Changing places

Reading Jhumpa Lahiri’s latest novel, Whereabouts was like sitting in an Italian café on a piazza, sipping coffee, watching people pass, and wondering about their lives. It was such an enjoyable experience, I read the novel twice to savour the details of its deceptively simple story and language.

An exquisite piece of writing, Whereabouts charts the life of a single woman in her forties as she moves from place to place in a small unnamed Italian town. Translated by the author from its original Italian, the novel is written in the kind of clear language that takes a lot of work to achieve and is ornamented by dazzlingly original figurative language.

Following the woman in her daily life, we are offered glimpses of the people, buildings and streets that surround her, her routines and preferences, her fears, pleasures, and changing moods. Using first person narration, Lahiri opens the door to the woman’s thoughts and memories, many of which centre on relationships with her parents and her past lovers. The slim volume brings this woman vividly to life.

The structure of Whereabouts mirrors its title. Each chapter is set in a new location with chapter headings including On the Street and On the Train. Lahiri’s deft descriptions of each setting are a pleasure to read in themselves, as are the short yet memorable sketches of individuals like the family who own the woman’s favourite shop selling stationery or an old friend who comes to visit in her apartment with her objectionable husband and sly young daughter.

The finest achievement of the novel to my mind is its evocation of subtle changes in the woman’s emotions in response to her surroundings and encounters. The shift from a kind of settled and irritable inertia to a sense of hope and excitement takes place alongside a change in seasons and inevitably, a change in place.

Not many novels focus on this middle stage of the lifespan in which the satisfactions of routine can threaten to stifle personal growth and the possibility of change. It takes courage to move out of comfortable patterns. Whereabouts shows us how, in a quiet and thoughtful way, one woman leaves behind her regrets and recaptures the joy and possibilities of a less predictable future.