The book is written in Italian by Lahiri and translated. I read the English version and here’s a short review.
The thing that strikes me the most about the book is the fact that whether knowingly or unknowingly, in the form of this memoir, Lahiri documents the anxiety and hope felt when learning something new.
The central theme of the book is Lahiri and her love for Italian and her relentless pursuit to conquer the language. We see her grow from a novice wannabe to someone who feels free enough to experiment with the language.
Her desire for Italian may or may not ring with many readers but here is the central point of the book; here is what made it a must-have for me: Learning something difficult is exhausting, when you see all these amazing people all around you being so good at everything, here is is this book documenting all the insecurities, making you feel safe, assuring you that you are not alone and the path isn’t yet dead.
I have always been in awe of writers like Arundhati Roy and Lahiri. Writers have their own weapons to conquer their readers, some have relatable characters, some have gripping story lines. But what writers like this have, are metaphors. Metaphors and their ability to manipulate them so acutely that the reader knows exactly how that moment must’ve felt. Through them, she paints a clear picture of her perseverance while mastering the language and her humility which leads her to state that it cannot be conquered, but that’s the point. Had she been able to conquer Italian, she wouldn’t have written in it.
One of the primary reasons why the book is so relatable is because it is about learning. At this point, while learning machine learning, I often at one point feel a tinge of despair when I see what everyone else is going and what I have accomplished. But not Lahiri. Despite the fact she never will be able to write like a native Italian, it is the thrill of the language, the suspense of the new words that keeps her going. Her enthusiasm for learning is contagious.
Don’t read it as a biography, read it as an experience and make connections wherever you can with events in your life, you’ll see the comfort, the beauty of insecurity and why this book should be on your shelf.
Overall, the book is a simple, relatable manuscript of the stages one goes through when learning something new. It is lucid and laconic. Something that you want to keep on your shelf for future reference.
