Jonathan Safran Foer, author of Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, and Jhumpa Lahiri, author of the namesake both invoke rembernece among their readers however they do it in different ways. Foer uses the story of a young nine year old boy while Lahiri uses the growing up and adjusting to new lifestyle that Gogol goes through.
Foer tells the story of Oskar Schell who is a nine year old boy who lost his father in the 9/11 terrorist attack on the twin towers. Oskar was very close with his dad, and had the utmost respect for him. After his dads death Oskar has a very difficult time falling asleep, he would lay awake in his bed “inventing” for hours. He would think of all these weird random objects. Some of the inventions are things that would have helped his dad like the bird jacket. Oskar spends the entire novel trying to find the lock for a key that he thought his father left him. Oskar also meets his grandfather who he never knew. Although Oskar never knows that this person is his grandfather but he does often feel that the guy does things very similar to his own dad which probably helps him a lot in getting over the loss of his dad. At the end of the novel Oskar goes and digs up his fathers grave seeing the grave Oskar is finally able to complete his journey and come to rest with the death of his father While looking for this lock Oskar is able to connect with his dead dad and create the kind of closure he needed to be able to move on with his life and sleep more easily. Through out the novel Foer throws in memories that Oskar had from when his dad was still alive.
Lahiri tells the story of Gogol Ganguli who is an American born Indian whose parents are both deep in Indian tradition especially his mom. Gogol eventually changes his name and goes off to Yale instead of following his fathers footsteps at MIT. Gogol continues to become more American he smokes and goes to party along with dating American girls. Eventually Gogol learns the true history of his name and starts to feel terribly about changing his name, when his dad suddenly dies of a heart attack Gogol has a new found attraction to his Indian lifestyle. Since there is no grave for Gogol’s dad Gogol cries and reminisce’s by a big poster of his dad. It takes Gogol a long time and a major transformation in his lifestyle in order to really miss his dad. Although they were not so close especially later in Gogol’s life the death really takes a toll on Gogol and he starts to really miss his dad. Lahiri uses this in order to evoke a kind of odd remembrance between Gogol and his father he wasn’t so close with.
