The Reluctant Fundamentalist, By Jamaica Kincaid

America is often called a melting pot. A land born from immigration. However, in today’s society there is often a divide between “Americans” and immigrants. There are even political cries to prevent immigrants from coming to the United States. Why is this? Two non-American authors who have spent time in America examine this divide between the Americans and immigrants. In their novels, The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid and Lucy by Jamaica Kincaid, both Hamid and Kincaid utilize American immigrants’ outsider view to demonstrate how Americans have an attitude of privilege that alienates non-Americans. Whereas Hamid uses Changez, an upper middle class Pakistani man, to focus on how privilege contributes to arrogance, Kincaid uses Lucy,
Mariah is the perfect example of “ignorance is bliss”. Lucy admits that, “Mariah was the kindest person I had ever known...it could be said that her kindness was the result of her comfortable circumstances”(Kincaid 72). Kincaid uses Lucy’s outsider perspective to analyze Mariah, because Mariah doesn’t comprehend the privilege she has from being a white, wealthy American. She is oblivious to the struggles of other people because of her sheltered upbringing. She demonstrates this multiple times through her interactions with Lucy. Mariah attempts to bond with Lucy by showing her freshly plowed fields that she thinks are lovely. Mariah’s ignorance appalls Lucy and she cruelly responds, “Well, thank God I didn’t have to do that” (Kincaid 33). This comment completely goes over Mariah’s head. Kincaid uses Lucy’s passive aggressive response to convey how Mariah doesn’t think about the fact that someone had to spend grueling hours of work turning up the ground that she finds lovely. Additionally, just like she doesn’t understand Lucy’s comment about the fields, Mariah also doesn’t notice, what Kirkus Reviews calls, “the master/slave ironies in their relationship”. This review refers to a master and slave relationship in socioeconomic terms. Lucy sees this while eating dinner on the train with