Interpreter of Maladies
Book Review: Nine beautiful and captivating short stories by Jhumpa Lahiri
Lahiri, Jhumpa. Interpreter of Maladies. Mariner Books, 1999.
I flew into Manhattan to unload myself from the $65 a month storage bin that I have been carrying for over four years. The plan was to return in 2020 to empty it but that rascal Covid got in the way.
After three years away from America, I wanted to spend Thanksgiving eating some Turkey with cranberry sauce which I can’t seem to find in Morocco.
So I found in my storage container something to read on the bus to Baltimore to see my sister and her family. I had many books in storage but decided to grab Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri mostly because I had read reviews of her work in the past. I have decided to write professionally and I wanted to have the benefit of reading noted writers. I was not disappointed. This book is a collection of nine short stories so beautifully written and captivating. All, in some way, bring the reader into the triumphs and emotional struggles of Indian diaspora in America.
I read the first two and enjoyed her storytelling so much. “A Temporary Matter” tells the story of a couple whose marriage has been ruptured by a stillbirth. They live in the same house but their intimacy is gone. The local utility company announces that the electricity will be shut off from 7 until 8 for the next three evenings. The nightly blackouts forces the couple to plan their dinner and activities. They even make love “with desperation they had forgetten” but will this temporary inconvenience restore their lives together.
I skipped some stories and became engrossed in “Sexy,” about a twentysomething American woman named Miranda who has an affair with an older married Indian executive. Miranda works at a call center with an Indian woman whose cousin’s husband decided not to return home from London after meeting a British woman on a plane trip. The story brings the reader full circle into the guilt and sentiments of infidelity.
I didn’t read all nine stories, but I really loved “Mrs. Sen’s,” “This Blessed House,” and “The Treatment of Bibi Haldar.” They are colorful, spicy and revealing the traditions of Indian diaspora in America. Each left me with an emotional response of sadness and joy.
Published in 1999, this book is Lahiri’s first published work for which she won acclaim. Since then, she has written several other works including The Namesake (2003) Unaccustomed Earth (2003), The Lowland (2013), and most recently Whereabouts (2018). Reading her short stories is inspirational and encourages me to try my hand at doing the same. I am now reading The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera which I will not review. They have completely different styles, but I am studying how they structure their writing voices.
Read Jhumpa Lahiri’s works in Intrepreter of Maladies if you want enjoy short impactful stories which will make you laugh, cry or smile and sigh.
Navigating between the Indian traditions they've inherited and the baffling new world, the characters in Jhumpa Lahiri's elegant, touching stories seek love beyond the barriers of culture and generations. In "A Temporary Matter," published in The New Yorker, a young Indian-American couple faces the heartbreak of a stillborn birth while their Boston neighborhood copes with a nightly blackout. In the title story, an interpreter guides an American family through the India of their ancestors and hears an astonishing confession. Lahiri writes with deft cultural insight reminiscent of Anita Desai and a nuanced depth that recalls Mavis Gallant. (less)