Teasing the Tiger

        In Lahiri’s novel, The Namesake, Gogol finds himself with a situation that keeps getting worse and worse. Before chapter eight, Gogol is happily dating and in love with Maxine. They date for a while and are constantly together until Gogol’s happiness is ripped away from him in one sudden phone call. Gogol is told that his father has died from a heart attack. Ashima, Gogol, and Sonia all meet together at home to grieve the loss of their loved-one. As Gogol is grieving he is doing the opposite of what he was doing when he was happy. He is now pushing away Maxine and not allowing her to grieve with him and bringing his family closer by visiting Maxine less often and his family more often. Because of this, Maxine breaks up Gogol, and Gogol is now even more depressed because he lost his love and his loved-one. Once he and his family have finished grieving, he meets a Bengali girl who he remembers from his childhood. They soon begin to date and then become engaged.

  Lahiri tortures Gogol by giving him a normal, joyful childhood until he became a teenager. At that point, Lahiri introduces Gogol to the truth about his name and the tragidies behind it. Gogol is then in constant shyness and embarrassment about his name and its roots. This pain lasts for a while until he’s eighteen when he changes his name to Nikhil. As Nikhil, Gogol studies hard, becomes an architect, and finds his love, Maxine. Gogol’s years of blissful joy with Maxine last for a while until his father dies, and he is sadness and depression again. Lahiri is brutal and cruel to Gogol by giving him a joyful childhood, followed by the pain and shame of his own name, followed by pleasure of freedom of his name and his parents in college, and sadness again due to the death of his father and break up with Maxine. Like all people, Gogol has his ups and downs in life but for Gogol, his ups and downs are extreme enough to look like Lahiri is giving Gogol a taste of happiness and freedom and when Gogol wants a little more, she rips it away. With Gogol’s recent engagement and happiness, I predict something horribly wrong to occur to hurt his new love and his family.