Ontological Ambivalence in Jhumpa Lahiri's Works
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Living in the Middle of Nowhere: Ontological Ambivalence in Jhumpa Lahiri’s Works ____________________________________________ A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Letters Keio University ____________________________________________ In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Literature ____________________________________________ by Shunsuke Shiga October 2019 Contents Acknowledgments . iii Prologue . 1 Chapter 1 Coming out of Nowhere: The Ambivalence of Realism and Unrealism in The Namesake . 49 Chapter 2 Drowning in Sentimentality: The Tradition of Sympathy in “Hema and Kaushik” . 94 Chapter 3 Re-rooting/Re-routing Travel to the Home: The Lowland as a Reinterpretation of The Scarlet Letter . 155 Chapter 4 Displaced American Authority: In Other Words as a Quasi-Autobiography . 211 Epilogue . 249 Bibliography . 263 Acknowledgments The evolution of this dissertation was made possible by teachers, colleagues, friends, and family around the world. It is impossible to fully show my gratitude here because I believe that all the encounters in my life explicitly and implicitly affected this dissertation. However, I would like to express my appreciation to some of those who made it possible to write. At Keio University, I learned not only the discipline of Literary Studies but also a passion and sincere commitment to it. First of all, I am truly grateful to my supervisor, Professor Takayuki Tatsumi, who first encouraged me to study American literature at graduate school. The whole dissertation was guided by his insightful suggestions and sharp intellect. When I was finishing the master’s course, I had decided to be an English teacher at a junior and senior high school in Japan. Without his suggestion that I should go on to work towards a Ph.D., I would not have written this dissertation. Although it sometimes felt hard to study while working in a full-time job as an English teacher, I was able to remain dedicated to my research because I wanted to repay his faith in me. Professor Yoshiko Uzawa’s class at graduate school inspired me a lot and constituted the transpacific and transatlantic framework of my study. Also, my sincere gratitude goes to Professor Hisayo Ogushi, who gave me invaluable advice on my papers and presentations. In particular, the iii iv second chapter of this dissertation owes much to her graduate class. She also introduced me to Brown University when I was looking for a university in the United States with which to affiliate as a Fulbright researcher. Along with these outstanding professors, I was fortunate to have enthusiastic fellow Ph.D. candidates in American literature: Shogo Tanokuchi, Yumiko Koizumi, and Kaori Hosono. Conversations with them were always inspiring. I would like to thank another Ph.D. candidate, Thae Ho Jo. Although his field is medieval English literature, while mine is contemporary American literature, we have encouraged each other since we entered graduate school in 2010. I am sincerely thankful for the funding from the Fulbright Scholarship Program, which enabled me to study at Brown University as a visiting research fellow from September 2018 to August 2019. Without the scholarship, this dissertation would not have been as it is. The scholarship offered me not only funding but also precious opportunities to become friends with Fulbrighters from all over the world. I learned from them the importance of respecting and sharing our ideas and cultural values, regardless of different nationalities. Also, the Japanese Association for American Studies and the Modern Language Association provided me with travel funds to attend their annual meetings in the United States while I was affiliated with Brown. At Brown University, Professor Susan Smulyan guided me as a supervisor. She helped me enormously to become accustomed to life at Brown. Professor Robert G. Lee generously allowed v me to attend his inspiring “Transpacific America” class. I was fortunate to be able to study the latest developments in transpacific studies. What I learned from his class and from other students are reflected in this dissertation. In addition, it was a joy for me to see Professor Emeritus Barton Levi St. Armand. His studies in nineteenth-century American poetry, H. P. Lovecraft, and Japanese haiku fascinated me. After seeing him in Providence, he kindly sent me a review about Jhumpa Lahiri, which I quote in the epilogue of this dissertation. While studying at Brown, I also had opportunities to see remarkable literary intellectuals outside the university. The highlight was my visit to Ohio State University to see Professor Brian McHale. Deeply impressed by his studies in postmodernism, I was delighted to see him. He and his wife, Professor Esther Gottlieb, welcomed me and my wife, Risa, at their home in Columbus for five days. Although busy, they showed us around