The Namesake Response

The Namesake Response

            Jhumpa Lahiri’s book The Namesake follows the life of Gogol Ganguli, a man born to Indian immigrants, from birth to age thirty two.  In this way, her book is unlike the others we have read so far since other narratives began after the main character was already partially or fully grown.  I believe this trait of the story is especially helpful since the reader is given the opportunity to see how parts of Gogol’s earlier life, the lives of his parents, and the lives of different women with whom he forms relationships mold him and help him to discover who he is. 

            Gogol’s parents play the most important role in his life when they choose his name.  Nikolai Gogol is the author of a book Gogol Ganguli’s father Ashoke was reading when he nearly died in a train wreck.  While recovering, Ashoke thought about a conversation he had held with a fellow passenger in which he had been encouraged to “see the world” while he could.  This conversation prompted Ashoke to move to America to continue his education after he had recovered from the accident.   Ashima, Gogol’s mother, immigrated to America after marrying Ashoke, a man she did not know prior to the wedding.  During Gogol’s growing up years, his parents represent his Indian heritage in their expectations of him, their food, their habits, and the trips they take back to India to visit family members.  They are the perpetual influence in his life, a reminder of the part of himself Gogol tries to reject throughout the book.

            Gogol’s relationships with different women between college and age thirty also impact his life.  These women include Ruth, Maxine,  Bridget, and Moushumi.  To them, he is Nikhil, the name he chose for himself when he was a teenager.  Maxine and Moushumi have a more significant role in Gogol’s life out of these four women.  Maxine represents Gogol’s attempts to completely become Nikhil and spurn his Indian heritage.  Gogol often notices that his parents could never conform to Maxine’s world, nor could Maxine be comfortable living like his parents.  In her world, he is free.  However, when his father dies and Gogol experiences Indian family duty, he comes to understand that he could never conform completely to Maxine’s world either.  Moushumi is a blend between Gogol’s heritage and the American personality he strives to adopt.  Although their parents put them together, their relationship is unlike the arranged marriages in India.  Gogol and Moushumi share a living space before their wedding and Moushumi exchanges her traditional sari for an American evening dress at her wedding reception.  In the end, Moushumi leaves Gogol for another man.  Moushumi represents the fact that Gogol has begun to accept his background rather than reject it.  He seeks the permanence the Indian culture offers rather than the temporariness of the American culture. 

            These relationships are nearly as important to the story as Gogol’s name.  They mark turning points of his life’s journey as he struggles to establish his identity.  I have seen this same pattern in my life.  Without these relationships, Gogol would definitely be a different person by the end of the book. 

Paper #1

Paper #1: Dreams and Lies

            “America was not Italy” Mario Puzo writes toward the end of The Fortunate Pilgrim.  In the sentences following, he describes the success and opportunity to be found in the new country.  However, there are other ideas suggested by this statement, ideas which permeate the three books we have read in class so far.   The second view points to the feelings of loss the immigrants experience when they leave behind the old country.  Also, Mario Puzo captures the concept that the new country is not quite what the immigrants expected it would be.  America is neither the old country nor a shimmering paradise as it is often portrayed. Connecting these three interpretations of Puzo's statment are the lies the immigrants believe before coming to the new country. 

            Although most of the characters we have encountered do not obtain the fullness of the American Dream, a select few experience success toward that end.  Bai Dajian, Yuan’s former fellow POW, is the character from War Trash who is able to most fully grasp the dream of the POWs for stability, success, and honor.  Near the end of the book, Yu Yuan sees Daijan, now a wealthy businessman, on a television screen years after Daijan went to Taiwan. Yuan and other repatriates wonder if their lives might have followed similar paths had they gone to with the Pro-Nationalists.  In Bread Givers, Sara Smolinsky succeeds in reaching the American Dream.  After the unhappy marriages of her sisters, Sara leaves the old world of her father entirely, working hard to earn a college degree and waiting to fall in love with a man of her own choosing. The Fortunate Pilgrim offers more than a few examples of Italian immigrants who live the American Dream, although the dream looks different for each of them. At the close of the story, Lucia Santa and her family are able to purchase a house on Long Island after saving money for several years.  Other examples include Dr. Barbato and Mr. La Fortezza the welfare investigator.

Each of these characters experiences the first interpretation of Puzo’s statement, believing the new world is one of fortune.  However, the lie believed is that all those that arrive at the new world have the same experience of success.  Although Yu Yuan and the other repatriates regret their fate, Yuan also understands that many who did not repatriate did not have the same fortune as Daijan. However, this understanding does not stop other former POWs from wishing they had not repatriated.  Also, the lie that brought them back to mainland China in the first place related to the false dream of equal opportunity and honor with soldiers who had not been captured. For the Smolinsky family, America seemed to be the land of fortune before they arrived, but Reb Smolinsky and his wife are not able to attain it because of Reb Smolinsky’s refusal to compromise his faith and embrace American ways.  Lucia Santa’s fortune in the ability to purchase a house is reduced by the terrible prices she pays along the way as she lost two husbands and one son.  For her, fortune is not equal for every person and comes at a cost higher than she is ready to pay. 

