The Namesake: Birth, Death, and Rebirth

In the novel The Namesake, by Jhumpa Lahiri, the process of rebirth shows the multigenerational experience of immigration through new attitudes, and even geographical places in life. Each character in the novel goes through many rebirths due to some event in their lives. Ashoke is reborn after his tragic near death experience in which he is haunted by a dead man’s last words to get out and not come back; he in turn goes to America to finish his education and start a family. Ashima and Ashoke are both reborn when they come to America and become parents and they start to absorb the culture of American suburban life. The family celebrates Christmas even though they aren’t Christians, and they start to buy American food products instead of their traditional Indian food. The main character, Gogal, has many rebirths; he changes his name to Nikhil and in turn become an entirely different person throughout his adulthood. He is reborn again through his father’s death. His father’s death allows Gogal to become closer to his family and to learn to appreciate his parents and background. Ashima is also reborn from her husband’s death and she becomes a different woman who has to learn to do things on her own. Ashima also shows her rebirth with a change of geographical location; the novel ends with her going back to India.  One of the most noted rebirths in the novel is Ashoke’s outlook on life after the birth of Gogal. After Ashoke nearly dies he is plagued and terrified of nightmares that remind him of the accident. Yet after the birth of his son the nightmares go away and he is able to put the past and the accident behind him.  Ashoke states to Gogal, “'You remind me of everything that followed'” (124) This is a beautiful sentence dictated by Ashoke to show that his transition and attitude on life is transformed and he is reborn through the birth of his son. The Namesake shows multigenerational experience of immigration through new attitudes and geographical locations brought into light when the characters are reborn and changed throughout the novel as a result of death or the creation of life.

“That's the thing about books. They let you travel without moving your feet.” 

― Jhumpa Lahiri, The Namesake

My Opinion:

I really enjoyed this book. It was amazing to read about the family dynamics of an American family with immigrant parents and to see how they adapted to life in America. They started to eat American food and celebrate Christmas, yet they still stayed true to their own ways while their children dove farther into American culture striving to get away. The series of rebirths throughout the novel is a major theme. First you have the rebirth of Ashima and Ashoke and then you find out about Ashoke accident and how the birth of his son changed his life for the good. Every little change in the character's lives show how they have changed and  been reborn. I just can not get over how beautifully written this novel is; the words just float off the page and leave you surrounded by their smoothness and power.

Relationships between immigrant parents and their children:

One of the main struggles in this novel is the strained relationship between Gogal and his parents. Throughout the book Gogal is embarrassed or unimpressed by his Bengali traditions. He would rather eat American food, celebrate Christmas, and have birthday parties with his friends from school then participate in his parents customs. It isn't until after his father's death that he realizes that family is the most important thing and he immerses himself back in with his mother and sister. This struggle between the american and homeland culture within families is an issue that has been studied and researched for quite a while! 

http://www.yoursocialworker.com/p-articles/immigrant-family-adaptation.htm  - this article discusses how struggles occur with in families because the children and second generations of people adapt and connect more with the local culture than then customs and traditions of the parents. This article also talks about the problems that many immigrant children face such as socializing with the opposite sex, clothing and even a higher risk of teen pregnancies. 

Thinking about this while reading the novel was very interesting. I see the disconnection between parents and children with some of my friends and by reading this book it allows you to take a front seat and share in the experience. 

"A rose by any other name would smells sweet."- William Shakespeare.

Throughout he book the main character Gogal has trouble finding himself and because of this he ends up changing his name. He is constantly worried and afraid of people judging him on his name and is ashamed to ever look at or actually read the book of poetry by the Russian author he was named after. He sees himself stuck with his pet name (his formal name got lost in the mail somewhere between his great-grandmother's stroke and America), and decides to go through all the paper work to change his name. Now he is two different people; he is Nikhil to his new friends at college and everyone new from that point in his life, yet he is Gogal at home and with close family friends. He has created a semi-alternate reality away from everything he knew before and he loves the separation. It isn't until his father reveals his true namesake that Gogal actually begins to appreciate his name. He feels guilty for being so ashamed of the name that was given to him because of his Father's favorite book that was the only means that he was able to be seen during the tragic train crash. 

