the plotlines grew tired, and some pof the characters ran together, but the work accomplished just what it seemed to set out to accomplish. It is an intriguing summary of the foreign experience.

Lahiri

I really enjoyed reading the Interpreter of Maladies. Although the themes were complex they were easily identified which made the book that much better.

In particular I noticed that most of Lahiri’s stories in some way had to do with marriage, and loveless marriages at that. This really hit home while I was reading the story titled “The Intepreter of Maladies.” Although I was looking for some sort of significance, I really think that when Mr. Kapasi said “The Chandrabhaga River once flowed one mile north of here. It is dry now,” was a symbolism for the love in a marriage drying up. In addition to loveless marriage I think the more general theme we could take with us is that all humans, whether Indian, American, or any race, need compassion and reassure of their existence through a partner or even just any other human. The compassion in the last story the main character had toward Mrs. Croft really emphasized that. I was curious as to whether the irregular age of Mrs. Croft was emphasized for a purpose or just mere detai?

Another thing I noticed in most of the stories was the element of food and the roled it played for that family. Most of the families in the stories could not completely let go of the culture of their past even though they were in America. I found that more than anything they clung to food as a comfort. For example, the egg curry in the last story and the seafood in Mrs. Sen’s story were often repeated over and over to emphasize the longing they still had for their life in India and the hard time they had adapting.

These short stories were comparable to Drown in the sense that they also touched on the American dreams. In Mrs. Sen’s Lahiri wrote, “Send me pictures they write.’ ‘Send pictures of your new life.’ What picture can I send?” She sat exhausted on the edge of the bed where there was now barely any room for her. “They think I live the life of a queen.” She looked around the blank walls of the room. “They think I press a button and the house is clean. They think I live in a palace." Although in some stories they came to America and made a great life for themselves, in at least two of the stories the characters actually claimed life in India was better. Most of the characters seemed to endure hardships and troubles no matter where they were .

For me this was definitely the best book we've read so far.

Drown

I really enjoyed Drown by Junot Diaz. It was a really fast and interesting read. I feel that he gives a personal in-depth view into the lives of some immigrants struggling in the United States. He shows that the "American dream" isn't always as it seems and that sometimes the United States is not so different that where you're original country. Due to a mixture of time and placement with the chapters, the reader feels disoriented with the start of each one. I couldn't always distinguish where each chapter was taking place. I think that Diaz did this to achieve that reader to see the similarities between two completely different countries. Life for Yunior wasn't that much better in the United States and sometimes it was worse. This is one reason I thought of for the disorganization of the chapters. Did anyone else have any other ideas as to why Diaz mixed up the chapters like that?

We talked about this in class today some- about why Diaz chose to end the book with his father's chapter instead of the chapter about Ysrael. Diaz didn't want us to have a positive and happy feeling when we finished reading the novel. I feel that he did this because he wanted to leave us thinking about the book instead of peacefully shutting it and continuing on with our lives. He wanted us to contempate the depth that people have and that you cannot take anything for face value. The American dream is also taken at face value throughout the novel. Many think that it will just come to them when they get here but it is not so easy to achieve as Diaz displays throughout the novel. Yunior and his family struggle during their time here in the United States and he even begins to sell drugs to support himself and his family. Yes, there are other ways to go about it, but his family clearly doesn't have a glamorous life here in the United States, as many seem to believe that they will have. Maybe someone else has some ideas about Diaz's perspective on the American dream as portrayed throughout this novel.

Diaz's Story

I couldn't help but feel that Drown was related to some of the experiences that Diaz himself has either seen or actually experienced. So I googled Diaz and found that he grew up in Dominican Republic and was raised by his mother and grandparents while his father worked in the US. His father abandoned the family in 1979 and his oldest brother was diagnosed with leukima. Diaz immigrated to New Jersey in 1974 but unlike the characters described in his book he did find "the American Dream" and overcame his poverty. I believe that Diaz's purpose for writing the series of short stories is to show Americans what it really means to be an immigrant and the problems that these immigrants become engulfed in.

