book review
Title: The Lowland
Author: Jhumpa Lahiri
# of Pages: 352
Summary (from amazon.com): But for its lyrical, evocative scenes of life in the Calcutta neighborhood in which her heroes grow up, Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Lowland could be set anywhere, in almost any time. At the center of this heartbreaking story are two very different brothers. Udayan, the younger by 15 months, is passionate, idealistic and ripe for involvement in the political rebellion in 1960s India (not all that different from his American counterparts of the same era.) Subhash is the “good brother,” the parent-pleaser, who goes off to study and teach in America. But when Udayan, inevitably, ends up a victim of his self-made political violence, Subhash steps in and marries his dead brother’s pregnant wife. His is the proverbial good deed that will never go unpunished; Subhash soon becomes a victim of his own goodness. As always, Lahiri’s prose is lyrical and rich and her story is steeped in history, but in this book (more perhaps than The Namesake, her other novel) the issues raised are more universal and the plot more linear. Competitive siblings, parental love, commitment to belief and family, these are the topics one of our most brilliant writers addresses in what is at once her most accessible, and most profound, book yet
Opinion: I absolutely love Jhumpa Lahiri. All of her books are infused with so much passion and culture that as I read sometimes I feel as if I'm reading a biography or narrative of someone's actual life as opposed to a work of fiction. Lahiri shines when her focus is on family dynamics, in particular between siblings or parent/child relationships - and that was no less the case here. The relationship between the brothers, between husband and wife, and of course between parent and child were so developed and moving. Couple that with the immigrant experience and political turmoil that shaped lives and personalities, and you've got a book that is at once engaging, interesting, and deeply moving to anyone.
Now Reading: I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb
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