I found Gogal's opinion of his name kind of unnecessary throughout the book. I also have a peculiar name that my mother and grandmother found in a movie (instead of a book). Yes at times, I wished I could have found my name on pencils and that teachers could say my name correctly on the first shot, but I grew to love my name more and more as time passed where Gogal grew to hate his...to me it made Gogal seem very insecure and uncomfortable in his own skin. 

http://www.legalzoom.com/tips-trends/lifestyle/top-10-reasons-people-change   

“Remember that you and I made this journey together to a place where there was nowhere left to go.” 

― Jhumpa Lahiri, The Namesake 

The Buddha of Suburbia- Hybrid Identities

The novel, The Buddha of Suburbia, demonstrates that hybrid identities are always in motion by examining Karim’s identity shifts throughout his coming of age story. In the novel Karim starts out as a teenage boy who just wants to get away from his suburban life style. He is thrown into a Buddistic meditative lifestyle with his father and from there his perception of himself is split and thrown all around. He is immersed into sex, drugs and rock and roll as the novel goes by and with this he is faced with racism from the people  around him. When he enters the acting world he is stereo-typically cast in an Indian role and it is with the acting that you can really see his hybrid identities show. Should he play stereotypical roles? Is he dishonoring his race by his representations of them?  He is constantly trying to find himself and he is exploring all options; sexuality, career, and locations. In Beginning Postcolonialism the section on hybrid identities offers a helpful insight. McLeod states, “Hybrid identities are never total and complete in themselves, like orderly pathways built from crazy- paving. Instead, they remain perpetually in motion, pursuing errant and unpredictable routes, open to change and reinscription” (254).  This quote can be transmitted into the novel because Karim never has one set identity throughout the entire novel. As Karim ages in the novel he is exploring and changing his identity with every step of life. New people and occurrences change his perception and actions. He doesn’t have a singular personality; his life is on “unpredictable routes” (254). Hybrid identities are always in motion in a way that an adolescent’s identity is constantly changing and in motion as well. Both are subject to the context they are found in and can constantly change and explore because they are trying to find the set identity that works for them.

My Opinion: 

Out of all the books read for my Postcolonial Literature course, this one is probably my least favorite. It might just be because of the cheating husband and the disintegration of the "suburban" perfect family or even the whirlwind of chaos with the sex, drugs and theater world that isn't to my liking. Other than that though this book does a marvelous job of showing the hybridism in second generation immigrants and the hybridism in people as a whole. In the novel we see Karim struggle with his identity as an English man and man from an Indian background. He is stereotyped into the role of Mowgli which kicks starts his acting career and his father grows famous and falls in love with a woman after he assumes the role of the Buddha of Suburbia even though the family isn't Buddhist. He goes around and teaches yoga and Buddhist theology which he just looks up in books for himself. Karim also struggles with his sexual identity he prefers both boys and girls and is constantly thinking of his friend and the various girls in his life. the idea of being split into throughout the novel (even being split between is mother and father in the divorce) create this huge impression of hybridity throughout the book. Karim is always looking for ways to complete himself, or better his predicament; he is never content and is always changing himself. This novel also summarizes up adolescent and young adult hood very well. 

David Bowie and The Buddha of Suburbia: 

The Buddha of Suburbia, was adapted into a BBC miniseries and the famous singer David Bowie created a lot of music for the show and even labeled one of his albums Buddha of Suburbia. 

