Darkness

By Bharati Mukherjee

Book Overview

At once sly and tragic, these twelve extraordinary stories chart the complex and shifting lives of the new immigrants to America--some helpless, some hopeless, others ambitious, beautiful, all striving for something they can't quite name, something more.... "Mukherjee writes with beautiful precision...neaty needlepointing a malevolent world." THE VILLAGE VOICE

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0140079300
• ISBN13: 9780140079302
• Release Date: November 1985
• Publisher: Penguin Group
• Length: 199 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Darkness

Mukherjee writes with sharp wit, presenting her Indian immigrant characters in uncomfortable, absurd, and often terrible situations. Her stories are about people who surrender "little bits of a reluctant self every year, clutching the souveniers of an ever-retreating past" [from her "Introduction"]. Her immigrant characters want to fit in their new America, and yet they want to cling to their pasts, their cultures, their ethics. They want to be American, in the sense of being successful and fitting in, and yet they can't reconcile themselves to it; America, often, rejects them, eats away at their traditions, their values, and even their self-respect. Note, though, that Mukherjee does not moralize; she never loses her sense of irony or absurdity.

4 Stars

It's really a wonderful short stories. I like, especially, Father. I am a parent and a Asian, so I can understand his feelings. I don't think it is a murder.