"When I first started writing I was not conscious that my subject was the Indian-American experience. What drew me to my craft was the desire to force the two worlds I occupied to mingle on the page as I was not brave enough, or mature enough, to allow in life."*
Nilanjana Sudeshna Lahiri (ঝুম্পা লাহিড়ী in Bengali) was born on July 11, 1967 in London to two Indian immigrants from West Bengal. Two years later, her family moved to the Kingston, Rhode Island in the United States. In kindergarten, her teacher called her by her nickname "Jhumpa", which caused her to think "I always felt so embarrassed by my name... You feel like you're causing someone pain just by being who you are."** Despite her English birth and West Bengalese heritage, Jhumpa considers herself American and has stated that “I wasn’t born here, but I might as well have been.” In a city dominated by a white demographic, Jhumpa’s mother felt that it was important that she and her siblings grow up knowing about and embracing their Bengali heritage. As a result, her family often visited their relatives in Calcutta, the capital of West Bengal.
Jhumpa later graduated from South Kingstown High school and at the age of 22, earned a B.A. in English Literature from Barnard College in New York City, New York. She was not content with just one degree however, and proceeded to earn four impressive degrees from Boston University, including: an M.A. in English and Comparative Literature, an M.F.A. in Creative Writing and a Ph.D. in Renaissance Studies. She had a brief two year fellowship at Provincetown’s Fine Arts Work Center which lasted from 1997-1999 and has also taught creative writing at both Boston University and the Rhode Island School of Design. Her passion for writing manifested itself in her very first publication, Interpreter of Maladies, a collection of short stories that examine the troubles of Indians and Indian immigrants and often address themes such as “marital difficulties, miscarriages, and the disconnection between first and second generation United States immigrants.”
In 2001 Jhumpa married journalist Alberto Vourvoulias-Bush who was at the time the Deputy Editor of Time Latin America, and now resides as senior editor. Her new marriage did not stop her from pursuing her passion in writing however, and in 2003 she published her first novel, The Namesake. The Namesake tells a 30 year story of the Ganguli family and explores what happens where there is a culture class between the highly different cultures of the United States and West Bengal. This award-winning novel was adapted into a film of the same name in March 2007, in which Lahiri made a brief cameo as “Aunt Jhumpa.”
Nine years after her first publication of short stories, she released a second collection called Unaccustomed Earth, which received the prestigious debut as number 1 on The New York Times best seller list. Two years later, she became a member of the Committee on the Arts and Humanities. In 2013, her most recent novel The Lowland was released and placed in consideration to receive the Man Booker Prize and was also a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction. Currently, Lahiri lives in either Brooklyn, New York or Rome, Italy with her husband and their two children, Octavio and Noor.
*Lahiri, Jhumpa. "My Two Lives", Newsweek, 2006.
**Anastas, Benjamin. "Books: Inspiring Adaptation", Men's Vogue, March 2007.
