India, Aug. 24 -- Where does one truly belong - a place, a past, or a sense of self? Some questions resist simple answers, and a perfect example where this stands true is author Herta Muller's book Traveling on One Leg . Published originally in German, in 1989, its English translation familiarises this reader with the story of Irene, a woman in her mid-thirties in the 1980s, who leaves Romania for West Berlin. As the short novel delves into her unsettling experiences of displacement and alienation, what gets highlighted is her struggle to find a sense of belonging in a new land.

Born into a German family in Romania, Irene's sense of identity is marked by uncertainty from the very beginning. Her emigration to West Germany only deepens thi...