Analysis of Jhumpa Lahiri's Stories: 'When Mr. Pirzada Came to Dine'
One of the main concepts in the Indian literature is the diaspora concept. Many 2nd generation diasporic characters with identity crisis are presented in those literary works. Jhumpa Lahiri wrote a collection of short stories about those diasporic people from different generations in order to provide the reader a window with an interesting view on this aspect. In this essay, this issue of the 2nd generation immigrants will be discussed by relating it to Jhumpa Lahiri's short story 'When Mr. Pirzada came to dine'.
Being away from homeland and adapting a new life in a completely different environment and culture challenges the diasporic people on many levels and creates more than one crisis including the crisis of identity. In 'When Mr. Pirzada came to dine', this aspect is shown to the reader from Lilia's – a 10-year-old child of an Indian couple – point of view. Being a 2nd generation immigrant is much more challenging, as the 1st generation usually stay rooted to their homeland's culture and traditions. And the 3rd generation immigrants get easily assimilated into the new country. 2nd generation immigrants are torn between two cultures with no sense of belonging to neither of them, which is the case of Lilia.
Out of curiosity and fondness, she paid attention to Mr. Pirzada's situation and discovered that he belongs nowhere, which is similar to her own situation. As she was born and lived her whole life in America, she had a limited view on the Indian culture including the politics there at that time which was through the news seen by her just like any foreigner. Unlike her parents and Mr. Pirzada that had a strong connection with their roots.
She is blamed for not knowing enough about the Indian-Pakistani political situation at that time, as we can see in her father's tone: 'What exactly do they teach you at school?'. Being an American-born child and enrolled in an American school she is expected to be just as American as all the other kids and to behave, think and feel the same way they do. She is also expected to be assimilated regardless of her inner sense of belonging. This concept can be seen when she was slightly reprimanded by her teacher as she tried to read a book about Pakistan that could give her an idea of the shared culture between it and India: “Is this book a part of your report, Lilia? […] Then I see no reason to consult it'.
What confused her even more is that she saw Mr. Perzada as Indian as her and her parents due to him specking the same language, having the same skin color and the same cultural habits. Also, the fact that he shared with them their meals - having the same food taste - and had the same manner as them made her question her identity more as she was told by her father that he is not Indian anymore and was different from them. The confusion can be seen in her words: 'It made no sense to me. Mr. Pirzada and my parents spoke the same language, laughed at the same jokes, looked more or less the same. '
This is how Lilia developed an identity crisis from a young age which was reflected on her perspective on many aspects including her view on Mr. Pirzada's situation. Lilia struggled to assimilate into the American culture and at the same time maintaining being rooted to the Indian culture and Lahiri keeps the story open-ended when it comes to the fact of whether Lilia fully assimilated or not.
Lahiri is an American-born to an immigrant Bengali couple and this is the reason that made her writings on this issue realistic and accurate. Lilie's character with all her inner thoughts, feelings and conflicted identity could be considered as a representation of Lahiri's inner self when she was at that age. This interesting writing technique is used in order to be connected with the reader on a personal level, which is one of the reasons that made Lahiri among the best writers of the Indian literature.