The White Tiger

In the novel, The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga, Balram rises to become an entrepreneur through criminal behaviors that lay the ground work for a critique of capitalism in India. Throughout the novel  Balram recounts the  story of how he grew to be a wealthy entrepreneur. He did this, in part, by abandoning his family and not sending them any money. The solitude Balram lives in can represent the idea that one needs to have to succeed individually in India’s capitalist market. By abandoning his family he can save up more money for himself and buy richer clothing so that he isn't categorized with the lower class that isn't permitted into wealthy establishments. The class issue shows that India is still corrupted by the caste concept. People in lower classes are stuck in their “classes” in this case the light or dark side. Even if you move to the cities and change your jobs you are still considered in a lower caste and it is almost impossible to work your way out of it because of the low pay, corrupt political systems, and lack of money spent for educational purposes. In order for Balram to escape his “dark” class he must commit murder and then assume the name of his master and use his money to make a business for himself. Balram had to break all of the rules in order to escape and become an entrepreneur. Balram states that you have to break laws to get ahead, “To break the law of his land—to turn bad news into good news—is the entrepreneur’s prerogative” (32). The quotation states that you have to make the best out of a bad situation to get ahead. In this case the bad situation is the murder of Balram’s master. He makes the best of the situation by taking his stolen money and starting a taxi business and he even assumes the name Ashok after his master. All of the actions in the novel fall into the critique of capitalism in the novel because where the country has such a far separation between the rich and the poor it is almost impossible for the poor to succeed without partaking in criminal behavior. Committing crimes is the only way it seems that a servant can rise to be a powerful business man in India’s capitalist society. 

My Opinion: 

I really enjoyed this novel; the humor and epistolary style of the novel really made it unique and one of a kind. The White Tiger shows the corrupt political and capitalistic society that plagues many countries. In the country the poor are kept poor through lack of education (money is taken away from the school and the teachers aren't teaching properly) and painfully expensive customs (huge weddings that cost so much the children must drop out of school to work.) In this case it seems that the only way to succeed is to get out. The separation of the classes is pretty dramatic, there doesn't seem to be a middle class in this book... the main character has to beg for a job and then is after getting a job is barely paid anything at all. He had no way to work up and make more money by driving his "masters" around and in tern he had to commit murder and theft to start his own business and to become rich and successful. Even though the novel is about a man who commits murder for financial gain, which normally would be pretty horrific and arise emotions of hate towards the character; The White Tiger is actually a very humorous and light story to read and i couldn't help liking the main character and feeling sorry for him. Even though he probably could have just knocked his master out and tied him up somewhere and stole the money (which probably would have allowed the rest of his family to have lived, (that was the most traumatic part for me, knowing that his entire family was being demolished. I felt sorry for Ashok but i guess a person can only take being ignored for a cellphone so many times before snapping.)) I find myself worrying about what will happen to the White Tiger. The novel ends to keep the reader guessing. You don't know if the Chinese diplomat will turn him in or if he will give up on his business to start another, the novel ends and really makes the reader want to sit back and evaluate every political and financial guru around them. 

I found this interesting video on entrepreneurship development in India! The school/program that created this video is all about inspiring future entrepreneurial ventures. 

The Secret of His Success

I found the following interesting article:

 http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/09/books/review/Kapur-t.html?_r=0 

"The Secret of His Success", by Akash Kupur is a critique of the novel The White Tiger. The article also gives the author's and the novel's author, Adiga's, opinions on the novel; it also states how people took it in India. Some said that the novel was there to undermine India's new economic progress while Adiga and others say that it there to uncover the truth. This really makes you think, the novel is criticized for having stereotypical characters, which is something I thought of because Ashok and his wife in the novel act out a scene very similar to one found in The Great Gatsby. 

The God of Small Things

The God of Small Things

In the novel, The God of Small Things” by Arundhati Roy one of the leading characters, Ammu, is troubled by many problems of classification related to gender, class and her family. In the novel Ammu is an outcast in her own family because she is a female and not the favorite male child. She isn’t permitted to go to college and because of this she marries the first man she finds. When Ammu divorces her husband and moves with her children back to her parents’ house, she is now classified as a broken woman and is predetermined to spend the rest of her life sulking in the family home. But Ammu doesn’t do this. She defies all odds and goes and finds love again, but by falling in love with an Untouchable it causes more problems with classification because she is then breaking the class classification and embarrassing her higher class family; she is immediately classified with her family so anything she does includes them as well. Ammu and Velutha’s affair is the moment of shear embarrassment for the family and Baby Kochamma sees it as her punishment and Ammu’s punishment as well. The following quote states the Baby Kochamma's, and the family's opinion of Ammu's predicament   “She saw it as God’s way of punishing Ammu for her sins and simultaneously avenging her (Baby Kochamma’s) humiliation at the hands of Velutha and the men in the march… a ship of goodness plowing through a sea of sin.” Here we can see just the extreme classification issues that take place for Ammu. She is immediately thrown into a sea of sin just for falling in love with a man her family didn’t approve of because of his class and religion. Throughout the entire book there are many issues related to classification for all of the characters, but Ammu seems to be affected by so many more than the other characters. She is classified by gender, class, and kinship she is even classified by ideas of how women should behave. 