The statement “America was not Italy” also carries with it the understanding that the immigrants have lost important parts of their lives and habits in coming to the new country.  Yuan’s return to mainland Communist China as a former POW causes him to lose his fiancée, his reputation, and the career he might have had.  Had he not needed to leave because of the war, he would not have endured these trials.  Sara Smolinsky’s mother misses the beauty of the homemade curtains and tablecloths she owned before coming to America and her father misses the reverence people had for the Torah and Jewish customs in the old country.  The Fortunate Pilgrim addresses this concept most as the Italian women lament the corruption of their children several times throughout the book. They consider Italy to be “where fathers commanded and where mothers were treated with respect by their children.”  Their tone implies a wish that the journey to America had never been made.

The lie believed in this interpretation is that the new country can support the ways of the old country.  However, Communist China has no appreciation for Yuan’s skills after his reputation is sullied by his months as a POW. The Smolinskys quickly discover that a man must work for his family to be able to survive in America.  Being “a light” to others by studying the Torah is not understood in America and does not put food on the table.  For the Italian immigrants, America offers a place where their children can be educated.  However, they expect the behavior of their children to reflect the conduct of children in the homeland. This shows that just as the situations of immigrants change in the new country, the immigrants themselves are expected to change. 

Finally, Puzo’s statement addresses the misleading optimism of the immigrants for the new world.  Often, the new country was imagined as a paradise. For example, the Communists stress the ideal of fraternity and deceitfully welcome back their POWs with open arms and promises of forgiveness. Yuan believes he can resume the life he had before the war.  Reb Smolinsky takes his family to America with the thought that “things cost nothing at all”.  Also, he believes the persecution from the Russian Tsar cannot affect him in America. Lucia Santa travels to America with the belief that life will be better for her than in Italy with her overbearing father.  She expects a life of hope.

            “America is not Italy” points to a longing for a perfect country. However, the miscalculation in this optimistic view is that no such country exists.  It remains in the imagination.  Yuan discovers that the Communists lied about his ability to return to the life he had prior to the Communist takeover.  He finds a future that is considerably better than that of Commissar Pei and other Communist Party members, but it is far from the future he expected.  Reb Smolinksy learns that money is a necessity in America and is confronted with new forms of persecution in the unsympathetic landlady, potential suitors for his daughters, and his rebellious daughter Sara who all refuse to understand his religious zeal.  Although Lucia Santa is able to purchase a house on Long Island, the sorrow she experienced during her forty years in America was not in her prior dreams of a life away from Italy.

            Empty promises of success, acceptance of the expectations and traditions of the old land, and perfection link America and China in these three books as Yu Yuan, the Smolinskys, and Lucia Santa are fooled in their beliefs about the new country.  In actuality, the new country filled with failure, poverty, the rejection of old ways, disappointments, and new problems to face. The reactions to the reality of the new country vary by character. In the end, Reb Smolinsky refuses to change his ways, still clinging to the lie that the Russian Jewish traditions can remain the same in an American setting. However, Lucia Santa and Yuan are similar because they leave behind the lies they formerly believed and embrace the new country as it is.  Behind all the lies, the new country still holds a good future for both of them.  The new country is not the old, nor is it the realization of the dreams they had about it.  However, the new country still remains a land of hope. 

The Fortunate Pilgrim Response

In The Fortunate Pilgrim, Mario Puzo presents an Italian immigrant family living in New York roughly between the time of the depression and the outbreak of World War II.  The family includes the mother Lucia Santa Angeluzzi-Corbo, her husband Frank, and their six children.  By utilizing his personal history as an Italian immigrant, Puzo is able to expertly recreate the lives and experiences of those in a New York tenement in his portrayal of the Angeluzzi-Corbo family.  His narrative points to the idea that achieving the “American Dream” comes at a greater cost than many of the immigrants originally imagined. 

Although The Fortunate Pilgrim’s third person omniscient point of view allows the reader to enter into almost every character’s mind, Lucia Santa is clearly the main character.  Through backstory and her inner thoughts, the reader is able to gain a summary of her history.   Lucia Santa left her home in Italy, emigrating to marry a man she did not know.  Once in America, she bore two children and lost her first husband to a sudden accident while pregnant with their third child.  She married her second husband Frank and had three more children.  During the course of the story, Frank becomes insane and is sent to an asylum, leaving Lucia Santa alone to raise the family.  In addition to the past misfortunes Lucia Santa suffers, she also endures the Depression, the disobedience and disrespect of her son Gino, and the deaths of Frank, her friend Zia Louche, and her son Vincenzo. 

However,  Lucia Santa is still counted fortunate at the end of the narrative.  In the words of one of her neighbors, “the balance was struck” because Lucia Santa’s remaining children are counted successful in life and the mother did not have to endure many of the additional misfortunes experienced by others in the tenement.  Yet when she leaves her home of forty years for a house on Long Island, Lucia Santa regrets that she could not have what she wanted “without suffering…without guilt, without sorrow, without fear of death.”  Attaining the “American Dream” comes at a price higher than that which she originally thought.  This concept is also seen in Larry’s willingness to threaten others for his job, Dr. Barbato’s disconnect from other Italian immigrants to maintain his professional status, and Vinnie’s subjection to hard work and a life of continual exhaustion and eventual death. 

In modern America, the costliness of the “American Dream” can still be seen.  The definition of the dream today is different from that of an Italian immigrant like Lucia Santa, but it still includes success and stability. In attempt to obtain it, Americans prioritize careers over their families as they work to climb business ladders, become consumed with self-interest, lose their health, and resort to dishonesty and hurtful practices.  The path to the “American Dream” is littered with pain, broken trust, and damaged relationships and few ultimately reach the goal. This leaves one to wonder whether such an elusive dream is worth the trouble it brings and whether there might be more satisfying definitions of success.