Throughout Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri shows life for her characters in two very different settings: America and India. She seems to portray India as a much more communal environment, people often live together in tightly packed apartment buildings and are always conversing. On the other hand, her depictions of America seem to show (at least as it relates to these immigrants) a more lonely setting that makes them feel homesick.
The first example of this can be seen in the story, "When Mr. Pirzada came to Dine." The story opens with Lilia giving an account on how she came to know Mr. Pirzada. She talks about how her family would find Indian last names in the phone book and call up these people, hoping to find some company to join them for dinner. "The supermarket did not carry mustard oil, doctors did not make house calls, neighbors never dropped by without an invitation, and of these things, every so often, my parents complained. In search of compatriots, they used to trail their fingers, at the start of each new semester, through the columns of the university directory, circling surnames familiar to their part of the world." This passage shows how Lilia's parents are a bit lonely without neighbors and friends to talk to, and they can't find the things that they are accustomed to here in America.
In "A Real Durwan" we get to see a picture of India, and of a tight-knit group of families all living in the same apartment building. Though Lahiri depicts an environment that is full of people who are very close, but this isn't necessarily a positive or negative environment. For example: everyone in the building takes care of Boori Ma, giving her new quilts to sleep on and things to make her a little more comfortable. Also the Dalals buy a sink for themselves, but also buy a second one for the other residents. These seem to be truly genuine, charitable, acts of kindness and compassion. But at the same time, the atmosphere in the apartment is that of rumor and gossip. Many families become jealous that the Dalals get their own sink, while they have to share one with everyone else, and when the sinks get stolen everyone (even the Dalals) are quick to blame Boori Ma, lamenting that they should have hired a "real Durwan."
Another example of Lahiri's depictions of America is in the story, "Mrs. Sen's." Mrs. Sen and her husband have lived in America for a while and although it seems that Mr. Sen has adjusted fairly well by immersing himself in his work and making friends with some of his academic colleagues, Mrs. Sen is constantly feeling lonely and homesick. When Eliot first comes to Mrs. Sen's he is amazed to see her cooking for hours each day just to create a dinner for Mr. Sen and herself. But after a week or so, he realizes that she does this to busy herself because she is very lonely and bored. She can't drive herself places and has to rely on Mr. Sen even to do the most basic tasks, like take her to the fish store. She laments that "at home" all she had to do was raise her voice and "a neighborhood and a half" would come by to talk to her and help her arrange whatever she was doing.
One last depiction of the more negative side of this tight knit community aspect of Lahiri's India comes in the story, "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar." Bibi is an outcast in her own building due to her seemingly incurable sickness and as a result many people resent her and tend to stay away from her. She is forced out of her home when it comes into question that she might have infected her cousin's baby with her sickness, and even when the wives of the building are "helping" her to find a husband, they only do it because it is like a fun game for them, they soon grow bored and leave her on her own.
Overall, Lahiri seems to make no judgment as to whether the environment in India is a positive or negative one. But based on her depictions of America and of many of the families' sentiments about living in America, it seems that most of the characters in Interpreter of Maladies preferred the Indian culture and often miss it. There are other examples of this littered throughout the collection in other stories such as "A Temporary Matter" and "The Third and Final Continent," but I selected the ones that seemed to most enunciate these dynamics. What do you think? Does Lahiri present India in a more positive or negative light? And do you think that she shows America as a change for the better or for the worse?
