The Namesake

For other uses, see Namesake (disambiguation).

The Namesake
First edition cover
Author(s)	Jhumpa Lahiri
Cover artist	Philippe Lardy
Country	India
Language	English
Genre(s)	Fiction
Publisher	Houghton Mifflin
Publication date	September, 2003
Media type	Print (Hardcover and Paperback) and audio-CD
Pages	291 (hardback edition)
ISBN	ISBN 0-395-92721-8 (hardback edition)
OCLC Number	51728729
Dewey Decimal	813/.54 21
LC Classification	PS3562.A316 N36 2003

The Namesake (2003) is the second book by author Jhumpa Lahiri. It was originally a novella published in The New Yorker and was later expanded to a full length novel. It explores many of the same emotional and cultural themes as her Pulitzer Prize-winning short story collection Interpreter of Maladies. Moving between events in Calcutta, Boston, and New York City, the novel examines the nuances involved with being caught between two conflicting cultures with their highly distinct religious, social, and ideological differences.

Plot summary

The novel describes the struggles and hardships of a Bengali couple who immigrate to the United States to form a life outside of everything they are accustomed to.

The story begins as Ashoke and Ashima leave Calcutta, India and settle in Central Square, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Through a series of errors, their son's nickname, Gogol, becomes his official birth name, an event which will shape many aspects of his life.

Summary

As The Namesake opens, Ashima Ganguli is a young bride who is about to deliver her first child in a hospital in Massachusetts. Her husband, Ashoke, is an engineering student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). As she prepares to give birth, she realizes how isolated she has become. If she were still in Calcutta, she would have her baby at home, surrounded by all the women in her family who would administer all the proper Bengali ceremonies and would tell her what to expect. In the United States, Ashima struggles through language and cultural barriers as well as her own fears as she delivers her first child.

The baby boy is healthy and the new parents are prepared to take their son home. But Ashima and Ashoke are stunned to learn that they cannot leave the hospital before they give their son a legal name. The traditional naming process in their families is to have an elder give the new baby a name. They have chosen Ashima's grandmother for this honor. They have written the grandmother to ask her to give the baby a name. But the letter never arrives and soon after, the grandmother dies. In the meantime, Ashoke suggests the name of Gogol. He chooses this name for two reasons. First, it is the name of his favorite author, the famous Russian author. The second reason is that Ashoke, before he was married, had been in a very serious accident. The train he was riding in had derailed. Many people died. Ashoke had broken his back and could not move. He had been reading Gogol just before the accident. He had a page of that book clutched in his hand. The paper caught the attention of the medics who had come to rescue him. If it had not been for that page, acting as a flag in the darkness, Ashoke could have died.

While he insists on being called Gogol in elementary school, by the time he turns 14 he starts to hate the name. His father tries once to explain the significance of it, but he senses that Gogol is not old enough to understand. His parents decide to give him a more public name, which is part of the Bengali tradition—having a private name that only family and friends use and a public name for everything else. They chose Nikhil. Shortly before leaving for college, he travels to the courthouse and has his name legally changed to Nikhil Gogol Ganguli. When Gogol goes off to college, he uses his public name.

This change in name and Gogol's going to Yale, rather than following his father’s footsteps to MIT, sets up the barriers between Gogol and his family. The distance, both geographically and emotionally, between Gogol and his parents continues to increase. He wants to be American, not Bengali. He goes home less frequently, dates American girls, and becomes angry when anyone calls him Gogol. During his college years, he smokes cigarettes and marijuana, goes to many parties, and loses his virginity to a girl he cannot remember.

When he goes home for the summer, Gogol's train is suddenly stopped and temporarily loses electricity. A man had jumped in front of the train and committed suicide, and the wait for the authorities causes a long delay. Ashoke, who is waiting at the train station for Gogol, becomes very concerned when he calls the train company and hears of this incident. When they pull into the Ganguli's driveway, Ashoke turns off the car and finally explains the true significance of Gogol's name. Gogol is deeply troubled by this news, asking his father why he didn't tell him this earlier. He starts to regret changing his name and changing his identity.

He lives in a very small apartment in New York City, where he has landed a job in an established architectural office after graduating from Columbia. He is rather stiff personality-wise, perpetually angry or else always on the lookout for someone to make a stereotypical comment about his background.

