Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

Interpreter of Maladies (Highbridge Distribution)

by Jhumpa Lahiri

Scintillating studies in yearning and exile from a Bengali Bostonian woman writer of immense promise. A couple exchange unprecedented confessions during nightly blackouts in their Boston apartment as they struggle to cope with a heartbreaking loss; a student arrives in new lodgings in a mystifying new land and, while he awaits the arrival of his arranged-marriage wife from Bengal, he finds his first bearings with the aid of the curious evening rituals that his centenarian landlady orchestrates; a schoolboy looks on while his childminder finds that the smallest dislocation can unbalance her new American life all too easily and send her spiralling into nostalgia for her homeland...Jhumpa Lahiri's prose is beautifully measured, subtle and sober, and she is a writer who leaves a lot unsaid, but this work is rich in observational detail, evocative of the yearnings of the exile (mostly Indians in Boston here), and full of emotional pull and reverberation.

Reviewed by lovelybookshelf on

5 of 5 stars

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Originally posted on my blog, A Lovely Bookshelf on the Wall:

I love fiction that teaches me something, and Interpreter of Maladies showed me just how little I know about India. Through Jhumpa Lahiri's characters I learned about the Partition of India, arranged marriages and matchmakers, that the old caste system lingers on in society, that Hindu families have rice ceremonies for their babies, and so on. I was constantly pausing to Google something, to find out more.

These short stories exude the richness of a variety of cultures and customs native to India, but also portray how quickly those traditions can change after emigration. The parents in the title story are second-generation immigrants, but seem as far removed from their parents' culture as one could possibly get.

Lahiri has given us nine stylistically similar stories, written with lovely prose, which are representative of the diverse experiences among Indians and Indian Americans.

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  • Started reading
  • 21 December, 2013: Finished reading
  • 21 December, 2013: Reviewed