A slice of American pie

America --- the country where dreams are made, where epic stories come to life, where Hollywood brews its glamourous concoctions while Silicon Valley rolls out the technological advances the rest of the world follows, where fashion gets made with a plunging neckline and where every city has lent its name to countless movie backdrops, where the White House has played host to turning the pages of history and whose each successive President is always making headlines, for reasons right and wrong. 

Love it or hate it, you cannot ignore the country Childish Gambino represented in his hit song ‘This is America' in recent times. Yes, there's so much that we would not like to talk about when glorifying the US- the racist slurs, the blatant gun shoot-outs, 9/11 or Trump. That however, doesn't take away from the kind of impact America has made on the lives of countless people who are not even citizens of that country- whether through its politics, history, trade, environmental policies, entertainment, lifestyle or fashion, we all know we have been victims of its flavour, in more ways than one. 

So how do writers who are constantly seeking new experiences to channelise their imagination stay unfazed by the world leader's all-encompassing influence on human lives, attitudes and other ethnic communities? Three books opened my eyes to this mammoth country that bears down on every other nation thanks to its power and potential. These stories take you to territories no newspaper or journal can claim to explore and compels you to look at it through the eyes of an outsider without demeaning or degrading the essence of American life and its people. These writers pen down characters who have adopted the American way of life, found meaning and purpose by embracing a new culture and freedom and lived to tell the story. These characters are innocent and manipulative at the same time, constantly searching for their identity amidst the vast differences they encounter between their own traditional faith and the modern outlook that they are bound to follow. 

Inscrutable Americans by Anurag Mathur 

This book written in the early 1990s may be rather dated for readers of 2018, but when I read it as a student on a friend's recommendation, I was in college, had never been to the US and knew little about it beyond its stereotypical identity of the land of burgers, colas and the Statue of Liberty. Mathur draws from his own observations of life in America, having lived there for more than a couple of years before he wrote this book. He throws us in the midst of a small university campus in the US and adds enough shock value for a rural novice about the American way of life. He cleverly picks a boy from the small town of Jajau, Madhya Pradesh to give a wide-eyed version of the American lifestyle, its explicit approach to all things sexual and its surprisingly amiable people. Relatively free from the racial bias that often surfaces in such books, protagonist Gopal is a 21-year-old with ambitions of clearing a chemical engineering course and returning to India, ‘well-qualified' in more ways than one. His American friend Randy is determined to see that he doesn't return a virgin, and this dream is fulfilled, quite unexpectedly, just like America springs surprises for young Gopal on every step of his way. With no real narrative or growth in the story, this novel is more anecdotal in nature and not to be taken as a reliable Indian's guide to ‘Amreeka'. What has stayed with me about this book however, is its ability to draw out parallels between both countries, without passing judgement. Bogged down by the moral grounding of his Indian roots, Gopal struggles to give vent to his desire to ‘graduate' from a boy to a man. He stumbles, rises and survives through his varied experiences within the cultural cacophony that enmeshes him in a foreign land. Gleefully interspersed with Gopal's default English vocabulary, his limited understanding of western ideas and concepts, and his innocent rendition of a superpower that changes him forever, Inscrutable Americans packs a comical punch. It makes us realise that people on both sides can, in fact, be inscrutable, depending on which way you choose to look at them. 

Why we should still be reading this --- because millions of students in India still travel to be a part of this exhilarating, aspirational and often life-changing dream that is America. In that sense, Mathur's book still remains relevant.

