Jhumpa Lahiri won a Pulitzer Prize in 200 for
Interpreter of Maladies, a collection of short stories. Previously I read her novel,
The Namesake, and liked it enough to move on (or back by actual date) to
Interpreter, which I also liked. Thinking about both of them though, I have to favor the novel. Lahiri is a subtle writer, and, IMHO, the novel wins because in each short story by the time I really got into the characters and the story, it ended.
Given: In collections of short stories, some are always better than others. Also given: Lahiri's writing often sings. Thus I find it odd that the only page I dog-eared was the last one in the book. The story, "The Third and Final Continent," is about a man from India who studies in England, then comes to work in Boston. The year of his arrival is 1969, and the United States has just put men on the moon. The sentences that made me misty:
"While the astronauts, heroes forever, spent mere hours on the moon, I have remained in this new world nearly thirty years. I know that my achievement is quite ordinary. I am not the only man to seek his fortune far from home and certainly I am not the first. Still, there are times I am bewildered by each mile I have traveled, each person I have known, each room in which I have slept. As ordinary as it all appears, there are times when it is beyond my imagination. (page 198)
I'm reminded of the final scene in
Auntie Mame when Mame borrows her grandson for the summer and says, "Oh, the things we'll see, the adventures we'll have." (I'm sure that's only a paraphrase.) The end of Lahiri's final short story and the end of Auntie Mame make me ask: Is any of it ordinary?
Give Jhumpa Lahiri a try. I think you'll like her.