My Opinion: 
Jealousy and hate play big rolls in this book. The fact that an older woman can ruin a member of her families life for no reason other than the man is from a different social class and a member of a political party that embarrassed her is beyond me. The main character, Ammu, is classified by her family yet the family isn't what we consider a close knit or accepting family. It seems like the only thing keeping this family bound is blood. The siblings and children of Ammu are also very distraught characters because of the lack of family support. This is exactly the opposite of the portrait that Ashima paints for us in the novel The Namesake. The children are scared by their families and they end up being messed up individuals when they reach adulthood. This had a very To Kill A Mockingbird feeling to it. This may be because it is a traumatic event told through the eyes of a child. 
Remnants of the Caste System: 
Ammu's love interest in this book is Velutha,a ex- Untouchable. Even though the caste system was abolished in the 1960s and this book took place in the 1960's it shows the stereotypes and opinions of people still hadn't really changed. (This could be though of as the segregation laws in the US even though the laws were revoked peoples' attitudes and opinions didn't change.) The caste stysem really plays a role in this book because Ammu is considered a shame and embarrassment to her family for being with a man below her own social status. It is a sad fact that represents a realistic issue. 

The Caste system is a hierarchy based on Purity and the level of purity decides on the social interactions and occupations. The Untouchable level is seen below the pyramid. They were outcasts  shunned and left to do all of the dirty work. Something interesting is that caste systems didn't only occur in India... they occurred in France, Spain, Africa and Japan as well! Even though the caste system was nullified  it doesn't mean that it doesn't affect how people think and view the world, as seen in this novel. 


Fun Note: When I took my Praxis II test for English certification there was a question about The God of Small Things. 

Slumdog Mllionaire

 Slumdog Millionaire

The movie Slumdog Millionaire participates in gendered discourses that use women to represent a class of people and represent men as the actors that liberate that class. The movie represents women as people who sit and wait for other people to change the world and the men are represented are the ones actually out doing the actions, they are the ones working to liberate the class. Throughout the movie the main female character, Latika, does nothing unless instructed to by a man. She stands out in the pouring rain as a small child until she is allowed to come inside the tunnel, and as a young woman she is forced into a relationship with an older powerful gangster, but doesn’t do anything. She doesn’t even try to leave until she is instructed to do so by Jamal, the main male role of the movie. Salim, Jamal’s brother, takes a stand for good a few times in the movie. He took a stand to get his brother out of trouble and he took a stand to kill the man that would keep his brother and Latika from being happy. Jamal is the one who saves the day, he wins all of the money on Who Wants to be a Millionaire, and he is the one who triggers all of the actions of the others. Then you have Jamal who rises up from poverty and acts as a liberator to show that you can get out of the slums of India. This love story intertwines many stereotypes Latika could represent the lower class who are trapped by society in grueling conditions, where they can’t afford school and the living conditions are intolerable.

My Opinion: 

The first time I watched this movie I was absolutely shocked about the conditions and horrors that these children were experiencing. Yet it is the truth, even if the life paths that the characters took is one of what seems like on bad thing after another. I was really surprised with the discussion in class about the poverty tourism that is growing in countries like India and I can't help but think that movies like Slumdog Millionaire promote this type of thing. It would be different if the tourism actually put money into the community but what we have been discussing is that the money goes into building apartments that can only house 1/4 of the people that live in these locations. People are loosing homes and are being just pushed aside. Another thing that bothered me with this movie is the gender roles. For a modern movie it is almost expected to have a pretty strong female role but this movie is simply not the case. She is tossed around as a child and then she ends up with an old mob leader. Instead of leaving and escaping, or better yet not getting into that situation in the first place she has to wait for the male characters in her life to let her go. The males make all the decisions and the actions throughout the entire movie and the main female character Latika does nothing but get tossed around and objectized into an object for affection. 