I found Drown to be a very interesting book and at times enjoyed having to put things together that Diaz did not do for you. I wonder what the short stories would be like if this was made into one book. Would some of these even be considered for chapters in a novel? I think everyone's biggest gripe is the ambivilence and the incontiguity of the short stories but I think thats what made the book such a good read. And after reading Diaz's biography I thought it was interesting that the spanish translation of Drown was called Negocios. Do you all have any insight as to why that would be?

Drown – Junot Diaz

Drown, in my opinion, was a fascinating read. Overall, the stories are very dispassionate and irregular, as many questions go unanswered, or are left for the reader to figure out. For example, Yunior’s poverty is something to feel sympathetic about, but it is left to the readers to feel this, rather than the book illustrating it. Yunior reflects, “We were poor. The only way we could have been poorer was to have lived in the campo or to have been Haitian immigrants”. Such lines, added to the long hours that his mother had to work at the chocolate factory, as the father had left them when he was four, is supposed to bring some sympathy towards the character. Instead, it is told in such dispassionate manners, that the reader has to figure these things out.

Other irregularity in the book include questions such as, are the chapters actually related to each other, or are they completely irrelevant and independent stories? Is there any particular motive behind not mentioning Rafa (Yunior’s brother) again in the book? Is Ysrael the actual protagonist in the story?

Whether living in Dominican Republic, or in the US, the book is revolved around extreme poverty, and characters who deal with such things, amongst several emotional sufferings. Even though these sufferings, the only character who comes out as positive is Ysrael, which seems remarkable. His life includes having a face (or no face) that was eaten by a pig, and having to endure constant abuse from other children. He has workout every day, so as to keep fit when running away from other abusers. He tries to pick up coins (when drunken people spill them) through “vomit and piss”. Despite these sufferings, he seems like the most positive character in the book. This seems surprising, but I believe Diaz is portraying that this is the only character who is “afloat”. The mother for example, is in the US, works as a house cleaner, but has been completely shocked at coming to the US, and remains mostly quiet. “She's so quiet that most of the time I'm startled to find her in the apartment. . . . She has discovered the secret to silence, pouring cafe without a splash, walking between rooms as if gliding on a cushion of felt, crying without a sound.” In comparison to Ysrael, the mother is slowly drowning in her own grief, much like the rest of the book’s characters.

Overall, I felt the book was excellent, especially given the detailed description of all its multiple dimensions, including poverty, torn-apart families and individuals, small humor (How to date a...), Dominican American street culture, and much more.

Good morning, everyone, and happy inauguration day. Regardless of anyone's personal political leanings, this day is an historic one (we've had a lot of those lately) and will be remembered. And now: snow! I hope you're all somewhere snug and warm for the morning, although I know at least some of you are standing outside in 25-degree weather in DC. 

So, what to say about Kazuo Ishiguro's novel, "Never Let Me Go"? Well, first I'd like to say that this discussion is open to anything--questions, your own conversation starters, etc. You can provide comments in the form of your own posts or in comments on this posting. 

I guess I'd like to start with your responses to Ishiguro's narrator, Kathy. How did you feel about her voice? What is Ishiguro trying to do with Kathy's voice and characterization, and what effects does he accomplish? Can you give us any examples of what you mean? 

I'd also like to think through the body-mind expression of this novel. What place is there for bodies here, for the human body, its wants and needs, its expressions? What kind of a relationship does Kath have to her body and her friends' bodies, and how were these relationships formed? What about physical appearance? What do we know about the appearances of our main characters and of their physical surroundings? Why do you think Ishiguro chose to present things in this way?

OK, that's enough to start with; but I invite you to bring up any questions or thoughts you might have as well. I'd love to hear what you have to say about the issues I mentioned, but we can follow these threads of conversation and your own interests and see what comes up!

Stay safe, everyone. Although the university is technically open, some of the roads are pretty rough and so if you are off campus, exercise extreme caution in coming in! 

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