Hello Gentle Reader
“From here to there it’s all just the farty sputter of a lantern. And they call that having lived. It’s not worth the bother of putting on your shoes.”
Herta Müller had said in the Nobel Documentary “Writing against Terror,” that “writing is kind of a taming. Writing tames what you have lived.” Born August third in nineteen-fifty three the future Nobel Laureate in Literature of two thousand and nine, has witnessed the horrors of history; which has left its mark on her. Through the continual vicious cycle of words, Herta Müller is able to tame what she has lived and experienced. Herta Müller’s writing style is incredibly poetic, structured on short sentences that become episodic, that add up to a painted landscape of deprivation and misplaced people who happen to be born at the wrong place at the wrong time; or in some cases they had picked the wrong side in a grand war of horror and inhumane actions, and they themselves were left at the mercy of something just as horrific that lasted for so many years.
Herta Müller lived under the regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu. Her mother was sent to a Soviet Forced Labour camp also known as a gulag when she was younger. Her father was part of the waffen-ss. The linage of the author is much like that, of her novels – grey. There is no moral high ground. No pompous or pretentious state where the author says there is justice in the world – or that a utopia was created after the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the collapse of the former Soviet Union. The perpetrators were not always punished and the victims at times were less innocent then they appear. The work itself is political. Yet the work is not political in a superficial sense, as that of a political thriller. The works themselves, bare witness to history; and in a poetic style, document the history and what had happened with an unflinching eye.
I think many will find Herta Müller’s work very difficult to read. The subject matter is difficult. It does not portray the west as some great land of utopia, or that the west had actively sought out to better the quality of life of those that suffered so needlessly. It’s presented as just the better option than the one that has been dealt with. While others suffer, we are too busy enjoy the luxuries of our comfort.
The work itself does not allow anyone to forget what had happened. Many suffered continuously after World War II, while others thrived, or were given atonement for the crimes that they themselves had to endure. The crimes that had befallen Herta Müller were never atoned for. There was no apology, there was nothing. The author herself was able to flee. Escape the situation that had been brought upon her, by Nicolae Ceaușescu and his feared secret police the Securitate, who to do this day refuse to admit that they harassed and assaulted the author. In fact in a recent article that I myself had found, from two thousand and nine, shows a former agent of the Securitate, has claimed that Herta Müller has psychosis. In many ways the former agent, and major, says that she was not interrogated as much as she has claimed. He’s pushed the heat off of himself, and placed it back on to Herta Müller in a mediocre style, by claiming that yes her house was bugged, but that was a one-time incident and entry into her home (in the Romanian city of Timisoara) and denied that Herta Müller was fired from her job, because she refused to cooperate with the police but rather because she smoked in the classroom. All of this is unconvincing to many who can put two and two together – at least when all ‘known,’ facts are placed together. For one the file that the Securitate had created for her, is nine hundred and fourteen pages long – one time incident and a few interrogations do not lead to the conclusion that the information collected amounts to that.
The criticism of Herta Müller usually comes from her native land of Romania, where the inhabitants of her once native land criticise her for trying to drag the country through the mud. A journalist of Romania, Cristian Tudor Popescu had said that, her reputation and books succeed only by criticizing the former regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu. Yet the same could be said for a fellow Nobel Laureate in Literature Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, whose reputation is in the fact that he was able to criticize the former Soviet Union.
Yet the criticisms themselves have come under attack from others, saying that they are nothing more than just attacks based around envy. Beatrice Ungar editor of the Hermannstadter Zeitung (a weekly Siblu newspaper) made it quite clear that no one but the dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife Elena Ceaușescu were the only ones to profit from the regime and the terror. Mircea Cărtărescu a fellow Romanian author has also been very pleased with the celebration of Herta Müller’s win.
“The Appointment,” itself is a common novel, by Herta Müller detailing through the vicious cycle of words, and poetic quick breath prose, which comprises her work; the novel deals with a tram ride, that takes forever (as it would when you have been summoned by the secret police) details the life of the main character. Her first marriage, which failed. To where she is in the present living with a man whose alcoholic who can only drink because that’s all there is left for him to do:
“He was always afraid we might grow used to happiness.”
Because even happiness could be taken away from a person. The novel is also full of absurd situations. When Albu the interrogator squeezes the main characters hand and kisses her hand, with a wet saliva filled kiss, before the start of interrogations; to the unprecedented discovery of a finger wrapped like a piece of hard candy found in the bag.
