"The reader should realize himself that it could not have happened otherwise, and that to give him any other name was quite out of the question." -- Nikolai Gogol, The OvercoatIn this novel, Jhumpa Lahiri explores just about everything about names. Her main character is Gogol Ganguli, named for the author quoted above because his father loves "The Overcoat" story. Considering his name, he thinks: "This writer he is named after -- Gogol isn't his first name. His first name is Nikolai. Not only does Gogol Ganguli have a pet name turned good name, but a last name turned first name. And so it occurs to him that no one he knows in the world, in Russia or India or America or anywhere, shares his name. Not even the source of his namesake" (page 78).
Apart from his father, the baby has three visitors, all Bengali ... Maya and Dilip give the boy a rattle and a baby book, with places for his parents to commemorate every possible aspect of his infancy. ... Dr. Gupta gives the boy a handsome illustrated copy of Mother Goose rhymes. "Lucky boy," Ashoke remarks, turning the beautifully sewn pages. "Only hours old and already the owner of books" (page 24).Lahiri also explores identity. Your name gives you one kind of identity, but so do other things, like owning books. This book focuses on national identity and the confusion immigrants feel while trying to assimilate. In an interview, Lahiri said,
"I have always been interested in why so many Indians come to America, because typically it is for very different reasons from, say, those of many of the European groups who have come, and those of many non-European groups as well. On the whole, Indians are not escaping some sort of dire political situation, a war, a famine, or social or religious persecution. ... [My parents] were here for the sake of greater opportunities, perhaps a better standard of living."Jhumpa Lahiri was born 1967 in London, England, and raised in Rhode Island. Her parents were from India. Not only is our world growing smaller, but our cultures are being mixed together as never before (at least in the United States and many European countries). It is incumbent upon us to try to understand these differences so we can live together in harmony.
==================== ( 8 of 10, a very good book )
Questions:
1. How did you get your name? Were you named for someone? Do you know what your name means? Who chose it for you? Do you like your name? Do you have a nickname?
2. One of the characters in the book has his name legally changed. Have you ever wanted to change your name?
3. This book is all about names. Moushumi complains that someone "mispronounced [her name], as most people did" (page 258). Then she explains how her name SHOULD be pronounced. Is your name, first or last, one that seems to confuse people? Do you have a usual way of telling them how to say it?
4. Astrid says, "It just feels like such a huge responsibility to name a baby. What if he hates it?" (page 243) How did you choose names for your children?
5. Do you know why your ancestors came to this country? Do you know when they came?
6. Identity is a difficult thing for immigrants and their children. Jhumpa Lahiri said, in an interview, "As a young child, I felt that the Indian part of me was unacknowledged, and therefore somehow negated, by my American environment, and vice versa. I felt that I led two very separate lives." Has anything like this ever been a problem for you? Did The Namesake help you understand the immigrant experience? In what ways?
7. Which culture, other than your own, would you like to understand better?
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Click here for a video, author interview, and discussion questions:
http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/readers_guides/lahiri_namesake.shtml
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Another look at this book: http://literaryfeline.blogspot.com/2007/03/namesake-by-jhumpa-lahiri.html
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March 11, 2008 update:
Read this NYT article: "Bad Baby Names" by J. Marion Tierney
10 comments:
1. How did you get your name? Do you know what your name means? Do you like your name? Do you have a nickname?
I was named for my mother's only sister, Bonnie, and my father's only sister, Lillian. Bonnie means "good" and Lillian means "lily." Do I like it? Hmm, better now than when I was a child. Because those two names were already in use, I ended up with the nickname "Bitsy" which didn't work very well when I reached my teens and was taller than all my friends and siblings and little kids had to crane their necks to look up at me. On the first day of first grade, when the teacher asked each of us what we were called, I chose the name I wanted and lied, saying, "Bonnie." And I've been Bonnie ever since.
3. Is your name, first or last, one that seems to confuse people? Do you have a usual way of telling them how to say it?
My last name was Setliffe, which nobody could pronounce correctly. It's two syllables: "set" like to set something down and "lift" without the "t" sound on the end ("Set-lif"). This name means "south cliff," so I was Good Lily South Cliff ... lol.
Hey Bonnie!! Like the new Blog!! You will have to come over and visit mine sometime!
How's it going anyway?? How is Donna? I haven't seen her around the boards lately.
2. One of the characters in the book has his name legally changed. Have you ever wanted to change your name?
I dealt with this when I was divorced, when the folks at the driver's license place told me I couldn't change my name unless the judge had approved it. Not so in Tennessee! As long as I am not trying to defraud someone, I can change my name. However, it appears I wouldn't have a driver's license because the bureaucrats wouldn't do it! Oh, well, I'll stay Bonnie Jacobs forever and for always, even if I remarry. If I ever foolishly decide to get married again, he would have to be someone who would understand why I was keeping my first husband's name. I'm too old to get "lost" in name changes now.
