Jhumpa Lahiri: evaluation

Transcript context

…They’re still on a train, somewhere. Yes, so I waited. I waited for these books and they weren’t coming. Then I said, “Listen, these books . . . I know you kindly sent them, but . . .” Then one thing led to another, and I found myself in Milan and, again, I reignited this interest, and he said, “Why don’t you come over?” And I went to her house. I saw her house, where she used to live, and we had a very interesting conversation. I saw her desk. I saw her things. I saw her paintings, and he gave me all of her books, like a cart full of her books. And that was really exciting. I started reading her with great interest. She’s an incredibly modernist writer. Her language is incredible, essential in its quality. She wrote an extraordinarily powerful book that, if life is long enough and there’s time, I would like to translate, called Nei mari estremi. It’s a two-part memoir of losing her husband. You know, there’re so many books now about grief and the loss of a loved one and what that means. But this was written a long time ago, before all of these books became part of our culture. So that’s an amazing book of hers. She wrote a lot of very interesting novels. She wrote about homecomings to places that don’t exist anymore, also.…

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