Yet there is also quick moments of dark humour. Like the main characters observation of the pencil stub on Albu’s desk:
“So maybe Albu’s own prick is like that and the pencil stub serves as a measure of the world.”
To the crude painted graffiti on the outhouse wall, when Paul and the main character are at the flea market:
“Life is really full of shit, There’s no choice but to piss on it.”
“The Appointment,” is not as great as the densely poetic “Land of Green Plums,” but nonetheless it was a great book. Harrowing and relentless in its depiction of Communist Romania, but shows the undying spirit of human dignity – and most importantly the individuals constant struggle to main freedom, and individuality against the state and dictatorships themselves.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Thursday, 28 June 2012
Thursday, 21 June 2012
The Short Story Review No. XIII
“Rooms,” by Antonio Tabucchi – From “Little Misunderstandings of No Importance,”
When Antonio Tabucchi died earlier this year, there was an empty feeling in the very pit of my stomach. Antonio Tabucchi couldn’t die, was my immediate thinking. Selfishly the concept of one of my favourite authors dying made me, resort to being selfish and childish in my inability to comprehend or want to at least accept that his death had come. However the shock and reaction has since warn off, and I realize – or rather force myself to accept the fact that there would be no more future works by Antonio Tabucchi. There are plenty works that still (need) to be translated into English by the author, but his future output itself, of a new novel has since been dashed by his untimely death.
Antonio Tabucchi has a quality of writing, that in a personal opinion, a writer either has or they don’t have. Tabucchi provides a lucid, distinct and luminous prose, however to call Tabucchi’s work unambiguous would be too far from the truth. Tabucchi’s prose, maybe lucid but it is also like a poetic hallucination, this along with his ‘normal,’ people characters – journalists, resistance, scholars, wanders, poets, widows as well as children; allow for him to write elegant and clever stories, and short novels, that explore both politics as well as the humanity of his characters, to which both author and character are able to share empathy. His ability to write about the lingering smells and tastes of a meal (such as in Pereira Declares, whose fondness of omelette’s and lemonade) as well as his ability to write about the philosophical and political, via dialogue can be brought into contrast of his culinary descriptions.
“She thought how bogus all writing really was – the implacable tyranny of circumscribing words, of verbs and adjectives that imprison things, hardening them into a glass fixity, like a dragonfly caught for centuries in a rock, which keeps the appearance of a dragonfly but is one no longer. Such is writing, with its capacity to pin down the present and the recent past and distance them, by centuries, from us.”
“Rooms,” by Antonio Tabucchi deals with the relationship between brothers and sister. If memory serves me correct the brother was one a scholar. A man of great importance; which leads to traces of “Waiting for Winter,” where the dead husband who was a writer, was also held to great esteem in the community and the elite of society, whose mourning for one of their own is described by the widow of the writer. That same could be said for “Rooms,” where the brother is a scholar, and whose importance and rising through the ranks, has led to him becoming acquainted with higher members of society. It would not be a surprise if the brother and his sister had attended the funeral and wake of the writer themselves.
Now the brother has fallen into ill health, and appears to suffer great pains. The sister herself takes care of her brother, in his suffering and long drawn out process of death itself. But what makes this story work is the prose itself. Highly defined literary metaphors, where the past and the present becomes descriptive, but also encased in amber like a prehistoric bug – or the fossil of some long since dead dinosaur, but the beauty of the prose itself carries the weight behind this short story, as it does most of the short stories in this collection, allow for a more show approach rather than a “storytelling,” approach where the action is described via oral and verbal ordeals. The work itself encases moments like memories or photographs. These moments, full of touching moments, and emotions. They remind one of their own feelings and emotions. Scenes, and moments that have long since faded away, and yet remain in the not so distant past, and with a mixture of nostalgia becomes moments of enjoyment. Like the time my father showed me, what lies inside of a cat tales (the plant) the cotton like fluff, that popped out of the brown felt casing of the plant, at the time was what clouds were made up of. To a degree that is what Tabucchi’s prose is like. It captures and encases the moments, and “hardening them into a glass fixity,” creating little jewels, gems, and crystals of literature itself, just waiting to be unearthed.
