The Namesake: It talks about unexpected lessons of life.
Three Cups of Tea: It inspired me with the story of one person truly changing the world.
Old School: It was thought provoking.
Pride & Prejudice: It was interesting and such a good read that I read it twice to make sure I took it all in.
Mrs. Mike: This classic love story made my heart smile.
Gone with the Wind: It was long but historically accurate and interesting.
Sweet Thursday: It made me wonder what was going on in the characters’ lives that was not written.
Scarlett: It gave Gone with the Wind a happy ending.
Killer Angels: I unexpectedly enjoyed reading this.
Twilight: It was cute in the most unrealistic aspect.
Dance Hall of the Dead: It was quite the mystery.
To Kill a Mockingbird: It’s a classic.
The Outsiders: It’s one of the books that I read a long time ago that I still remember and enjoy.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Change, Discovery, and Remembering: A Circle of Life
The beginning and the ending of The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri come full circle; the novel begins with a baby being born, his parents finally giving him the name Gogol, after the Russian author because of the book that saved his father’s life, when the baby’s great-grandmother’s letter fails to arrive; the novel ends with Gogol/Nikhil finally picking up the book his late father gave to him, written by Nikolai Gogol. All before the age of thirty-three, Gogol changes identities, has various lovers, pushes away his family, lives his life without his father, and gets married and divorced; and yet, this novel is not merely an abstract of a man’s life: the narrator portrays one tumultuous life surrounded by one goal: one man’s search for his true identity.
What makes this novel so interesting is that the protagonist lives two separate lives: one where he is known as Gogol and one where he is known as Nikhil, but they intertwine at significant parts of the novel. His life as Gogol mostly revolves around his family, as his parents’ original intent for the name is only as a nickname, a name for him to be called only at home. When Gogol makes the decision to change his name to his parents’ original choice of a formal name, Nikhil, Gogol feels the need to push his family away, spending more and more time with his girlfriend, Maxine, and her parents. He accustoms himself to their family’s way of life, endeavoring to break away from the world that knew him as Gogol. He attempts to recreate himself as a different person, with different habits and routines he wished his parents could follow, “[a]nd yet it had not been possible to reinvent himself fully, to break from that mismatched name” (Lahiri 287). I thought that the limitless boundaries Gogol surrounded himself with when known as Nikhil presented more selfishness than self-identity, especially when he fails to take care of his family. He merely caters to his own need of getting away from his previous life, even refusing to pick up the phone, until he figures out that something is wrong. When he discovers that his father had passed away, Nikhil briefly returns to his life as Gogol, not wanting to part with his father and the significance attached to his previous name. So, does it take one life-changing tragedy for Nikhil to realize his identity as Gogol? Or, perhaps, he knew it all along and this tragedy was the one final push for him to admit his true identity as Gogol? Or was it merely just one event in a basket of events that made him Gogol? But, his name is still Nikhil.
When Nikhil finally meets Moushumi, this novel takes another turn. There is something different between Moushumi and Nikhil’s previous lovers: she knew him as a child. Moushumi is the link between his life as Gogol and his life as Nikhil. While I was reading about their relationship, I found that the comfort they give each other is their source of love: the easy conversations about how they grew up as “cousins” and how they had never really spoken until their mothers urged them to meet presented a different type of understanding and closeness. The intimacy Nikhil feels when he is with Moushumi shows me that because Moushumi is from his life as Gogol, the life his father was a part of, Nikhil feels a connection with Moushumi because of the consolation attached; Nikhil sees her as a source of comfort, a reminder of Gogol. Does this mean that Nikhil/Gogol has figured out his true identity?
This quote Gogol’s father had told him while they were at Cape Cod in the breakwater reminded me of the end of the novel when Nikhil finally begins to read the copy of Nikolai Gogol that his father had given him: “Remember that you and I made this journey, that we went together to a place where there was nowhere left to go” (Lahiri 187). Nikhil has no other place to go after his father arbitrarily dies: he went from Gogol to Nikhil and then felt more familiar with his identity as Gogol. Yet, after his marriage slowly deteriorates, after both his life as Gogol and as Nikhil do not go the way he thinks they should have, he cannot move forward; rather, he moves backward; he retraces his steps back to the beginning of his life, back to his namesake. I wondered whether or not Nikhil regretted his change of identity after his father died; I gathered that at first he did because he felt a greater connection with Gogol than Nikhil, yet his change of identity to Nikhil was the one thing that actually brought him closer to his identity as Gogol. Without changing to Nikhil, it is doubtful that he would have opened that book at all. It seems implausible that Gogol would fully appreciate the gift of the namesake that his father has given him.