4. Astrid says, "It just feels like such a huge responsibility to name a baby. What if he hates it?" (page 243) How did you choose names for your children?
We couldn't agree on names, but we had found a couple of girls names both of us liked, Barbara and Sandra. Never could settle on one of them. On the way to the hospital he asked, "What if it's a boy?" I replied, "David is the only name we both liked." The one baby we were expecting turned out to be twins! Identical twin daughters. So -- ta, da! -- we named them Barbara and Sandra. Three years later we had only that one name chosen, David if it's a boy, no idea what to call her if it's a girl. Luckily, we had a boy and used our last agreed-upon name.
One day when David was four and his sisters were at school, he asked me, "Why didn't you get me a twin?" I said, "It doesn't work that way." He persisted, "Then get me one now." I laughed and said, "It doesn't work that way either." Good thing, too, since we didn't have another name, anyway ... lol.
1. My Mom just liked it, no mystery there. But my middle name was my Great-Grandmother's. I guess I have a good name.
2. Probably only in HS. I went through a "I wish I was named Victoria" phase.
3. Local people have no problem with my last name. Telemarketers can never say it right.
4. It is a big responsibility! I agonized with a name for dd. We only came up with one the week before she was born. Mostly, dh hated everything. We tried to stick with something Celtic to go with our last name.
5. I'm really into genealogy. I have traced our ancestory back several generations.
Hey Bonnie. Thanks for checking me out! I have not read The Nakesake yet. One of these days. All I know about Stephanie is my Dad picked it out....wouldn't settle for anything else. My middle name is Lee. Named after my Grandpa.
The kids, well, that's different. Chad is named after a brother of mine that was killed when I was in college. I actually only wanted to use it as a middle name, but Chad just works better as a first name. Isabella was named because I fell in love with Beauty and the Beast and always wanted a daugher named Belle. It wasn't very popular until I named her...but now there seem to be LOTS of Isabellas. And Anastasia was a whim. A trip into Russian history. And I honestly thought she was a boy, so I didn't even HAVE a girl's name picked out. She was BABY GIRL TOLAND for 5 days. I hope they like their names!
5. Do you know why your ancestors came to this country? Do you know when they came?
Word of mouth down through the family says one of my great-great-great-grandmothers was christened on the throne of Marie Antoinette. I guess that sounds good, until you realize that French queen lost her head. The only French name in the family tree is Derieux (or maybe DeRieux). The Derieux grandmother was born at about the right time in history, so maybe she's that baptized baby.
Word from another branch of mother's family says one of the Derieux men designed Mt. Vernon. That would put the family in the colonies at about the right time, too, since Marie Antoinette was taken from Versailles by the mob in 1789, the year George Washington became president. She was held in custody until being sent to the guillotine in 1793. So my guess is that the Derieux family fled during the early part of the French Revolution because it was not safe there for anyone close to the throne.
The Hidden Diary of Marie Antoinette, an engaging 2005 novel by Carolly Erickson, indicates that the royal family probably could have fled Paris along with their frightened subjects months or years before the mob got hungry and violent. Louis XVI, who suffered from depression and lethargy, kept delaying in spite of his wife's appeals. He couldn't believe his subjects would harm him or his family. He was wrong, and my distant relatives were right to flee. If they hadn't, I wouldn't be me.
Hey Bonnie,welcome to blogging!
You know. I have no idea where my name came from - my family isn't big into sharing! Extracting information is like trying to get the sword out of the stone!
My surname was changed when I was about 12 by my mother. She changed it to the name of my stepfather - a man I despise! I have thought numerous times about changing it back again but haven't ever really done it.
When I was pregnant I knew exactly what I would call the baby if it was a girl. It was a real struggle for a boy's name.
How did you get your name? Do you know what your name means? Do you like your name? Do you have a nickname?
Hi Bonnie!! Here's the story of my name.
I was named after my maternal grandmother, Grietje Geertruida Wilhelmina. My parents made it a little bit more modern: Margreta Wilhelmina. I love my name, as I loved this grandmother. It gives me a sense of my ancestry, to know I'm one in a line of strong women.
Margareta means 'pearl' in Greek...not too bad huh? I don't have a nickname. My brother called me names, like pimpleface, to get me really mad!! He doesn't anymore though.
6. Did The Namesake help you understand the immigrant experience? In what ways?
It helped me get into the thinking of those who are torn in two directions, and it showed me how really difficult it must be to always have to be thinking about two different ways of seeing the world. Another book that does a good job of showing the immigrant experience is Anne Tyler's Digging to America.
7. Which culture, other than your own, would you like to understand better?
I guess I wonder about them all. Reading takes me into other cultures and, when the book is a novel, into other ways of thinking. That's why I enjoy books so much, because they give me a new outlook on the world, kind of like seeing a whole new landscape when I peer out of a character's eyes at the world she inhabits. I go into the life of "someone else" and come out enlarged by the experience. We take so much for granted in our lives, and when we read about other ways of being human, we see our own lives from new perspectives.
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