Interpreter of Maladies

 

This is one of those books I had heard a lot about, but sadly, it failed to meet my expectations.

 

Each story in Interpreter of Maladies gives a perspective of the immigrant life of Indian Americans as well as their Indian counterparts in the 1970s and 80s. The stories are set in a time when maids could walk into your house anytime and play with your kids, a time when landlines were a sign of luxury and people still cooked with kerosene. However, there isn’t a lot of variety in the stories. In all the stories based in America, the women are always at the mercy of men, constantly in the kitchen cooking fish or curries, while the men themselves are, more often than not, college professors. I understand this must have been the predominant scene of Indian immigrants to the USA during the 70s and 80s, but as a reader, I would have liked to see some diversity in this collection of nine stories, which gets a bit too predictable at times.

 

While I am aware, intellectually, that these stories are supposed to make me feel something, something deep and soulful, but in all honesty the stories hardly touched me and had no effect on me whatsoever. When I read of a father watching his country broken and tattered in the war, with no clue about the fate of his wife and daughters, I wanted to feel his pain. When I read of a couple reconciling after a long silence, I wanted to wipe their tears and lend a shoulder. But the author never gives you that opportunity to completely connect with the characters. The stories end just when you want them to begin; want them to be explored further. Reading this book felt like words being interpreted in my mind, and that is all.

 

The only thing I liked about the book is that it gave me the immigrant Indian perspective of the state of affairs during the 70s in which the stories are set. We don’t fight wars with our neighbors anymore, and though we hear a lot of rhetoric in the media, wars are avoided as much as possible. My generation has no experience of what it means to watch your country crumbling down on TV millions of miles away. We do not know the longing one feels while waiting for years before they have saved enough for a visit to their homeland. But these things have changed so much now, that many a times I felt a generation gap while reading the stories, whether they were the ones based in America or the ones based in Bengal.

 

There is no doubt Jhumpa Lahari's writing skills are admirable and distinct. She describes every scene beautifully, and makes you feel like you are there, in the centerstage of her story. However, I wish she explored the human nature and relationships more in depth, the way she does with the surroundings. I wish she took one step further and implored each character a little more, dug deeper into the intricacies of their thoughts, so that the stories didn’t feel empty and the writing impassive.