Her previous three novels which I've read - The Namesake (2003), Unaccustomed Earth (2008) and The Lowland (2013) were all written in English although I have also read her translation of Domenico Starnone's Lacci as Ties (my review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...), a book it's difficult not to see as a response to Elena Ferrante's I giorni dell'abbandono, translated as The Days of Abandonment by Ann Goldstein.

Whereabouts by Jhumpa Lahiri | Goodreads Whereabouts by Jhumpa Lahiri | Goodreads

It probably grew out of my frequent crossing of Ponte Garibaldi in Rome, the bridge that takes me from Trastevere and leads to the Jewish Ghetto on the other side of the Tiber, where there is a library, housed in the Centro Studi Americani, that I love to work in. I discovered it when I was living in Rome, and I began writing this piece of fiction there. A total solitude that sincerely suffocates the reader, the protagonist seems deliberately created without the possibility to ask and give herself the reason of things and without strength and desire for a "real" change. In Italian we’ll call it a "piagnona". This is the kind of writing that is easy to slap the label 'navel-gazing' upon but that would be ungracious. Not everything has to be "oh! look at the state of the world", it can be about solitude, the pleasure of figs and the delights of the local stationery shop. She’s in tune with the rhythms and seasons of her city. How important is her hometown to her? Is there something particularly Italian about this sense of place? My favourite chapters are about the character and her mother. That's complicated but so well-written.This is a character I will think about for years to come. I will definitely be going about my business and thinking, “ I wonder how she’s doing?”. When I closed the book, I felt like I was leaving my friend behind. I think it was the solace for me, there is something deeply moving about a character who firmly stands in who they are, know exactly what they want and continue to live wholeheartedly. I only hope that she did not have in her heart that depressed vision if not jealous of the reality described there, otherwise Juhmpa, what a great woman you are!!

Ale OF – Telegram

One thing that can be said about Jhumpa Lahriri’s new novel, “Whereabouts,” is that by adding to this gray subgenre, it strikes a victory for female representation. Lahriri, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 2000 for her first collection of stories, “Interpreter of Maladies,” is a careful explorer of subterranean emotional pain. She wrote “Whereabouts” in Italian and then translated it into English, which contributes to its sheen of deliberateness and distance. In its starred review, Publishers Weekly wrote, "Lahiri's poetic flourishes and spare, conversational prose are on full display." [8] The prose style is peaceful, restrained, moderate, unhurried - it never changes pace and is straightforward to read. I don't know - this just feels underwhelming to me, a sort of generic version of contemporary 'literary women's writing' that never engaged or connected with me - instantly forgettable, in my case, I'm afraid. Whereabouts ( Italian: Dove mi trovo) is a 2018 novel by Jhumpa Lahiri. It is her third novel, her first since The Lowland (2013). It was originally written in Italian, and later translated into English by Lahiri herself. [1] Writing and development [ edit ] Originally written in Italian it is translated by the author herself and it reveals her poetic soul. The language is enchanting. You feel warm through your whole being. More a reflection on the wonder of life and the things around you. You don’t feel like a confident listening to gossip; you don’t feel you are just nodding in the right places. You feel part of the woman’s life, as integral to her being and presence as her shoes. Not just seeing with her eyes but engaging all your senses.

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Definitely though a worthwhile read and one I would not be surprised at all to see longlisted for the Booker – although this time the International 2022 version (the 2021 prize being the first to feature a self-translated book). The story is adapted from your new novel, “ Whereabouts,” which will be published in April. You’ve been writing in Italian for several years now, and you wrote the novel in Italian, under the title “ Dove mi trovo,” and then translated it into English. In an excerpt we ran in 2015 from your essay collection “ In Other Words,” you describe the moment when you found yourself first writing a diary entry in Italian: “I write in a terrible, embarrassing Italian, full of mistakes. . . . It’s as if I were writing with my left hand, my weak hand, the one I’m not supposed to write with.” Could you have imagined then that you would ever be comfortable enough in the language to write a novel?