At a party, Gogol meets a very attractive and rather socially aggressive Barnard girl named Maxine. Gogol becomes completely wrapped up in her and her family. Maxine's parents are financially well off and live in a four-story house in New York City. Maxine has one floor to herself and invites Gogol to move in. Gogol becomes a member of the family, helping with the cooking and shopping. Maxine's parents appear to have accepted him as a son. When Maxine's parents leave the city for the summer, they invite Maxine and Gogol to join them for a couple of weeks. They are staying in the mountains in New Hampshire, where Maxine's grandparents live. For a while, Gogol is fixed on this very American family.

Gogol introduces Maxine to his parents. Ashima dismisses Maxine as something that Gogol will eventually get over. Shortly after this meeting, Gogol's father dies of a heart attack while he is working on a temporary project in Ohio. Gogol travels to Ohio to gather his father's belongings and his father's ashes. Something inside of Gogol changes. He slowly withdraws from Maxine as he tries to sort out his emotions. Maxine tries to pressure him to open up to her. Gogol breaks off the relationship and begins to spend more time with his mother and sister, Sonia.

Ashima, after some time has gone by, suggests that Gogol contact the daughter of one of her friends. Gogol knows of the woman from his own childhood. Her name is Moushumi, and she has had the unfortunate experience of having planned a wedding only to have her intended groom change his mind at the last minute. Gogol is reluctant to meet with Moushumi for two reasons. She is Bengali, and she is recovering from having been shamed. But he meets her anyway, to please his mother.

Moushumi and Gogol are attracted to one another and eventually are married. However, by the end of their first year of marriage, Moushumi becomes restless. She feels tied down by marriage and begins to regret what she has done. Gogol suspects something is wrong and often feels like a poor substitute for Moushumi's ex-fiance, Graham, who abandoned her. One day, Moushumi comes across the name of a man she knew when she was a senior in high school. She contacts him, and they begin an affair. Gogol finds out. Moushumi and Gogol divorce.

The story ends with Ashima selling the family home so she can live in India with her siblings for half of the year. Sonia is preparing to marry to an American man named Ben. Gogol is once again alone. But he feels comforted by one thing: before his father died, he finally told his son why he had chosen that name for him. By the end of the novel, Gogol has come to accept his name and picks up a collection of the Russian author's stories that his father had given him as a birthday present many years ago.

Characters

The Gangulis

• Ashoke Ganguli: Gogol's father who is nearly killed when he is a young man. Prior to embarking for the United States in the 1970s, he is involved in a horrific train crash.

• Ashima Ganguli: Ashoke's wife who arrives in NewYork after an arranged marriage (Born Ashima Bhaduri).

• Gogol/Nikhil Ganguli: The main character who struggles with his Indo-American identity and rebels against his parents throughout the book

• Sonia/Sonali Ganguli: Gogol's younger sister. Ashoke and Ashima give her only one name to serve as both an official and nickname, in order to avoid the confusion which arose with Gogol's two names. However, nicknames are hard to avoid, especially in Bengali families, so Sonali's name ends up being Sonia.

Gogol's love interests

• Ruth - Gogol's college sweetheart is a white American to whom Gogol is deeply attached. They soon separate after Ruth spends both spring and summer terms in England studying literature. Shortly after Ruth's return to the United States, they begin fighting and decide it is best that they stop seeing each other.

• Maxine - Gogol's first "real" love, Maxine, is of Anglo-Saxon American ethnicity and a member of a liberal and very wealthy Manhattan family. Although the two love each other, they break up due to Gogol's struggles regarding the emotional complications of his father's death. Maxine later gets engaged to another man.

• Moushumi Mazoomdar - Gogol's wife is a childhood friend from another Bengali family. After his breakup with Maxine, Ashima talks Gogol into starting a relationship with Moushumi, particularly due to their shared culture and background. Although she grew up in England, Moushumi shares a great deal in common with Gogol and the two eventually marry. However, their marriage breaks up when Moushumi starts cheating on Gogol with her old love interest, a man named Dimitri.

Film

• The film The Namesake was released in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and India in March 2006. It is directed by Mira Nair and is based upon an adapted screenplay by Sooni Taraporevala.

Bengali version

The Namesake has been published in Bengali from Kolkata, India by Ananda Publishers by the name Samanami.

See also

• ABCD (American-Born Confused Desi), a term Gogol encounters in the book that applies to himself
• Nikolai Gogol

External links

• Powell's review
• 21 Things You Didn't Know About The Namesake, Nirali Magazine, March 2007