While reading Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies, I noticed some common themes between the stories. Specifically, the representation of the Indian community in regards to outsiders was very similar in "A Real Durwan" and "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar."
In "A Real Durwan," Boori Ma is a frail old woman that serves as a sort of doorkeeper for the apartment building that seems to have taken her under its wing. She talks of tales from her old life, both good and bad. Her voice is described as being "brittle with sorrows, as tart as curds, and shrill enough to grate meat from a coconut" (70). From talking about her losses during Partition to reminding the public of her daughter's extravagant wedding, Boori Ma always seems to be rambling on about something or another. Initially, this struck me as kind of annoying and reminded me of those old relatives everyone keeps around but doesn't care to take seriously. However, I soon noticed that I was being presented the situation largely through the eyes of an outsider. Since the narrator is pretty detached, I began noticing the way the people of the apartment building were treating her. They were very dismissive of her legitimacy, both as a storyteller and as a durwan. The title, "A Real Durwan," stems from the fact that none of them consider her to be a proper doorkeeper. In fact, she seems to be living amongst them much like a stray cat would.
Similarly, "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar" concerns a younger woman, Bibi Haldar, who is deemed unmarriable and unlovable due to her sporadic seizures, the cause of which is unknown. She is also described as being kinda ugly and unkempt. This story differs from "A Real Durwan" since, for the first time in the book, this story is narrated from the first person plural, "we." "In the mornings Bibi arrived in the storage room wearing cracked plastic slippers and a housecoat whose hem stopped some inches below the knee ... She bemoaned her fate and challenged her stars as we hung our laundry or scrubbed scales from our fish. She was not pretty" (160). Already we can see that the community is being a little harsh towards Bibi; treating her suffering as volatile and her appearance as subpar. When it turns out the cure for her disease is "the most outrageous of them all," which is to find a husband, the community actually seems to help her get cleaned up and marriage-ready. However, I had to be careful to consider whether this was the Indian community genuinely helping her, or if they were treating her as just another pet or project.
In these two stories, both Boori Ma and Bibi Haldar seem to be overlooked as to having any legitimacy. This made me question what Jhumpa Lahiri's intentions were when writing this book. Instead of presenting India as the ideal homeland and America as a cold new world, Lahiri actually hints at the cons of Indian community. Especially when it came to the treatment of Boori Ma and Bibi Haldar, I noticed that the people weren't as accepting of outsiders as I may have thought.
I definitely saw that, although Lahiri seemed to emphasize that, in India, there was more of a communal aspect to society, there were some draw backs. It seemed like if one was different from the community, they were isolated because of it. Sort of like that mentality of: You are either with us or against us. I suppose this makes Lahiri's depiction of India an unbiased one because we are given the ups and downs of each society.
ReplyDeleteAgreed! Lahiri also doesn't just talk about America as a great new land with opportunities and endless goodness, which is often the kind of mentality that people think immigrants have of America. She does a great job at representing the good and the bad of both sides, which makes for a very realistic read.
ReplyDeleteI really like this post, Pauline! After reading "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar," I began thinking about it in comparison to "The Real Durwan" because the stories are similar in a lot of really important ways. Primarily, the power of the community is apparent. In the case of Boori Ma, the community joins together to throw her out into the streets. On the other hand, in "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar," the community works together to boycott Haldar's store and help Bibi. Here, the community plays a different role but still has the great power it does in "A Real Durwan." This is just one of many great connections between the two stories.
ReplyDeleteI too noticed many similarities between "A Real Durwan" and "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar." I wrote a blog post partly about this and I agree that a huge part of these stories is the sense of community that is found only in India. However, when I wrote my post I was thinking that Lahiri was portraying this community as a wholly positive thing and the isolationist American household as a negative, but I did not think to consider how the community turns on both of these characters in a very negative mob mentality.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I now see much more clearly how Lahiri puts a more negative spin on the indian culture. Your question about what Lahiri's goals were when writing the book is a very good one as well. This post also made me wonder why Lahiri has India be missed in the stories set in America, and then shows its flaws when the stories are set in India.
ReplyDeleteThis is really interesting, I hadn’t really thought before about this story portraying an Indian community in a more negative light than in the other stories. Also the “we” narrative was strange. At some times in the story it seemed like the narrator(s?) were dismissive of Bibi Haldar, but at other times I felt like it was a small group of people split from all the neighbors who actually cared and wanted to help her.
ReplyDeleteI think Lahiri wanted to show us that while India has a strong sense of community, community isn't always a positive thing, especially if a community bands up against one person. Both Boori Ma and Bibi were constantly treated with disrespect, mostly from their communities.
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