Fairy Tales and Happy Endings: 

This movie ends on a fairly unrealistic note. Not only does Jamal get the girl, but he also wins all of the money. Yes the entire story is about how he actually knew the answers to the questions but when it came to the last question he used his last life line and then guessed. When he called Latika of course she didn't know the answer, but by her answering it renewed the hope that she had seen him on T.V. and that she had finally managed to escape and hey could be together. This is a classical "Happy Ending" that is seen in many Fairy tales. The boy gets the girl and they get to live together rich and happily ever after. It is also a classics rags to riches like Aladdin where the street rat grows in society and  marries the Sultans daughter. This happy ending is almost a cliche for this movie that is so realistic and traumatic  Why wouldn't the movie end on a realistic note? I guess it is meant to be a glimmer of hope for people.                                                                               
                                       


I found an amazing research article that discusses gender, fairy tale endings and globalization in Slumdog Millionaire! This goes perfectly with everything I have been saying :) 

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14746689.2011.569072#preview                                                                                                                                                                         

Shame

Shame

In the novel Shame by Salman Rushdie, the character Sufiya embodies the inner struggle brought on by shame in Pakistan and the ruling class that she grew up in. Sufiya is constantly at war with herself, she thinks with the mind of a six year old girl but when things turn truly shameful (such as when her mother was tortured by the turkeys of her husband’s ex-lover) she snaps and her inner demons, the division inside of her, emerge. This is seen again when the blissful almost bride to be almost kills her sister’s groom because of the shame that he has brought her family. Her last inner division comes when her husband chooses to not make her his “wife” in the bedroom and it opened up the curiosity that a six year old has and it also brought out the division in her and her inner demon, which causes her to go out and have sex and murder the young boys.  Sufiya’s war with her inner demons is finally over, but the inner demons had won and she becomes a wild and murderous creature and a thing of fables. Also, throughout the novel there is always the rise and fall of political leaders. We watch as Iskander rises to power after powering through his inner struggle (he tries to separate himself from the partying, sexual man and rise up to be a great man of power, but the division never really happens because he keeps up with his old ways but just more privately.) Izkander is killed and Raza Hyder rises to power only to be over powered by someone else, showing the inner struggle with power in the nation itself. There is an inner struggle with all of the characters, Biliquis struggles with only loving one daughter, and where she didn’t produce a male heir her shame slips her slowly into madness; and “Good News” has her inner struggle of choosing love (or lust) only to be punished for it repeatedly and to be swallowed up in the makings of her love where she chooses the way out and commits suicide. The best visual image of the inner struggle is seen on page 140, “Sufiya Zinobia at the age of twelve had formed the unattractive habit of tearing her hair…she would sit in the enormous cot…and tear each damage hair in two all the way down to the root.” This is a powerful statement of the inner division that is in all of the characters and the country itself. It shows each hair being split in two just as each person is being split in two with all of the shame built up in side of them. 

My Opinion: 

I absolutely loved this book! It is extremely chaotic with twists and turns and an air of fantasy mixed into the reality.The characters in this book are completely multidimensional. You Sufiya a young girl who's shame piles up inside of her and releases an evil monster, all of the political figures who rise to power and then fall due to betrayals, and Omar, the one who the story mostly follows, is a child born from fantasy and grows to become a city doctor only to die not once but twice in a chaotic way. The book tells many different stories but they all end up together at the end. It takes you down path after path and yet you end up seeing everything fall together and the people connect and the stories are wrapped up with deaths or disappearances. It can also be seen as a Post Modernism critique of Pakistan's nationalist narratives, because of the two story lines of Raza d Iskander's rise to power and then fall from power. 

