THE NAMESAKE SELF-DISCOVERY The Namesake, a novel by Pulitzer Prize winning author Jhumpa Lahiri, is a novel of which mainly

y deals with the theme of self-discovery. The novel follows the life of Gogol Ganguli from birth until middle age, chronicling his struggle to discover who he is as a second-generation immigrant. Gogol is a troubled kid, and the main thing that irks him is his rather wacky name. His father is a fan of the nineteenth-century Russian writer Nikolai Gogol, and slaps that name on a birth certificate for lack of a better one when his son is born. Growing up, Gogol absolutely despises it. He sees his name as both the cause and the symbol of the way he feels as an IndianAmerican, caught between the Bengali heritage of his parents and the American culture he lives in. In many ways, his odd name is the door through which Lahiri ushers us into the world of the Indian immigrant experience. Lahiri was born in London, the daughter of Indian immigrants from the state of West Bengal. Her family moved to the United States when she was three; Lahiri considers herself an American, stating, "I wasn't born here, but I might as well have been." Lahiri grew up in Kingston, Rhode Island, where her father Amar Lahiri works as a librarian at the University of Rhode Island; he is the basis for the protagonist in "The Third and Final Continent," the closing story from Interpreter of Maladies. Lahiri's mother wanted her children to grow up knowing their Bengali heritage, and her family often visited relatives in Calcutta (now Kolkata). When she began kindergarten in Kingston, Rhode Island, Lahiri's teacher decided to call her by her pet name, Jhumpa, because it was easier to pronounce than her "proper names". Lahiri recalled, "I always felt so embarrassed by my name.... You feel like you're causing someone pain just by being who you are." Lahiri's ambivalence over her identity was the inspiration for the ambivalence of Gogol, the protagonist of her novel The Namesake, over his unusual name. Lahiri graduated from South Kingstown High School and received her B.A. in English literature from Barnard College in 1989. Lahiri then received multiple degrees from Boston University: an M.A. in English, M.F.A. in Creative Writing, M.A. in Comparative Literature, and a Ph.D. in Renaissance Studies. She took a fellowship at Provincetown's Fine Arts Work Center, which lasted for the next two years (19971998). Lahiri has taught creative writing at Boston University and the Rhode Island School of Design. In 2001, Lahiri married Alberto VourvouliasBush, a journalist who was then Deputy Editor of TIME Latin America, and who is now Senior

Editor of Fox News Latino. Lahiri lives in Fort Greene, Brooklyn with her husband and their two children, Octavio and Noor. IDENTITY CRISIS: Which is it Gogol or Nikhil? The readers will get a little tired of all the confusion. Of course, so is Gogol. In fact, he seems the most confused out of everyone by his names. The whole Gogol (his pet name) versus Nikhil (his good name) back-and-forth is a source of constant frustration, consternation, and alienation for the protagonist. It's the central question of the novel: just who exactly is Gogol Ganguli? At first, it seems like Gogol is squarely in the Gogol camp. But doesn't seem like the happiest of kids, so maybe he's already feeling the sting of being a cultural outsider. When he starts school and his father tries to persuade Gogol to go by his good name, Nikhil, Gogol refuses, and we find out, "He is afraid to be Nikhil, someone he doesn't know. Who doesn't know him?" Despite the fact that Nikhil is a Bengali name, and Gogol is an Old Russian dude's last name, Nikhil is the name that, at this point, feels foreign to Gogol. After all, up until this point, he has only really interacted with his family, who has always, called him Gogol. It's the only name he knows. Gogol's name wreaks havoc with him, especially when he enters school. Upon discovering its strangeness, its utter uniqueness, he becomes a bit ashamed of it. And when he heads off to college, he decides to do away with it altogether. Why is Gogol when you can be Nikhil? Not only does Gogol Ganguli have a pet name turned good name, but a last name turned first name. And so it occurs to him that no one he knows in the world, in Russia or India or America or anywhere, shares his name. Not even the source of his namesake. It's telling, too, that in all of Gogol's romantic relationships, he is called Nikhil. In fact, the only people in the novel beside himself who call him Gogol are members of his family. That makes sense while considering the fact that pet names are usually reserved for close loved ones. But

isn't Maxine a loved one? And what about Moushumi, his wife? Why doesn't he allow them to call him Gogol? Honestly, the reader can't help but think it's because Gogol is just as confused as the reader is. He's an American born Bengali son of immigrants, surrounded by rich white folks at schools like Yale and Columbia, and in places like Boston and New York. That's quite the identity crisis. No matter what happens with his identity crisis, Gogol is lucky in one way: he has an awesome family. And as it turns out, that very same family just might be the solution to his woes. Who better to show you who you are than those who know you best? Gogol's father, Ashoke, seems to help him the most. It's only after his dad spills the story of Gogol's name (the horrifying train accident that almost ended his life) that Gogol begins to regret the whole Nikhil thing. And it's only after his father's death (and after his divorce from Moushumi) that Gogol realizes something really important: Without people in the world to call him Gogol, no matter how long he himself lives, Gogol Ganguli will, once and for all, vanish from the lips of loved ones, and so, cease to exist. Yet the thought of this eventual demise provides no sense of victory, no solace. It provides no solace at all. The name itself is not what matters. Gogol the name is not what makes Gogol the man who he is. It's his family. It's the people that call him Gogol that make him who he is, and if he allows his family to die off without allowing himself to truly be Gogol, well then he will simply "cease to exist." So by the end of the novel, we feel pretty secure in our belief that Gogol will put the kibosh on the whole Nikhil thing and start to embrace the name his father gave him. At least, that's the conclusion we arrived at when Gogol began reading the stories of his namesake at the end of the novel.