Gogol and Moushumi Commonalities in The Namesake

As Gogol copes with the death of his father and the termination of his relationship with Maxine, he continues on his journey toward finding the right girl, and he finally manages in the eighth chapter. Surprisingly, it’s his mother who sets him up with the right girl, and he and Moushumi click because they have a lot in common.

What Gogol and Moushumi have in common goes way back into their childhoods. As children, they would go with their parents and attend the same parties, eating the same food, talking to the same people, and enjoying the same company yet never actually speaking to each other. On their very first date Gogol thinks that “their contact until tonight has been artificial, imposed, something like his relationship to his cousins in India but lacking even the justification of blood ties… He decides that it is her very familiarity that makes him curious about her” (199). Gogol appreciates that he has history with Moushumi, and he accumulates the curiosity to pursue his relationship with her while he recalls all of the things they share.

In another example, Gogol continues to reminisce about his past with Moushumi, and he “struggles but fails to recall her presence at Pemberton Road; still, he is secretly pleased that she has seen those rooms, tasted his mother’s cooking, washed her hands in the bathroom, however long ago” (200). I find it unusual that Gogol previously spends so much energy trying to avoid what he finds so appealing in Moushumi. He tries to run from his name, his family traditions, and his mother’s attempts to set him up, yet he likes most about Moushumi how she connects to his past and has a general knowledge of his character before his name change.

Gogol and Moushumi have things in common not only in their personal histories but also while they date. While on a date, “they talk about how they are both routinely assumed to be Greek, Egyptian, Mexican – even in this misrendering they are joined” (212). Both Gogol and Moushumi harbor uncertainty about their heritages and the influence of Bengali culture in their lives, and they bond over this uncertain commonality between them.

Personally, I find it fascinating that both Gogol and Moushumi reject the influence of Bengali culture in their lives – with Gogol trying desperately to become completely American and only dating American women prior to Moushumi and with Moushumi making a pact with friends never to marry Bengali men – and they still end up together, in accordance with their parents’ wishes.