Jhumpa Lahiri, Pulitzer Prize winning author and professor of creative writing at Princeton University, sat down at Hofstra Hall on Oct. 10 to discuss her work and answer questions from students. Later that evening, she read at the Great Writers, Great Readings event at the Helene Fortunoff Theater in Monroe Lecture Center.
Lahiri’s work hones in on identity and dislocation. Her short story collection “Interpreter of Maladies” – which won the Pulitzer Prize – and novels “The Namesake” and “The Lowland” have received critical acclaim and international success.
“I have never been able to idealize my childhood, and my writing comes out of my unease,” Lahiri said, while surrounded by about 50 students and professors in Hofstra Hall.
Shortly after winning the Pulitzer Prize in 2000, Lahiri abandoned writing in English and moved to Rome to immerse herself in Italian.
“In Rome I spoke English, Bengali and Italian everyday,” she said, when commenting on the autonomy and anonymity she found in a distant culture. “I felt at peace in every way.”
Lahiri held up a blue pocket-sized notebook filled with scribbled memos. “I still keep a notebook in Italian,” she said.
While in the United States, she obsessed over the language and worked with a tutor to accelerate her learning.
“I used the time with him and our weekly meetings as sort of lovely deadlines,” she said. The notes that she kept were used as the source material for her book, “In Other Words,” which was written entirely in Italian and then translated into English by Ann Goldstein.
“The book grew out of self-imposed homework exercises,” Lahiri said.
“I really enjoyed what she had to say about her experience as a writer infatuated with the Italian language,” said Brenna Lilly, a freshman English major. “I also feel that hearing a writer read their own work is important because you get to hear their intended tone.”
Lahiri’s talk at Hofstra Hall was one that focused on writing. She jokingly compared the “transformative” and “liberating” attributes of writing in a foreign language to that of other mediums of creative inspiration. “That’s Italian for me … it’s not just in the form of a pill or a bottle.”
The Great Writers, Great Readings usually takes place in the Guthart Cultural Center Theater, but Lahiri’s reading was an exception.
“I always go to the Great Writers, Great Readings when I can because usually they’re small,” said Erinn Slanina, a sophomore English major.
After Lahiri answered questions ranging from the nature of the Italian publishing industry to the language in which she dreams, the night came to an end like a fire slowly burning out.