QuoteProject
From the beginnings of literature, poets and writers have based their narratives on crossing borders, on wandering, on exile, on encounters beyond the familiar. The stranger is an archetype in epic poetry, in novels. The tension between alienation and assimilation has always been a basic theme.
Jhumpa Lahiri
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

This quote reflects on how literature often explores themes of wandering, exile, and the experiences of strangers in unfamiliar territories.

Jhumpa Lahiri's quote speaks to the enduring presence of the 'stranger' as a significant figure in literature, highlighting how narratives frequently revolve around the experiences of those who cross borders and encounter the unfamiliar. It encapsulates the ongoing tension between alienation and assimilation, suggesting that stories often reflect a universal struggle with belonging and identity in a world that is both vast and interconnected.

Themes

LiteratureStrangerNarrativeExileAlienationAssimilation

In practice

Example use cases

In a literary analysis class, one might reference this quote to discuss themes in modern novels.

More from Jhumpa Lahiri

If certain books are to be termed 'immigrant fiction,' what do we call the rest? Native fiction? Puritan fiction? This distinction doesn't agree with me.
Jhumpa LahiriRead
When I sit down to write, I don't think about writing about an idea or a given message. I just try to write a story which is hard enough.
Jhumpa LahiriRead
When I am experiencing a complex story or novel, the broader planes, and also details, tend to fall away.
Jhumpa LahiriRead
I think each time you start a story or novel or whatever, you are absolutely at the bottom of the ladder all over again. It doesn't matter what you've done before.
Jhumpa LahiriRead
The sky was different, without color, taut and unforgiving. But the water was the most unforgiving thing, nearly black at times, cold enough, I knew, to kill me, violent enough to break me apart. The waves were immense, battering rocky beaches without sand. The farther I went, the more desolate it became, more than any place I'd been, but for this very reason the landscape drew me, claimed me as nothing had in a long time.
Jhumpa LahiriRead
On the technical side, I hope that my writing is evolving and maturing, ripening, deepening.
Jhumpa LahiriRead

Similar quotes

I want to remind people of the great and profound joy that can be found in stories, and that stories can connect us to each other, and that reading together changes everybody involved.
Kate DicamilloRead
I still believe nonfiction is the most important literature to come out of the second half of the 20th century.
Tom WolfeRead
If one believes that words are acts, as I do, then one must hold writers responsible for what their words do.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
Most contemporary novels are not really "written." They obtain what reality they have largely from an accurate rendering of the noises that human beings currently make in their daily simple needs of communication; and what part of a novel is not composed of these noises consists of a prose which is no more alive than that of a competent newspaper writer or government official. A prose that is altogether alive demands something of the reader that the ordinary novel-reader is not prepared to give.
T. S. EliotRead
Chapter One. The Bride." He held up the book then. "I'm reading it to you for relax." He practically shoved the book in my face. "By S. Morgenstern. Great Florinese writer. The Princess Bride. He too came to America. S. Morgenstern. Dead now in New York. The English is his own. He spoke eight tongues." Here my father put down the book and held up all his fingers. "Eight. Once in Florin City...
William GoldmanRead
The difference between memoir and autobiography, as far as I see it, is that a memoir is there primarily to tell one particular story, whereas an autobiography tries to be a full account of a life.
Salman RushdieRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.