, there are flash floods in greater New York and, after my train breaks down and I am stranded at the station, the 87-year-old plunges out in her car to fetch me. Desai is tiny, with a very direct gaze that makes one feel – unreasonably, perhaps – that she is often in the position of having to tolerate idiots. That the Indian novelist finds herself, at this stage of her life, living in a small town in the Hudson Valley some 90 minutes north of Manhattan strikes her as thoroughly absurd.
Desai loves Mexico; it reminds her of India. She first started travelling to that part of the world when she moved to the US more than 30 years ago and needed an escape from the Boston winter. She was teaching at MIT and the first winter, she says, “was like Siberia. The snow piling higher and higher and higher. And I was just desperate to get away.” When she got off the plane in Oaxaca, she practically squealed with delight.
‘In England I was not anyone’s wife or mother, I was a writer. That was an amazing experience for me’ Kiran was a teenager when Desai moved to England, and moved with her for the life of the fellowship. After it ended, Desai set her sites on America, where her two oldest children were already studying. She won a post teaching creative writing at MIT, and later moved to Smith and Mount Holyoke. Desai’s late husband, Ashvin, a company director, never moved from India. “He used to visit. I used to visit there.
That sense of being uniquely tied to one place left Desai a long time ago. When she returns to India these days, she finds it is not the country she left. On the other hand, America is alien, too. “It’s just not my country. And other people here see me as a stranger, too.” It suits her, somewhat, as a background condition – “always being apart. Perhaps that is being a writer. One is always an observer rather than a participant.
Australia Latest News, Australia Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Source: abcnews - 🏆 5. / 83 Read more »
Source: FOXSportsAUS - 🏆 24. / 51 Read more »
Source: 9NewsAUS - 🏆 10. / 72 Read more »
Source: brisbanetimes - 🏆 13. / 67 Read more »
Source: GuardianAus - 🏆 1. / 98 Read more »
Source: 7NewsSydney - 🏆 16. / 63 Read more »