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Discussion for The Namesake
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Discussion Questions (from Reading Group Guides and the publisher)1. The Namesake opens with Ashima Ganguli trying to make a spicy Indian snack from American ingredients --- Rice Krispies and Planters peanuts --- but "as usual, there's something missing." How does Ashima try and make over her home in Cambridge to remind her of what she's left behind in Calcutta? Throughout The Namesake, how does Jhumpa Lahiri use food and clothing to explore cultural transitions --- especially through rituals, like the annaprasan, the rice ceremony? Some readers have said that Lahiri's writing makes them crave the meals she evokes so beautifully. What memories or desires does Lahiri bring up for you? Does her writing ever make you "hunger"?
2. The title The Namesake reflects the struggles Gogol Ganguli goes through to identify with his unusual names. How does Gogol lose first his public name, his bhalonam, and then his private pet name, his daknam? How does he try to remake his identity, after choosing to rename himself, and what is the result? How do our names precede us in society, and how do they define us? Do you have a pet name, or a secret name --- and has that name ever become publicly known? Do different people call you by different names? Did you ever wish for a new name? How are names chosen in your family?
3. Newsweek said of Lahiri's Pulitzer Prize–winning collection of short stories, Interpreter of Maladies, "Jhumpa Lahiri writes such direct, translucent prose you almost forget you're reading." The Namesake is also subtle in style, elegant, and realistically paced. How are the events of the novel simultaneously dramatic and commonplace? What details made the characters real to you? Did you ever lose yourself in the story?
4. When Gogol is born, the Gangulis meet other Bengali families with small children, and Ashima finds that with a new baby "perfect strangers, all Americans, suddenly take notice of her, smiling, congratulating her for what she's done." How, for all of us, do children change our place in the community, and what we expect from it? Have you ever connected with someone you may have otherwise never spoken to --- of a different ethnic background or economic class --- through their children or your own?
5. In his youth, Ashoke Ganguli is saved from a massive train wreck in India. When his son, Gogol, is born, Ashoke thinks, "Being rescued from that shattered train had been the first miracle of his life. But here, now, reposing in his arms, weighing next to nothing but changing everything, is the second." Is Ashoke's love for his family more poignant because of his brush with death? Why do you think he hides his past from Gogol? What moments define us more --- accidents or achievements, mourning or celebration?
6. Lahiri has said, "The question of identity is always a difficult one, but especially for those who are culturally displaced, as immigrants are . . . who grow up in two worlds simultaneously." What do you think Gogol wants most from his life? How is it different from what his family wants for him, and what they wanted when they first came to America to start a family? How have expectations changed between generations in your own family? Do you want something different for your own children from what your parents wanted for you?
7. Jhumpa Lahiri has said of The Namesake, "America is a real presence in the book; the characters must struggle and come to terms with what it means to live here, to be brought up here, to belong and not belong here." Did The Namesake allow you to think of America in a new way? Do you agree that America is a real presence in The Namesake? How is India also a presence in the book?
8. The marriage of Ashima and Ashoke is arranged by their families. The closest intimacy they share before their wedding is when Ashima steps briefly, secretly, into Ashoke's shoes. Gogol's romantic encounters are very different from what his parents experienced or expected for their son. What draws Gogol to his many lovers, especially to Ruth, Maxine, and eventually Moushumi? What draws them to him? From where do you think we take our notions of romantic love --- from our family and friends, or from society and the media? How much does your cultural heritage define your ideas and experience of love?
9. Lahiri explores in several ways the difficulty of reconciling cross-cultural rituals around death and dying. For instance, Ashima refuses to display the rubbings of gravestones young Gogol makes with his classmates. And when Gogol's father suddenly dies, Gogol's relationship with Maxine is strained and quickly ends. Why do you think their love affair can't survive Gogol's grief? How does the loss of Gogol's father turn him back toward his family? How does it also change Sonia and Ashima's relationship?
10. Did you find the ending of The Namesake surprising? What did you expect from Moushumi and Gogol's marriage? Do you think Moushumi is entirely to blame for her infidelity? Is Gogol a victim at the end of the book? In the last few pages of The Namesake, Gogol begins to read "The Overcoat" for the first time --- the book his father gave him, by his "namesake." Where do you imagine Gogol will go from here?
I'm glad that this book was chosen and that I read it. It gets me inside the experience of immigrants, how they maintain ties to their cultural of origin, adapt them (did you know that you can use Cream of Wheat to make an Indian treat?), and assimilate as much as they want to or need to.
