Book of the week - Namesake

That's the thing about books. They let you travel without moving your feet

“They were things for which it was impossible to prepare but which one spent a lifetime looking back at, trying to accept, interpret, comprehend. Things that should never have happened, that seemed out of place and wrong, these were what prevailed, what endured, in the end.”
― Jhumpa Lahiri, The Namesake

The Namesake published in 2003 is a debut novel by American author Jhumpa Lahiri. It was originally published in The New Yorker and was later expanded to a full-length novel.

We’ve chosen Namesake for father’s week! let’s hop in…

The book explores many of the same emotional and cultural themes as Lahiri's Pulitzer Prize-winning short story collection Interpreter of Maladies. The events in the novel take place between Calcutta, Boston, and New York City, involving the nuances involved in being caught with two conflicting cultures — distinct religious, social, and ideological differences.

In fact, themes like immigrant experience, the clash of cultures, the conflicts of assimilation, and, most poignantly, the tangled ties between generations; enriched by Lahiri made her collection an international bestseller.

Lahiri brings great empathy to Gogol (spoiler) as he stumbles along the first-generation path, strewn with conflicting loyalties, comic detours, and wrenching love affairs. With penetrating insight, she reveals not only the defining power of the names and expectations bestowed upon us by our parents but also the means by which we slowly, sometimes painfully, come to define ourselves

Ending with a quote from this beautiful novel —

“You are still young, free.. Do yourself a favor. Before it's too late, without thinking too much about it first, pack a pillow and a blanket and see as much of the world as you can. You will not regret it. One day it will be too late.”
― Jhumpa Lahiri, The Namesake