Swapna Yathra

The Namesake written by Jhumpa Lahiri is translated to Sinhala. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize the New Yorker Prize for Best First Book. Ashima is about to give birth. Her husband Ashoke accompanies her to the hospital in a taxi. In the waiting room of the hospital he remembers the deadly accident when he was taking the train from Calcutta to Jamshedpur to visit his grandfather and collect the books he was to inherit from him. Rescue workers found Ashoke because of the book page he clutched in his hand. When their baby boy is born Ashima and Ashoke want to wait until they receive Ashima's grandmother letter which will have the name for their baby. Even at the time they were leaving the hospital the letter has not arrived so baby was given a pet name suggested by Ashoke. Gogol it is the name of the author whose book Ashoke was reading in the train that had the serious accident many years ago. In the Namesake Lahiri enriches the themes that made her collection a bestseller - the immigrant experience the clash of cultures the conflicts of assimilation and most poignantly the tangled ties between generations.