The story starts in Cambridge where Ashoke is studying at MIT. The town is quite familiar to me since my daughter and her family live there. Each of them has friends and colleagues from around the world and a rare born-and-raised in Cambridge one. I think it is strange that the author never names the town where they live next. It is in the Boston area, has at least one college. That describes so many possibilities. From what my daughter says, it is very typical for Cambridge to be just a stopping-off place. People come for grad school and the start of their careers, then move a little farther out or far away. Cambridge is about the size of my school district in Oregon. Both have many elementary schools, but Cambridge has only 2 middle schools and one high school compared to our 10-12 and 6. Students and their families move away.
I wonder if Gogol would have changed his name at age 18 if his father had told him the story of his train accident. It sometimes surprises me that he chose an Indian name rather than an American one.
Ashima and Ashoke socialize with a large group of Indians, apparently all Bengalis except for the Punjabis they met their first year. Their social connections are not as child-oriented as the question indicates. Many of us spend our time with families we have met through their kids: classmates, teammates, organizations. For many of us that extends to volunteer work in schools or groups such as Girl Scouts and goes beyond our children's own involvement.
Many children of immigrants and first-generation college grads choose or are pushed toward certain majors. Gogol is expected to choose medicine, law or engineering. He chooses architecture, which is not that different from engineering but brings in the artist of his grandfather. Moushumi's parents are pleased that she chose chemistry, but did not know of her double-major in French and that it was her true love for a career.
The ending does lead to a question of what next? He is reading The Overcoat finally. Will he read more Russian works? Will he change his name back or at least be more comfortable with being called Gogol (or Goggles) by his family?
The story starts in Cambridge where Ashoke is studying at MIT. The town is quite familiar to me since my daughter and her family live there. Each of them has friends and colleagues from around the world and a rare born-and-raised in Cambridge one. I think it is strange that the author never names the town where they live next. It is in the Boston area, has at least one college. That describes so many possibilities. From what my daughter says, it is very typical for Cambridge to be just a stopping-off place. People come for grad school and the start of their careers, then move a little farther out or far away. Cambridge is about the size of my school district in Oregon. Both have many elementary schools, but Cambridge has only 2 middle schools and one high school compared to our 10-12 and 6. Students and their families move away.
I wonder if Gogol would have changed his name at age 18 if his father had told him the story of his train accident. It sometimes surprises me that he chose an Indian name rather than an American one.
Ashima and Ashoke socialize with a large group of Indians, apparently all Bengalis except for the Punjabis they met their first year. Their social connections are not as child-oriented as the question indicates. Many of us spend our time with families we have met through their kids: classmates, teammates, organizations. For many of us that extends to volunteer work in schools or groups such as Girl Scouts and goes beyond our children's own involvement.
Many children of immigrants and first-generation college grads choose or are pushed toward certain majors. Gogol is expected to choose medicine, law or engineering. He chooses architecture, which is not that different from engineering but brings in the artist of his grandfather. Moushumi's parents are pleased that she chose chemistry, but did not know of her double-major in French and that it was her true love for a career.
The ending does lead to a question of what next? He is reading The Overcoat finally. Will he read more Russian works? Will he change his name back or at least be more comfortable with being called Gogol (or Goggles) by his family?
So far I've really enjoyed this novel. Lahiri's prose has this certain 'distant' quality to it...yet there is also a poignancy to the way she writes. There are few dialogues and we never navigate the character's thoughts, still, we come to know them through their actions. I have only a few chapters left and can't really tell how the story will end.
Lahiri has a gift for curating detail in a way that allows readers to easily fall in step with her characters. The writing feels simple and sparse, yet contains a subtle intensity that keeps the reader connected. Lahiri also leaves space, trusting the reader to fill in the characters’ emotions, but it never felt like anything was left out. I enjoyed observing the growth of each character and how the world shaped them in both expected and unexpected ways.This was an excellent choice!
About the Book (from Reading Group Guides and the Publicher)
From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri's critically acclaimed first novel is a finely wrought, deeply moving family drama that illuminates her signature themes: the immigrant experience, the clash of cultures, the tangled ties between generations.
The Namesake takes the Ganguli family from their tradition-bound life in Calcutta through their fraught transformation into Americans. On the heels of an arranged marriage, Ashoke and Ashima Ganguli settle in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where Ashoke does his best to adapt while his wife pines for home. When their son, Gogol, is born, the task of naming him betrays their hope of respecting old ways in a new world. And we watch as Gogol stumbles along the first-generation path, strewn with conflicting loyalties, comic detours, and wrenching love affairs.
About the Author
Jhumpa Lahiri is the author of four works of fiction: INTERPRETER OF MALADIES, THE NAMESAKE, UNACCUSTOMED EARTH and THE LOWLAND. She has received numerous awards, including the Pulitzer Prize, the PEN/Hemingway Award, the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award, the Premio Gregor von Rezzori, the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature, a 2014 National Humanities Medal, awarded by President Barack Obama, and the Premio Internazionale Viareggio-Versilia, for IN ALTRE PAROLE.