The use of allusions is to help the reader better understand the point that the writer makes, the intended meaning that she applies and wants us to think on this.
Mukherjee makes an intended point above all in her use of allusions. She tries to explain her point about westernization as an escape by alluding the latter considering the difficulty to achieve it, the difficulty to hit this road and makes the reader think about this point.
Sometimes allusion is concealed that it requires an effort from the reader to tap into the intended meaning. In her essay the writer identifies herself as an American and writes that her books is reduced to jacket-flap copy amidst the transformation of the United States in 1970s. The jacket-flap copy does not have a direct meaning. Mukherjee does not mean that publishers stopped to publish his book as hard-copies, but what she means is about her writing experience later. She started to write less as she grow older.
The title itself is open to discussion as the writer points out to the 400 years old cultural, historical and technological reshaping as an Indian and her new identity as an American thus redefining what makes her a true American.