Again, the narrator sums up the meaning of the events as a whole when stating, “They [the events in his life] 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” (Lahiri 287). These events made Gogol open that book and begin reading. They brought him back to the beginning of the novel, back to the significance of his namesake, showing that life sometimes refuses to cooperate in the way that you want it to, but every event has an impact and will change the way you perceive the world. Gogol made decisions that seemed important to him, but not life-altering, such as changing his name, but this changed his life. It impacted him in a way that he had not intended; it was only after all these events that made him the slight bit curious about what was inside that book written by Nikolai Gogol.
I enjoyed reading this novel because of the unexpected twists and turns Gogol/Nikhil faced every step of the way until he opened that book. Many things were unpredictable and heartbreaking, but the author reminds us all about how life brings us unexpected things that may lead to the one discovery we have been waiting to find. (1070)
The novels I read this summer:
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin
Old School by Tobias Wolff
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
What makes this novel so interesting is that the protagonist lives two separate lives: one where he is known as Gogol and one where he is known as Nikhil, but they intertwine at significant parts of the novel. His life as Gogol mostly revolves around his family, as his parents’ original intent for the name is only as a nickname, a name for him to be called only at home. When Gogol makes the decision to change his name to his parents’ original choice of a formal name, Nikhil, Gogol feels the need to push his family away, spending more and more time with his girlfriend, Maxine, and her parents. He accustoms himself to their family’s way of life, endeavoring to break away from the world that knew him as Gogol. He attempts to recreate himself as a different person, with different habits and routines he wished his parents could follow, “[a]nd yet it had not been possible to reinvent himself fully, to break from that mismatched name” (Lahiri 287). I thought that the limitless boundaries Gogol surrounded himself with when known as Nikhil presented more selfishness than self-identity, especially when he fails to take care of his family. He merely caters to his own need of getting away from his previous life, even refusing to pick up the phone, until he figures out that something is wrong. When he discovers that his father had passed away, Nikhil briefly returns to his life as Gogol, not wanting to part with his father and the significance attached to his previous name. So, does it take one life-changing tragedy for Nikhil to realize his identity as Gogol? Or, perhaps, he knew it all along and this tragedy was the one final push for him to admit his true identity as Gogol? Or was it merely just one event in a basket of events that made him Gogol? But, his name is still Nikhil.
When Nikhil finally meets Moushumi, this novel takes another turn. There is something different between Moushumi and Nikhil’s previous lovers: she knew him as a child. Moushumi is the link between his life as Gogol and his life as Nikhil. While I was reading about their relationship, I found that the comfort they give each other is their source of love: the easy conversations about how they grew up as “cousins” and how they had never really spoken until their mothers urged them to meet presented a different type of understanding and closeness. The intimacy Nikhil feels when he is with Moushumi shows me that because Moushumi is from his life as Gogol, the life his father was a part of, Nikhil feels a connection with Moushumi because of the consolation attached; Nikhil sees her as a source of comfort, a reminder of Gogol. Does this mean that Nikhil/Gogol has figured out his true identity?
This quote Gogol’s father had told him while they were at Cape Cod in the breakwater reminded me of the end of the novel when Nikhil finally begins to read the copy of Nikolai Gogol that his father had given him: “Remember that you and I made this journey, that we went together to a place where there was nowhere left to go” (Lahiri 187). Nikhil has no other place to go after his father arbitrarily dies: he went from Gogol to Nikhil and then felt more familiar with his identity as Gogol. Yet, after his marriage slowly deteriorates, after both his life as Gogol and as Nikhil do not go the way he thinks they should have, he cannot move forward; rather, he moves backward; he retraces his steps back to the beginning of his life, back to his namesake. I wondered whether or not Nikhil regretted his change of identity after his father died; I gathered that at first he did because he felt a greater connection with Gogol than Nikhil, yet his change of identity to Nikhil was the one thing that actually brought him closer to his identity as Gogol. Without changing to Nikhil, it is doubtful that he would have opened that book at all. It seems implausible that Gogol would fully appreciate the gift of the namesake that his father has given him.
Again, the narrator sums up the meaning of the events as a whole when stating, “They [the events in his life] 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” (Lahiri 287). These events made Gogol open that book and begin reading. They brought him back to the beginning of the novel, back to the significance of his namesake, showing that life sometimes refuses to cooperate in the way that you want it to, but every event has an impact and will change the way you perceive the world. Gogol made decisions that seemed important to him, but not life-altering, such as changing his name, but this changed his life. It impacted him in a way that he had not intended; it was only after all these events that made him the slight bit curious about what was inside that book written by Nikolai Gogol.
I enjoyed reading this novel because of the unexpected twists and turns Gogol/Nikhil faced every step of the way until he opened that book. Many things were unpredictable and heartbreaking, but the author reminds us all about how life brings us unexpected things that may lead to the one discovery we have been waiting to find. (1070)
The novels I read this summer:
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin
Old School by Tobias Wolff
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)