Welcome to Americastan by Jabeen Akhtar

Bringing out the struggle of a first generation Pakistani-American settled in North Carolina with her family, is 27-year-old Samira, who has recently lost her job and been dumped by her boyfriend at the beginning of this book. What happens when you are an Asian from the wrong side of the planet, post 9/11? Do Americans accept a Muslim immigrant family into its fold without casting an accusing finger at the nation that breeds terrorists? Do Pakistanis eventually become more American in their ways than they would want to admit to, after being exposed to the liberal (read immoral) ways of the majority around them? As an author writing for her chick lit reading audience, Akhtar fails to rise to the occasion of breaking stereotypes about Asians living in America. We realise early in the day that her protagonist Samira is more wannabe American than typical American with her quest of landing a gora boyfriend, her drinking binges, her inability to relate to her parents and her indifference to all things religious or orthodox. What gives the book its share of credit however, is that it doesn't try to be taken too seriously. We aren't asked to sympathise with Samira or her parents but to ride along with them in this happy-go-lucky tale of fates that grapple with their American bearings. Her supporting characters like the judgement-passing mother, the gaming-obsessed brother Khalid or the long-distant cousin from Pakistan, who seeks out an arranged marriage with Samira in his own conservative way are all idiosyncratic, hilarious and wittily sketched. The story doesn't aim at hailing the American way of life but gleefully captures the Americanisation of its primary characters without supporting it as the right approach to ‘fitting in'. It is a contemporary take on a Pakistani trying to live past the fear of being categorised as a terror suspect merely because of her origin and a God-fearing, burqa-clad, Quran spouting extremist. Unfortunately, she becomes a caricature of all things wrong with the American youth as a result but there is hope that she learns from her follies in the end and that is the silver lining readers will take home with them.

Why should you be reading it?

If you liked East is East, you will like this book's confused take on all things desi and videsi. 

Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche

Americanah can be read in two ways, as the binding love story of Ifemelu and Obinze or as a portrait of an African who lands in America to embrace the progressive outlook she seeks to find here as a woman, as a student and as a resident of another race. The book therefore, at a deeper level, is an intrinsic study of the conflicting ideals of modern Africa and America and their take on each other's cultural and social perceptions.  The book finds its strength from its principal character, Ifemelu who has a distinct, independent and engaging voice, powerful in its logic and incisive in its observations about life. Her poignant ability to understand the struggles of African immigrants and how she strives to find pride in her identity as a black woman amidst the opposing forces around her forms the crux of the tale. Both Obinze and Ifemelu make their way through their adventure in the UK and the US respectively, only to return to Nigeria, wisened and hardened to the forces of truth and fate, and yet they continue to try and write the pages of their future and find happiness together. The West is not painted out to be the outright villain here, neither is Nigeria thrust down to being a suffering and apathetic nation. Adiche's sensitivity towards universal themes of love, longing and social alienation through the aspiring, urban youth of Nigeria is striking. Adiche is unpretentious in her opinions about the West or her own Nigerian roots, she is unforgiving about the apprehensions of those who try to fit into the margins of the ‘ruling whites' and insightful in her portrayal of human emotions and desires. 

Why should you be reading it? 

The book is oh-so-feminist without flagging down the man who makes Ifemelu's heart beat fast. It protests the hypocrisy that is endemic to well-bred gentry whether in a developed or developing country, it breaks stereotypes about racial bias and is still tender in its treatment of love and of those who seek happiness through it.

Travelling the world, one page at a time

I am no literary critic and this post is really a very subjective reading of modern literature. I still feel compelled to write this as I always hope that more people should be encouraged to read and open their minds and hearts towards other races, castes, communities, cultures and so on. The world needs all the tolerance and sensitivity it can get at a time when mistrust and misgivings rule our conscience, blurring the lines of what is right and wrong, acceptable and unacceptable. In the recent past, a bunch of books  opened up my world view to places we barely get to visit and even if we do, we only look at them through our rose-tinted shades or through the ‘outsider’s perspective’. So if you haven’t already got your hands on these gems, I suggest you do and challenge your stereo-typical visions of countries as varied as China, Nigeria, Turkey and Saudi Arabia and let authors as diverse as chalk and cheese, welcome us to their homelands with open arms and mighty hearts.

Say you’re one of them- Uwem Akpan

I had no idea what to expect when I got my hands on this book and thought it would be nice to read from Africa’s rich treasure trove of stories, penned with a conviction that is authentic, sensitive and striking in its expression. Worded by a Nigerian Jesuit priest who is as modern in his sensibilities as any of us but is passionate about highlighting the atrocities that have bogged down generations of African children, Uwem Akpan’s stories are both heart-wrenching and unique. Does human cruelty cripple our ability to think beyond our own survival or does it make us that much more resolute in our struggle for survival amidst all odds? Akpan uses the most poignant way of story-telling, we see each story unfurl its pain and problems through the honest and innocent eyes of a child. Africa has long remained a continent that has been misinterpreted and dismissed as being inferior thanks to its overwhelming images of poverty, strife and apathy. Uwem Akpan opens the doors of his beloved land to us outsiders, till we can shy away no more from shedding our inhibitions and confronting the demons that lie within each of us.

