No one came to prepare the tea, to make the beds, to sweep or dust the rooms. On the stove he cooked breakfast on a coil that reddened at a button’s touch. Oatmeal and hot milk.
When it was finished she heard the spoon methodically scraping the bottom of the pan, then the water he immediately ran to make it easier to clean. The clink of the spoon against the bowl, and at the same time, in a separate pan, the rattle of the egg he boiled and took away for his lunch.
She was thankful for his independence, and at the same time she was bewildered. Udayan had wanted a revolution, but at home he’d expected to be served; his only contribution to his meals was to sit and wait for Gauri or her mother-in-law to put a plate before him.
– A scene from Jhumpa Lahiri’s new novel The Lowlands. Gauri, Naxalite-revolutionary Udayan’s wife, arrives at her husband’s brothers grad student apartment, set in Rhode Island in 1971/2.
Thought these paragraphs captured the gap between a revolutionary’s political and domestic behavior in a way that perfectly exemplifies Lahiri’s writing: Simple, domestic, yet clear and sharp.
Thoughts?