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Acclaimed writer Jhumpa Lahiri's latest book is a collection of short stories with a common thread: sincerity about Roman life.
roman tales reflects on the lives of teenagers, women, men and families whose destiny seems to be linked to their roots; to the Rome they inhabit and, in many cases, to the land they once inhabited. The translation by Carlos Gumpert, from Lumen, can now be found in Spanish bookstores.
The writer
As unusual as it may be, the good reader of the stories that make up roman tales deserves an introduction to its author. Celebrated in literary circles and praised by critics, Jhumpa Lahiri is well known among book consumers; although, their stories belong to a less popular life experience. Of Bengali parents and born in the United Kingdom, the writer spent her childhood and youth in the United States, where she studied at Boston University and published her first books in English. What's more, after beating the Pulitzer Prize with The interpreter of pain (1999) and his book being chosen unaccustomed land (2008) as Best Book of the Year 2008 by The New York Times -among other no less important recognitions-; he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2012.
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However, Lahiri, whose maturity was already the result of several migrations and mixing of cultures, chose to condemn success and moving with his family to Italy; a decision closely linked to the need to build one’s own identity. The radicality of his change was such that he abandoned English to learn Italian, and even his last writings were written in the Romance language. With roman tales Jhumpa Lahiri's personal journey converges into a nuanced analysis of the city of Romeon those who flee from it and on those who take refuge in it.
A subtle exercise against intolerance
The truth is that, despite many trying to forget it, the value of literature does not lie only in its power of abstraction, of pleasurable leisure or of beautifying language; in the same way that painting, music and the arts that complement them, constitute a key to minds that have been caged in ignorance. Whoever places Jhumpa Lahiri's book in your hands is at your disposalconsciously or not, Eliminate prejudices and make the reality of many part of yours.
Example of this exercise is The border, the story that begins the collection. Written with an elegance that pays attention to every detail, it results in a reflection of Western societies: two opposing realities coexist. An invisible wall reproduces the blindness of the most fortunate to the injustices that oppress others. ANY, The date, a story full of resentment towards the silences that mistreat. Lahiri reveals in it the constant fight against racism and the ways in which it remains permeated in society.
They're not the only ones, all their stories come unexpected endings that impact the reader like meteorites of thought. In just a few paragraphs the writer surprises with new and necessary perspectives.
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Enter the city to understand life
roman tales is to see Rome with different eyes, forget the ideal romantic look for tourists and start to perceive it as it is: a heterogeneous city inhabited by people with minds and hearts as diverse as the obstacles they have faced in their lives. Then, The staircase transforms an urban element into a vertex of joy and restlessness that, for ordinary walkers, only causes indifference.
The desire to read entire novels starring the characters in your stories is indescribable. In P parties, the passion of a married writer for a woman in the same condition performs a microscopic exploration of the way of being of the Italian privileged class family. It's like finishing reading and wanting to grab life thanks to a denouement that recedes while deepening its initial knot.
In short, the words and resources used by Jhumpa Lahiri are easily comparable to the arteries that carry life. The development of each space, meditation and act is done with metaphors and images whose symbolic value exponentially enriches the story.