Dec 06, 2009 10:31 AM
8552 Views
We are in the age of globalization, most people think that having dual identities( passport, fluency in 2 languages or more) is an asset, and many of Bollywood films suggest that living in USA, UK or Australia is real fun.
"Here" and "There" can be explained a lot easier than "We" and "They" because many people cannot belong to both side comfortably. I would say that identity can be transplanted elsewhere, but just like a tree, it also depend on the quality of foreign soil.
Basicly, we could get some prediction that most people migrate to USA for a better opportunity! As I have said mentioned in other reviews on Lahiri, these people are somewhat professional and there are too many books about this group of people. The thing is these people have high expectation on things including the maintenance of their identity.
Just like the author herself, perhaps more than 3 cultures that almost every single main character in "interpreter of maladies" has to encounter( on top of that, they seek approval from all sides). I do have the same feeling with the other short stories book named "Unaccustomed earth" which its setting has gone beyond America and India.
The assumption of the disappearance of time and space couldn't change much of the deepest side of the human's mind shaped from constructed values of ethics, nation, race, gender or religion that most people can't and might not be willing to question them.
Depressively portrayed, the book upset a lot of people. If you google the book's review. But again, those who think of this book negatively do not care much or do not care at all about the issue relationship, they just need to have so much fun like most mass media audience.
With its simplicity, not only providing ultimate pleasure of reading to the non-anglophone people, this book reveals parts of unspeakable secret like of the feeling of the loss of newly born infant, the crisis of Bengaliness drawn by different religion, a confession about a child born from extramarital affair etc.
In short, no matter what people said badly about this book due to their own limited perception, I would say this is most of beautiful tragic short stories in South Asian American categories.
