A Literary Analysis of Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri Essay

Imagine a time when you were observing someone you had just met and tried to develop an idea of the type of person he or she was based solely on his or her actions and appearance. Better yet, think of when somebody may have told you something that meant one thing, but you thought it had a completely different connotation. Thus, you may have formed a judgmental opinion about someone or something because of superficial character traits or a lack of communication. In the short story Interpreter of Maladies, the author Jhumpa Lahiri uses characterization, primarily of Mrs. Das, as well as point of view and the importance of communication to lay the foundation for a conflict between characters that proves detrimental to their relationships with each other.The character of Mrs. Das is primarily utilized as a means of uncovering the personalities of the other characters, especially Mr. Kapasi. Mrs. Das is a character who is rather childish and does not seem to exert love or compassion for her children or anyone else for that matter. One example the author uses to illustrate this is when Mrs. Das turns away from her daughter Tina and tells Tina to leave her alone while she was painting her nails (312). Thus, Lahiri portrays this character at the beginning of the story as a flat, static character, one who is only there to provide a selfish persona. Despite this, there was one instant where Mrs. Das showed compassion. This occurred when she became interested in Mr. Kapasis other job as a language interpreter and called it romantic (314). She seemed entranced by his stories and later appeared comfortable enough to confide in him her secret affair. At this point, Lahiri makes it seem that she could be a round, dynamic character, one who changes her ways and is actually able to care about somebody other than herself however, this sudden interest of Mrs. Das into someone elses ordeals...