Laila Lalami was supposed to visit our university in March; of course, the event was cancelled, as most things have been since that time. But in preparation, I read two of her novels. 

 

The first, "The Moor's Account" is a tour-de-force historical epic framed from the point-of-view of the slave, who gets just a line in the official sixteenth century account. I was blown away.

 

The second, "The Other Americans," is a contemporary family story. With blurbs from J.M. Coetzee and Viet Thanh Nguyen, Lalami needs no additional praise from me.

 

But let me do this: I will draw you a Venn Diagram of the mind. In the intersection of a book like Tommy Orange's "There, There," in which each chapter switches to a different character's point-of-view to tell a part of the story, and a book like Jhumpa Lahiri's "The Namesake," which tells the story of an immigrant family's experiences building a life in the United States of our time, lives "The Other Americans." 

 

Of course, "The Other Americans" is its own story. And "There, There" and "The Namesake" are just two examples of many that could work in this model. But they are the ones that came to mind. It's a fun exercise. 

 

In the end, I recommend both of these Lalami books unreservedly. Try them. Expand your circles. 

 

-cg

This is a great story. It provides a compelling answer to the 400 year old question, "What's in a Name?"

I had initially struggled with whether to make this a 3 or 4 star read but I realized that for as much as my own experience made the story not new for me, sitting down to write the review and seeing the tangles with my experience made me reflect on my life in a way that no other book had asked me to do, thus revealing the right choice. It is definitely worth all four stars.

While I do identify with many aspects of the story and Gogol's struggle with his name, I hesitate to think I have some sort of rare connection with it. Yes, this is an immigration story, but in the US, so many of us having immigration in our not-too-distant past. Gogol is not the one to emigrate to the US, he is a part of the acclimation process and it takes much longer for a family to acclimate than people who have "always" been here realize. I think there are plenty of Americans, even white Americans, who have immigration stories in their histories that are close enough to recall, close enough to be little bits of family lore, close enough to identify with parts of Gogol's struggle.

For me, this story didn't hit me right away when I was listening to it. It hit me with all the questions afterward. It made me think about the path I had to take to recognizing my own name as something that actually identifies me, to recognizing the way it represents a compromise between the cultures and histories of my parents as had the process of naming my son. It made me think of those bits of family lore that are part of the immigration stories in my family, the things the family had let go of in order to acclimate and the things they could assimilate and the things that would always keep us at least a little different. Though the story is very much about the Ganguli's, the writing is done in such a way that it also made me feel like the story really brings the reader into their world.

It's about understanding each other and going out on a limb for each other and getting passed our own perspectives to see how the places we are change us and what we expect for ourselves and each other. Each member of the family is fully formed and have their own ideas about their places in the world, what they are and what they should be. Each member sees the others a little differently. Sometimes it feels like no one family member understands any of the others and that is a part of the magic of the story. You feel for all of them, for all of their misunderstandings, for all of their missed chances and all of their triumphs. With that, it makes you not only contemplate what is in a given name, but what is in a family name. What did it mean to be Ganguli? What does it mean to be a member of any family?

I love that the book leaves the reader with personal questions. I love that the story shows the reader so much about what it really means to start a new life in a new country and for your children to not understand anything about you. I love that the story shows the reader so much about what it is like to be a kid with parents who are different from all the other parents, with customs that no one else has to abide by, with expectations that are different put upon them.

I listened to the audiobook, read by Sarita Choudhury. I love her voice and her reading style. This is the second audio of hers that I've listened to, the first being The God of Small Things last month.

 

The Clothing of Books by Jhumpa Lahiri is a very slim volume that repeats a philosophical statement several times - a book is not its cover, and a cover is not the book. Unfortunately, the book stops at that statement and does not go beyond to discuss the reasons, decisions, and conversations behind cover design. As such, this “book” is all philosophy and no fact; it would be better suited to a personal essay format.

 

Read my complete review at Memories From Books - The Clothing of Books.

 

Reviewed based on a publisher’s galley received through NetGalley.

 

As a professional who writes in a different language than his mother tongue, Lahiri's short book 'In Other Words' seemed to spoke to me directly. I, too, am anxious about making grammar errors(that translated in my language seemed correct) and about using 'textbook' language instead of more ordinary words. This is my first JL book, so I hope her novels are just as great.

In Other Words - Jhumpa Lahiri Me and Italian language go way back. In fact, ours has become a long-lasting relationship even though I have often neglected him along the way – English has always been of greater use, and then I met German who I had to get close to. Not to forget Bulgarian who was there from the start.

I have love stories with all of the above mentioned languages. And these are some colourful and passionate stories. I could sit down and put them to paper.

But I am not called Jhumpa Lahiri.
Nobody would care. My stories are unique to me and Lahiri’s story is unique to her, but I feel like she is a bit behind on things. People all over the world, mostly those whose mother tongue is not English, have been learning and connecting with languages for a long time. I am sure most of us can relate to her story, but I don’t see the point of it being published. For someone who writes about love for language, the language she uses is repetitive and clichéd. It is self-indulgent and vain. In the end, it is simply pointless.
It was a smart move on the author’s part to choose to write this in Italian – a language that, unlike English, allows you to talk about yourself without overusing the omnipresent ‘I’ word. Still, this book is ultimately all about the ‘I’ and not about the language.

In Other Words will probably be a good read for anyone interested in Jhumpa Lahiri.
For anyone interested in a non-fictional account of the magic of language, someone like Wittgenstein is the author to go to.