I was shocked when, three hours into my listening, the book ended.

This book, which seems to be part journal, is almost more of a lengthy essay fit for a literary magazine than a book-length memoir. I also craved more details of her new surroundings, the gorgeous city of Rome, which she leaves mostly to the reader's imagination.

What I missed from this book was more of her story (she moves her family to a new country and rarely discusses those struggles or sacrifices). That's forgivable, because Lahiri makes you co-pilot on her journey to navigate her way through this new, more romantic language, one that makes her feel more at home and creative, but one in which, to her own admission, she still struggles. This slim volume, translated from her new-found Italian to English, her language of core competency, reflects the often staccato style of a foreign speaker, which felt repetitive at first. Read by the author in both English and the original Italian.Īs a journalist who has studied a foreign language, lived abroad, and spent considerable time in Italy, I enjoyed Jhumpa Lahiri's exploration of the themes of exile and finding a new voice in her writing through another language (in her case, a third). Presented in a dual-language format, this is a wholly original book about exile, linguistic and otherwise, written with an intensity and clarity not seen since Vladimir Nabokov: a startling act of self-reflection and a provocative exploration of belonging and reinvention. In Other Words, an autobiographical work written in Italian, investigates the process of learning to express oneself in another language and describes the journey of a writer seeking a new voice. There, she begins to read and to write - initially in her journal - solely in Italian. Seeking full immersion, she decides to move to Rome with her family for 'a trial by fire, a sort of baptism' into a new language and world. Although Lahiri studied Italian for many years afterward, true mastery always eluded her. For Jhumpa Lahiri, that love was for Italian, which first captivated and capsized her during a trip to Florence after college.

It is at heart a love story - of a long and sometimes difficult courtship and a passion that verges on obsession: that of a writer for another language. From the best-selling author and Pulitzer Prize winner, a powerful nonfiction debut - an 'honest, engaging, and very moving account of a writer searching for herself in words' ( Kirkus Reviews).

In other words lahiri