In modern society the problem of marriage is very important. The family is a basis of each society and country. Only in good family the man can grew up and show his value and character. There are many views and cultural traditions in different parts of world about engagement, marriage, and family. The United States have unique situation where these features combine. The majority of immigrants believe that marriages will work and last if married couples are from similar cultural, national, and racial backgrounds. Parents also advise their children to date people who are like them, ethnically and culturally. I think, that the nationality has not a first place in marriage. Our world is very interconnected and influenced by globalization. Therefore, the common interests and understanding become the basis for relations and marriage. The life story is more eloquent illustration of this idea.
The plot of The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri is not about a young man who suffered greatly in his life due to his comical name. This is a very American romance novel, in the sense that America is country made of immigrants, that millions of the first generation Americans start of their life with "strange names", or better yet with a need to find themselves in the New World, without braking their family, ethical and cultural ties.
Gogol, the son of Bengali immigrants, had relations with many women. There was unknown girl, with whom he lost his virginity; Ruth, with whom he spent almost year in Yale College. Also, he has relation with another American girl Maxine, and their relation was broken after Gogol father’s death. It was not sudden process. Gogol began his journey back to his family and culture. The new love in Gogol’s life is the sign of revival his respect to family background and ethnicity.
Moushumi Mozoomdar is from Bengali family also. Her and Gogol’s families had supported contact during their American life. As Gogol, Moushumi was on the crossroad of cultures – American and Bengali traditions. Moushumi was negatively influenced by her mother’s experience of family life, very sluggish tradition, relatives’ pressure in marriage settings and ceremonies.
Moushumi’s experience with her fiance Graham was her, because this guy “was a part of… American expatriates”. He “fooled everyone, including her”. He didn’t accept her entirely. By the time, when Moushumi meets with Gogol, she is ready to begin relations with a Bengali man. Gogol, in the contrast to Graham, is “very familiar”. Moushumi considers Gogol as a closest friend and conversable. Also, Gogol perceives Moushumi the same way.
In spite of Moushumi’s decision “never to marry a Bengali man,” she accepts Gogol as an American man with Bengali origin. Her decision is an opposition of excessive submission to Bengali culture. But Gogol turns her opinion. Gogol had tried to be real American during his whole life. That made him more American than Bengali. However, he could not completely reject his nationality. The common origin gives them the way of mutual understanding.
Long relations between Gogol and Moushumi lead to a new stage. The event, which happens on the Moushumi American friends’ party, is the striking example and early sign of the problem in family relations. Moushumi, being slightly tipsy, divulge that Gogol changed his name, she tells about that very flippantly. She puts him in a situation where he has to tell, how his parents named him Gogol. This situation is very unexpected and disappointed for Gogol. Something absolutely private is exposed to people, who do not merit respect. Moushumi does not like her native background. “She is always flattered when her students assume she herself is French, or half-French” (p.253). She said that she hated to be Moushumi. She extends her opinion to Gogol. By this way Moushumi offends Gogol. The same situation happened in Gogol’s life earlier. It’s relation with Maxine was broken, when Gogol realized the differences between him and his American girlfriend. However it is another situation now. Moushumi is the Bengali woman and their parents blessed their marriage. Moushumi’s thoughtless act is very meaningful and deplorable for Gogol, and it seems the relationship will not last.
Then Moushumi falls under her friend’s influence, particularly Astrid who says, “I just do not see you with some Indian guy” (248). From this moment Moushumi tries to convince herself, that she loves Gogol, that she likes his lifestyle, “that he is neither a doctor nor an engineer”, but she understands, that it is not really true.
Moushumi understands how grateful she had felt when Gogol had reappeared in her life after breaking up with Graham. Also, she realizes Gogol “had accepted her, had obliterated her former disgrace” (p.249). Yet, the time spending with him does not gratify her. She does not have enough feelings for him. In spite of proverb “the living with darling in a shelter of branches is like a paradise”, Moushumi takes notice of conditions of life, “that Nikhil has a respectable if not terribly lucrative job. It would have been different with Graham – he had made more than enough for both of them”(p.254). Her cogitations and smoldering discontent become apparent while having dinner at a restaurant. She cannot express her feelings and just tells, “…It’s not what I thought it would be”(p.252). This is a sign of her deep depression in family relations. She tries to understand her own inner world and grasp her feelings. At this moment, Gogol reminds Moushumi symbolically about her vow “never to marry a Bengali man”. After many years the childish oath comes back and brings breakup in mutual understanding in family of Gogol and Moushumi.
In spite of her attachment to Gogol, Moushumi recognizes that she does not really need a Bengali man. She has become completely American. Her relationship with Gogol, as everything in her life, is a temporary event. After many years she gets a chance to meet with Dimitri Desjardins, her frustrated boyfriend from high school and college. She rekindles her relation with the new old friend. It is adultery that is so peculiar to American society. She accepts new lifestyle very strongly that even marriage with man from her similar origin could not stop her to break family life.
By the example of Gogol’s life we can see that common origin and similar culture could be a guarantee for lasting relations. Both of them, Moushumi and Gogol, have a common origin, ethnicity, and parents’ agreement for their marriage. However, they do not have common interests and goals in life. Our lives consist not only from origin and national roots, but also upbringing and lifestyle, habits and ways of thinking, temperament and life experience. There are so many divorces by people of similar background to each other. The constancy and absolute understanding are more important for lovers.
December 2007
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