the campus of the OSU and the city of Columbus. We will never forget their kindness. Our stay was more than inspiring: Professor McHale showed me not only academic books but also works of art, such as postmodern architecture, the beautiful music of Antonín Dvořák, and American comic books. Knowing that I had published an academic journal article about the Beatles, he let me listen to the original vinyl records of the band, which was really fun. He also introduced me to Professor James Phelan, who wrote a chapter about Lahiri in his Somebody Telling Somebody Else, and a specialist in postcolonial studies, Professor Pranav Jani. In addition to these distinguished scholars, it was a vi great honor to meet a remarkable science fiction author in Providence, Mr. Paul Di Filippo. As a local author, he told me interesting stories about literary figures in Providence, such as Edgar Allan Poe and his fiancée, Sarah Helen Whitman. I should not forget to mention professors at Roger Williams University who formed the basis of my literary study. As the supervisor of my senior thesis, a former professor, Dr. Dianne Comiskey, exposed me to the work of a number of contemporary female writers, including Lahiri. Even after graduation, I owed much to her, as she kindly wrote a recommendation letter for the Fulbright scholarship. I also learned the joy of studying American literature from Professor James Tackach. I truly admire his passion both for literature and baseball. Before writing this dissertation, I published in scholarly journals and delivered academic presentations. I would like to express my sincere appreciation to the American Literature Society of Japan and the English Literary Society of Japan in particular. I was fortunate to receive comments from acclaimed Japanese scholars at conferences. Dialogue with specialists of Asian American literature established the basis of my study in Lahiri: Professor Hideyuki Yamamoto of Kobe University, Professor Takashi Aso of Waseda University, and Professor Rie Makino of Nihon University—to name a few. I had only limited awareness of previous studies in Lahiri; their outstanding studies guided me like torchlight in darkness. vii In addition to these scholars, I would like to mention others to whom I feel grateful. First are the library staff of Rogers Free Library in Downtown Bristol, which was located literally beside the backyard of my apartment while I was affiliated with Brown. I really enjoyed studying in the warm atmosphere that they created. They reminded me of the most fundamental and most important thing about literature: love for books. Second are my former students of Seiko Gakuin Junior and Senior High School. I have many memories of them from the four and a half years I spent with them. Although I was only a teacher, they often overwhelmed me with their intelligence, because they were some of the smartest students in Japan. It was one of the hardest decisions in my life to quit the job in order to concentrate on the dissertation, because I profoundly enjoyed being with them. I will never forget their warm wishes and tears on my last day in the job. I do not think that they will read this dissertation, but I would like to tell them, “I love you!” Also, my gratitude goes to Mr. Jeremy Lowe, who thoroughly proofread this dissertation. Last but not least, I wish to thank my family, both in Japan and in the United States. Their support and understanding enabled me to literally practice transpacific study between the two countries. In particular, I want to heartily express my gratitude to Risa, who has encouraged me throughout all of my Ph.D. days. He’s a real nowhere man Sitting in his nowhere land Making all his nowhere plans for nobody Doesn’t have a point of view Knows not where he’s going to Isn’t he a bit like you and me? ——The Beatles, “Nowhere Man” Prologue The iconic American musician and 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature winner Bob Dylan recollected that the United States witnessed a drastic change in the 1960s. Concerning this turbulent era, marked by such historic events as the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the Civil Rights Movement, and the Vietnam War, he remarked as follows: “If you were here around that time, you would know that the early Sixties, up to maybe ’64, ’65, was really the Fifties, still the same culture, in America anyway. And it was still going strong but fading away. Then, by the time of Woodstock [in 1969], there was no more Fifties” (44). As if responding to the unprecedented turmoil that surrounded Americans, Dylan performed his first electric concert at the Newport Folk Festival on July 25, 1965. Some in the audience complained about the change in his musical style; they even booed and called out, angry at this change. However, what he stated implies that he was so keenly aware that the times were changing that he had to renew his music in order to express the upheaval of the era.