Writing Style of Unaccustomed Earth

Jhumpa Lahiri tells the story of a Bengali family through the point of views of eight different members of the family, but does so in a peculiar manner. Rather than write in first person for each character, Lahiri uses third person omniscient, focusing on one character at a time. There are both positive and negative aspects to this writing style. A positive aspect would be that the reader is given a more complete picture of each character. For example, Ruma hints at the poor relationship between her and her father at various points throughout the beginning of the novel. She describes how it has been a long time since her father had sent her a postcard. She also mentions that her father called her to ask if it would be okay for him to spend a week in Seattle with her family, while her mother simply would've told Ruma that she was going to stay with her. The fact that the father has to call and ask shows that the relationship between Ruma and her father is distant at best. Why is her father so distant? Rather than continue to describe the various ways in which Ruma's father is aloof, Lahiri offers the viewer insight on the mind of the father. The first glimpse the reader gets into the mind of Ruma's father is through the statement, "How freeing it was, these days, to travel alone..." (7) Clearly the father is relieved to not have to worry about anyone else, so the reader is given the feeling that the father must have been under a lot of stress when he travelled with his family in the past. Hopefully Lahiri will continue to develop the father's story, so that the reader may be able to figure out why his relationship with his daughter is strained. In sum, Lahiri's writing style gives a complete picture of the characters because we get both the views one character holds of another, and the individual thoughts of the different characters.

 A negative aspect is that there is some disconnect between storylines early on. One moment Ruma is complaining about not being happy because her husband is doing so much for her, and then all of a sudden the dad thinks how nice it is that he can travel to Europe without worrying about anyone else. It seems likely, however, that this problem will be resolved, as the father plans to go spend a week with his daughter's family in Seattle.