Without language, there is emptiness, a void. Each of us has a unique memory of our earliest words, the numbers, nursery rhymes. In invoking those we get a word picture of our childhood, our deep joys, our irrational fears. The language that we speak gradually becomes a layering, a part of us, an extension of everything we do. ‘In Other Words’ is Jhumpa Lahiri’s first book in Italian.
Browsing: Jhumpa Lahiri
Without a doubt, she’s a literary rock star.
Jhumpa Lahiri receives the kind of frenzied adulation reserved for celebrities. Her new novel ‘The Lowland’ has created a buzz in the US, with reviews carpeting every media from The New York Times to the most obscure little blog.
She was nominated for both the Man Booker and the National Award – and ‘The Lowland’ had hardly even hit the stores! Her book tour took her to several American cities and social media lit up with Jhumpa talk.
Few writers of Indian origin command this kind of fanfare – except perhaps Salman Rushdie. So is she the next big Indian writer after Rushdie, in terms of international standing?
Salman Rushdie, Vikram Seth, Jhumpa Lahiri, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, or M G Vassanji – who would be the one you’d vote for in the world of journalism and literature? Bobby Jindal, Swati Dandekar, Dr. Ruby Dhalla or Ameya Pawar – who would be your choice for political leadership? Would you be torn if you had to choose among Mira Nair, Russell Peters, Meera Syal, Sunil Nayar and Sanjeev Bhaskar in the field of entertainment?
Well, now you have a chance to vote for the most notable NRIS – and perhaps win free tickets to India in the bargain, with the upcoming Light of India Awards.
As an immigrant writer from India, I well remember my first day in New York City.
Overwhelmed by the enormous skyscrapers, fast moving crowds and nonstop traffic on Fifth Avenue, I suddenly came across an ocean of calm, an iconic, strikingly beautiful Beaux-Arts building at a height, with cascading stairs below it.
At the foot, on either side were two life-size handsome marble lions. Patience and Fortitude.
When Bhairavi Desai met President Barack Obama on the receiving line at the Administration’s first State Dinner at the White House, she introduced herself as the director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance. Obama smiled his high voltage smile and bending down, confided: “I was an organizer too!”
“It was such a thrill to hear him say that – it was such a nice endorsement of my profession,” recalls Desai, who is a fearless advocate for the rights of New York cabbies. She and co-founder Javaid Tariq were both guests at the glittering dinner with celebs and politicos, a party which possibly America’s entire population wanted to attend but to which only 320 guests were invited, not counting the gate-crashers Michaele and Tareq Salahi.
With deft, intricate brush-strokes Jhumpa Lahiri creates characters that are so real you could swear you recognize them, you know them, or at least people like them.