Being placed in new situations can be challenging for anyone. Depending on how new the situation is, change may require difficult habituation and the overcoming of hardships. “All the world is full of suffering. It is also full of overcoming.” (Keller, 1960) The autobiography The Story of my Life by Helen
Keller and the novel The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri reflect this quotation. The life experiences of non-fiction character, Helen Keller, greatly reflect those of fictional character, Ashima Ganguli. Both of these women and their families are faced with the similar challenges of adaptation, overcoming adversity and forming a positive sense of identity throughout their lives. These challenges are overcome using literature and the consistent, …show more content…
The biggest challenge for him is breaking through the shell of his pet name, Gogol, in order to be just like all of the other kids. Gogol resents this name that his parents give him, and he regrets the day that he decides to keep it. On Gogol’s first day of
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kindergarten, he is so nervous about how he would adjust to the new environment, and how his identity would translate to the other kids in his class. He is afraid to become someone that he has never met before. In his mind, Nikhil is an entirely new him, and at the time he does not realize how valuable this new name could be. “He is afraid to be Nikhil, someone he doesn’t know. Who doesn’t know him. His parents tell him that they each have two names, along with all their Bengali friends in America, and all their relatives in Calcutta. It’s a part of growing up, they tell him, part of being Bengali” (57). For the rest of his childhood, Gogol learns to hate his name. It represents his past that he wishes to escape, and it separates him from all of the other American children. However, when he becomes an adult and learns the true meaning behind the name “Gogol,” he finally understood that his identity is, and always will be, rooted