"I think fiction allows us to sit for a while with people we would rather not meet."- Uwem Akpan

The Museum of Innocence- Orhan Pamuk 

Orhan Pamuk’s Museum of Innocence does for Turkey what Khaled Hosseini did with The Kiterunner for Afghanistan. As someone unfamiliar with the craggy terrain that is Afghanistan, only looking at it through the journalists’ lens showing war-stricken and impoverished citizens under the Taliban regime, Khaled Hosseini humanised the whole population for us in a way no news story could match up to. Orhan Pamuk’s novel, although essentially a tear-jerking love story, unleashes a whole gamut of previously unknown cultural nuances of Istanbul, mostly sold to us through touristy postcard representations of old domes, minarets and romanticised artefacts. We are suddenly thrown in to the claustrophobic and pretentious cauldron of champagne glass-clinking Turkish families who are vying for suitable marriage bonds between themselves. Every new evenly-matched couple is given a nod, constantly being subjected to societal pressures of marriage while the couple itself tries to get to know each other intimately. Within this haloed circle, there is no room for dalliances, second thoughts or unconventional beginnings. So just when you think Kemal and Sibel are a match made in heaven, enters Fusun, the girl who is a poor cousin to aristocratic Kemal and the girl who will shatter all his realities with the promise of a passionate love affair. It is almost pitiable how Kemal then unwittingly steers himself into undertaking a downhill ride that will only pull him deeper in to the dark caverns of loneliness, tragic longing, social withdrawal and eventually deprivation. The Museum of Innocence is not meant for those who pay little heed to the pain of unrequited love or for those who are looking for gratifyingly mushy love stories. In stead, it rips apart the farcical promise of socially-accepted relationships to look beyond our morally constructed matrix of propriety and status.

"People only tell lies when there is something they are terribly frightened of losing."

The Bonesetter’s Daughter- Amy Tan

If you have a mother who was born in an era that saw India win its independence, you will relate to Amy Tan’s amazingly sharp potrayal of mother-daughter relationships. As millennials used to India’s globalisation days, we hardly let bygone tragedies that might have touched our elders like the partition bother our smug and sheltered existence. We are hassled by our parents’ inability to come to grips with technology and social media, little aware that they might be similarly bothered by our reluctance to embrace their past. The Bonesetter’s Daughter makes us stare in the face of a protagonist coping with her aging mother who is herself grappling with Alzheimer’s and for whom a declaration of suicide is just a whine away. But while this book threatens to analyse your own discomfiture with all things old, yes including your own parents, it also transports you back to rural China. The narrative suddenly comes to life, full of ancient fallacies, incidents that could be part of dramatic folklore and the rendition of a personal tragedy with a historical flourish rooted in the Japanese conquest and the civil war. If you come out of this a tad more tolerant to those who belong to another generation than you and a lot more respectful of their experiences and beliefs, know that it is Amy Tan’s magic weaving over you through her exotic spell.

That was how dishonesty and betrayal started, not in big lies but in small secrets.

Girls of Riyadh- Rajaa Alsanea

Take a trip to the little-explored city of Riyadh, through the omniscient eyes of writer Rajaa Alsanea. This book is our peek into the world of the upper crust of Saudi society, where men and women try to push their social and cultural boundaries, but are often stunted by the traditional dogma that dictates it. Four friends Gamrah, Sadeem, Michelle and Lamas lead you in to an often misunderstood and rarely demystified foreign land and yet make you relate to them through their lives, the choices they make and the fates they encounter. Often labelled the Arab version of Sex and the City, and highly debated as being disrespectful to its subject and Saudi Arabian ethics and values, I read this book barely knowing about the seismic ripples it created in the upper echelons of Riyadhi society or how photocopies of the book were being circulated for as much as $500 after its release. This is not a book that is written to provoke the bourgeosie. It does not pretend to be a revolutionary indictment either by preaching against the predominant value system. It is just a very frank, humourous and witty take on the lives of four women who are trying their best to marry the principles they were brought up on to the liberated world-view that the western civilisation has brought them closer to. This is a book that is highly recommended for male readers who shouldn't be misled by its name and imagine feminism being shoved down their throats while reading it. It is a book that will sensitise you towards the privilege of getting a clear advantage in the conflict between modern-orthodox ideologies, a fact that resonates till date in urban India as well.