Jhumpa Lahiri - Interpreter of Maladies

This book is amazing. It is nine short stories of different people in different circumstances that are an easy read as short stories should be. The stories leave you unsatiated - begging for more - but without the pleasure of asking the author whether there is a sequel. Perhaps there is more to be told but perhaps that is really the end of the story and there is no more to add.

When I read the book, I had just come from a malady that needed to be 'interpreted'.  I marvelled at times when one is sick and under the weather and one cannot explain to the Doctor just what one feels except that they have some malaise. I wondered how Doctors manage to treat patients who have clear symptoms but for whom the tests reveal nothing.  (No wonder doctors have 'invented' placebos and my people are often known to sigh with desperation that some sinister powers were at play.) After paying hefty consultation fees and lab tests, the Doctor was none the wiser and adviced me to rest and take lots of water. I stared at the doctor incredulously as I expected my sickness  to be intepreted beyond being told the obvious.  I was also drawn to the  short story titled 'Treatment of Bibi Haldar'. Can one have a disease that cannot be interpreted and hence cannot be dealt with?

In Jhumpa's book, the interpreter of maladies has the fanthom task of 'translating' people's maladies into a language the Doctor could understand as the patients and the doctor were on very different language planes.  It must have been difficult for the interpreter as for the patient. The Doctor-Patient relationship has a lot of sanctity and a third party should not really be privy to the secret ailings of the patients.  This reminded me of my dad's Somali patients from Mombasa's old town.  They often came with the neighbours to interpret their maladies.

 

My best story was that of Mrs Sen. I cannot rationally explain why I was drawn to this story most.  The relationship between little Elliot and Mrs Sen.  Mrs Sen drew much comfort in her ward who - though a child - understood her challenges.  Challenges of being in a foreign land...

I loved the 'Third and Final Continent'.  As we are in the race to our respective destinies, I could not but admire the indefatigable 103 year old Mrs Croft. I  was quite touched by sentence burried somewhere in the narrator's thoughts....when my son is discouraged, I tell him that if I can survive on three continents, then there is no obstacle he cannot conquer.

When all is said (read) and done, I enjoyed all the stories. Different Strokes.