AP Prompted Writing #2: Change

Ann Jacob

Ms. Nichole Wilson

AP Multicultural Literature

1990. Choose a novel or play that depicts a conflict between a parent (or a parental figure) and a son or daughter. Write an essay in which you analyze the sources of the conflict and explain how the conflict contributes to the meaning of the work. Avoid plot summary.

Change

            Whether or not people change is widely debated. Jhumpa Lahiri, author of Unaccustomed Earth: Unaccustomed Earth, uses conflicts between Ruma and her father (Baba) to investigate whether or not people have the ability to change in the terms of love when the right circumstances appear.

            Ruma and her father have always have been cordial to one another but Ruma always doubted his love for her and her mother. When Ruma’s mother dies after “react[ing] adversely to the Rocuronium used to relax her muscles” during her surgery, a gap forms between father and daughter (Lahiri 20). Before the tragic accident, Ruma had “arranged a packaged tour to Paris for her mother and herself” but after her mother’s death, since Ruma wasn’t going, Baba asked “if it would be all right for him to reserve the tour in his own name” (Lahiri 20). Ruma, in a daze from the misfortune, says yes but she wonders about how much love there was in her parent’s relationship, but dismisses the trip as her father’s form of grieving. Yet despite this dismissal, there is a small nagging feeling within Ruma that widens the invisible gap between the two of them.

            Another source of conflict stems from Baba’s refusal to stay with Ruma and her family iin Seattle. Ruma, once “angered” by the “presumptuousness” of her parent’s impromptu visits, can’t wrap her head around her father’s refusal to come live with her and her family (Lahiri 5). Wanting to share the grief of losing her mother and his wife together, Ruma questions Bab’s method of grieving and again the love he had for his wife. She tries to understand the reasons for her father’s denial but come up empty handed besides her reasoning of the “nonexistent love” between her parents (Lahiri 52).

            Throughout most of the story, Baba is at Ruma’s home after a recent vacation, making a quick visit before travelling again. As the days pass with Ruma, Baba, and Ruma’s son, Akash, Ruma sees a change within her father. He is more independent, caring and connectable. As Ruma observes Baba reading to Akash, it finally dawns on her that “for the first time in his life her father had fallen in love” (Lahiri 40).  

            Soon, it is time for Baba to leave for another vacation. After he departs, Ruma finds a postcard addressed to a “Mrs. Bagchi.” As “she stared at the card, [she] instantly knew…the evidence [proved] that it was not just Akash her father had fallen in love” with (Lahiri 58). Suddenly all the pieces fit together for Ruma. Why her father had not grieved as she had for her mother, why her father went on such bountiful trips, and why her father refused to move in with her, even upon her request. The reason? Mrs. Bagchi.

            As Ruma rewinds and deciphers all of Baba’s words and actions over the past couple weeks, she realizes that her father didn’t actually love her mother. Jhumpa Lahiri, author of Unaccustomed Earth: Unaccustomed Earth, uses conflicts between Ruma and Baba to prove that people can change to love; it is just a matter of being in the right time, place, and company. For Baba, the freedom of the world in his travels, meeting new people, and coming to learn about Akash changed his hard heart into one that actually had the capacity to hold love for others.