INTERPRETER OF MALADIES

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER - WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE - PEN/HEMINGWAY AWARD WINNER. With a new foreword by Domenico Starnone, this stunning debut collection flawlessly charts the emotional journeys of characters seeking love beyond the barriers of nations and generations.

With accomplished precision and gentle eloquence, Jhumpa Lahiri traces the crosscurrents set in motion when immigrants, expatriates, and their children arrive, quite literally, at a cultural divide.

A blackout forces a young Indian American couple to make confessions that unravel their tattered domestic peace. An Indian American girl recognizes her cultural identity during a Halloween celebration while the Pakastani civil war rages on television in the background. A latchkey kid with a single working mother finds affinity with a woman from Calcutta. In the title story, an interpreter guides an American family through the India of their ancestors and hears an astonishing confession.

Imbued with the sensual details of Indian culture, these stories speak with passion and wisdom to everyone who has ever felt like a foreigner. Like the interpreter of the title story, Lahiri translates between the strict traditions of her ancestors and a baffling new world.

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208 pages

Average rating: 7.85

73 RATINGS

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1 REVIEW

Community Reviews

E Clou
May 10, 2023
8/10 stars
I know this is a the Pulitzer Prize fiction winner for 2000, but let's pretend for a moment that I don't know that. I think this was a solid collection, but not quite up to 5 stars.

I think the short stories "A Temporary Matter" and "This Blessed House," which were both short stories about married couples were my favorite. I would have enjoyed reading more about either couple in a full-length novel, which is maybe more of a complaint than praise ...read more

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