In Other Words is a revelation It is at heart a love story of a long & sometimes difficult courtship & a passion that verges on obsession that of a writer for another language For Jhumpa Lahiri that love was for Italian which first captivated & capsized her during a trip to Florence after college Although Lahiri studied Italian for many years afterwards true mastery had always eluded her Seeking full immersion she decided to move to Rome with her family for a trial by fire a sort of baptism' into a new language & world There she began to read & to write
- initially in her journal
- solely in Italian In Other Words an autobiographical work written in Italian investigates the process of learning to express oneself in another language & describes the journey of a writer seeking a new voice Presented in a dual-language format this is a wholly original book about exile linguistic & otherwise written with an intensity & clarity not seen since Vladimir Nabokov a startling act of self-reflection & a provocative exploration of belonging & reinvention