An Evening with Jhumpa Lahiri

Although it's Monday night, which means Yoga Night, I'm keeping up the recent pattern of getting to class every other week. Tonight I chose to skip class to attend a reading by author Jhumpa Lahiri at the Central branch of the Seattle Public Library. She was reading from her new book of short stories, Unaccustomed Earth. A number of years ago I discovered her debut publication, a beautiful collection of short stories entitled Interpreter of Maladies. I had read some short stories prior to reading her book (James Joyce's Dubliners was the most noteable that stayed in my mind). However, I was not very interested in reading short stories. I like the journey through the course of a novel with characters one becomes attached to and the unfolding of the themes over the length of a novel. Interpreter of Maladies was so striking to me because each story was so rich in detail and the characters so well sculpted that they stayed with long after the brief pages that captured their story. My opinion of the short story genre completely changed as a result of reading Interpreter of Maladies.

Last month I finally got around to reading her first novel, The Namesake. I thought it was another beautiful piece of work. (A film was made of the book and Jhumpa Lahiri makes an appearance in the film.) Using a very broad attempt to describe her writing, her work looks at the experience of first generation Bengali Indian immigrants in the US and often focuses on their relationships with their children who are raised in this country and the cultural struggles faced by each generation. Her new book seems to continue these themes. From her reading tonight I was again struck at just how well she uses language. She takes very simple language and creates great detail and richness in her scenes.

The auditorium at the library was bursting at the seems in an attempt to accommodate the turn out for her reading. I met my friend Linda there and while the auditorium itself was a little wanting to truly appreciate a book reading, I was delighted to hear the author's voice as she read from the short story with the same title as the collection. It was interesting to discover that the title Unaccustomed Earth was inspired by a passage from an essay by Nathaniel Hawthorne regarding his novel The Scarlet Letter (which I love). I will no doubt read her new book, but it won't be in the next few days. I decided to skip the throngs that had gathered to purchase the book after the reading and instead joined the masses attempting to pay for parking and leave the building. As crowds go, it was easy to tolerate this one. How wonderful that a reading by an author, held in a library, should stimulate such a turn out!!!