- this cover was interesting :) 

.Shame, Vengeance, and Magical Realism: 

 Magical Realism is when magical elements are blended into a realistic scenario. In this novel it can be seen as a critique of the West's knowledge of the East. It starts out in a mythological back story about three women who conceived at a party and they all were "pregnant" with the child. The child is then born and grows up in isolation until he is old enough to demand to go to school. It is then that the books switches into a realistic setting with the life of the military families. It is with these families that we start to see the flashes of "magic" through Sofia. Her murderous episodes and snaps occur during highly stressful and shameful situations until finally not even the chains that her husband and father have put on her can hold her back and she escapes. At the end of the novel we are back at the three mothers' house after the fall of Raza from power and they are all fleeing the country. The mothers are furious that Raza had their other son killed and they poison him and then have him impaled with mechanical spikes. They disappear and it is their son Omar who takes the blame for the murders. The mother's get their vengeance and then Omar dies by a gun shot because he is seen as being responsible for Raza's death and he dies again when his blushing bride finally finds him and crawls to him in her animalistic state and kills him. The book is constantly back and forth and in between reality and fantasy. I think that is what makes it so unique. 

- Visualizations of Magical Realism -

Unity Across Time and Space- Cracking India

Unity Across Time and Space

         In the novel, Cracking India, a once unified people (under the British rule) are then divided into religious affiliations. The unity at first shows that when a nation is whole then all the parts of the nation can work together, but when the nation has turmoil or is "cracking" the nation and the parts of the nation crumble apart. The novel, it starts out with everyone sitting together and trading and conversing with each other but then as the idea of who will run the country when it is free “cracks” the people. The cracking of India, separates friends and co-workers so that everyone is seen for their differences. The ununification is the opposite of the migration story Colonel Bharucha tells during the Parsi congregation.  In this story the Parsi people have been kicked out of Persia by the Islamic rulers and now they are trying to find a new place to live. The prince of the Indian land filled up a bottle of milk to the brim to say that the country was full and that they couldn’t accept any outsiders. The unification of religion is seen in the following quote: “Our forefathers carefully stirred a teaspoon of sugar into the milk and sent it back. The prince understood what that meat. The refuges would get absorbed into his country like the sugar in the milk” (47). This really represents how all of the different religions and people have been living all as on unified body but as time went on the differences were noticed. And as the differences of religions were called out and upon the unity of the nation was rocked and then divided. In this section of the book unity is seen as “sameness” and when people’s differences were called out upon and then not appreciated or accepted it divided the nation.

My Opinion: 

I found Cracking India to be a very interesting book. The story is told through a child's eyes and the description of the terror that occurs in the book is almost softened because of Lenny's perspective. To tell the truth I had no idea that India was split into modern India and modern Pakistan... it isn't something discussed in American public schools. The persecution and split of a county that was once so united against a common enemy (Britain) is absolutely shocking. How can religion be such a means of hate?  It has been a means of hate for so long that it seems almost medieval. 

This novel does break some Orientalism stereotypes at the end of the book. At the beginning of the book the female character Ayah is very sexualized and has many suitors but at the end of the novel it is the woman who band together and raise money to send displaced women back to their families. The men in the novel go from nice and caring individuals (almost the image of a feminized male from Orientalism stereotype) to having surges of power and the once nice men turn to murderers. 

The physical location of the town Lahore in the novel shows that the characters are right in the middle of the turmoil and they are in the actual space of the "crack" that divides India and Pakistan. (the map below shows the line between the two countries...a line that today is still being fought over.) 

Christian Allegory in a Islamic- Hindu Fight through Parsi eyes. 

One of the most notable scenes in this novel is the last supper with all of the friends. In this scene Ayah is holding Lenny while all 12 of herfriends (even Ice-candy man) surround her; This can be an allusion to Christ and his 12 apostles In this book it is the young girl, Lenny, who acts as the Judas figure in this Christian allegory. In the days to come among the chaos and death due to religious differences, it is Lenny who tells Ice- Candy man where  Ayah is hiding. She is the one who turns her over to meet her ultimate demise and the Christ-like Ayah character is carried out and away to never be seen again. I found it very interesting that in the middle of the splitting of India (into Pakistan and India) and the religious hate that occurred between Hindu and Islamic groups that there is a Christian Allegory and one that strikes deep; the betrayal of a loved one.