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“Feather in the Hair,” by Ersi Sotiropoulos – From: “Landscape with Dog: and Other Stories,”
In the autumn of two-thousand and eleven, Ersi Sotiropoulos, lamented on the current state (and what was just the beginning of a very long drawn out process that will most likely continue) of Greece and its debt crisis. She uses her signature style to remark on Greece’s past image, its complicate relationship with Europe (much like the UK), and the incompetence of the Greek politicians who have done nothing but to continue to add fuel to an already blazing out of control fire – not to mention her accusation remarks against Germany, and ability to open up old wounds, while maintain a strong Green nationalist stance, with plenty of spice and garlic to boot.
Here are a few remarks that the author said during her interview with BBC Radio 4 “The View from Greece by Ersi Sotiropoulos,”
“Autumn this year in Greece is darker than in other years – a season of insecurity and distress. The signs of recession are everywhere: in the centre of Athens shops are closing one after another. Immigrants squat in dilapidated buildings, the trash piles up in the streets.
The decline has been swift – meanwhile immigrants continue to arrive in a country where there is no work and no social security. What will happen to all these people who are coming here already hungry and exhausted? Hunger brings violence, we know that. The party’s over, I say to myself, and and Greece will be (only) the first to fall.”
The author is very right with that comment. Last I had heard, violence in Greece had gone up a whole 90% -- or more. Suicide had raisen 30% - 40%. The outlook continues to look grim, even with the prospect of another Greek election coming up in a few weeks; and all the past referendums, have done nothing so far to help improve the situation, or inspired any hope or caused or determined a solution for a continuous long term problem.
“I walk through a collapsing city, a city paralysed by the strikes, where rubbish from the past several weeks still sits uncollected in the streets and wonder – is this place really a part of Europe?”
There is a definitely a sense of alienation, and more importantly a real sense of betrayal, as Greece now starts to wonder about its own membership in the “Eurozone,” seeing as in a blink of an eye the ruling people and government of Greece, was forced into taking some: “austerity measures demanded by the IMF and the European Central Bank.” From the sounds of it, this lead to steep cuts in social programs, large cuts in public sectors, cuts in pension plans, outrageous tax increases – that even the minimal wage would have to pay (even though they wouldn’t be able to afford), the Greek state assets were to be privatized and sold to investors and banks, at a very shrunken down discounted price. From here people took to the streets, the outrage, the anger, the protests, the betrayal was shown in the faces and at times outrageous gestures and actions of the people of Greece. But the message was clear – There was a big problem.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada also continues this demand for a solution. However, it doesn’t appear that Prime Minister Stephen Harper, has come up with any solution himself; as Canadian resources themselves are sold off and given away to other countries for manufacturing, without concern for the future and the fact that will cause many to worry for Canada’s economy: “What happens when Alberta’s Oil Sands run out,” what about Saskatchewan’s pot ash ceases to be Saskatchewan’s let alone Canadian? What will we do when the Northern Diamond mines, become nothing more than holes in the ground. The British Columbian lumber trade and market has since come into major problems. The fishing industries of the Atlantic Provinces are no longer a, abundant resource – since over fished for the over consumption for the rest of the world. Quebec has no resources and the protests of a tuition increase in the province further shows a decline, in economic stability in an otherwise economically stable country in a sea of sinking ships – and further shows the ever increasing divide between the lower privileged and the very highly privileged. Yet many in the rest of Canada (well at least from where I am from) view the Quebec student protests as immature, and spoiled – seeing as Quebec pays the lowest tuition!
The reason why this is written is because the more, I hear about the Greece debt crisis and its problems that continue to surround it, and what Greece is turning into, the more the stories of this collection change. Greece starts turning into a wasteland; a place that resembles more of a penal colony or Alcatraz then a place of once cultural beauty, and splendor – which has given birth to the first documented account and idea, of democracy, and the Olympics; which this year might be more political than at first thought possible – if that’s possible for the Olympics.
“Feather in the Hair,” itself (I think) took place, in Italy, another country hit hard by the recession, and also a cultural epicenter. The short story appears to concern the relationship between mother and daughter and the changing landscape of the city. Relationships themselves, are at the focal point of these stories, and the relationship between Greece and Continental Europe (especially Germany) makes for an interesting premise, while reading these short stories.
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“In the Outer Suburbs,” by Peter Stamm – From “In Strange Gardens: and Other Stories,”
Peter Stamm’s stories at times can come across as flat. The prose which is austere, somber and grave, leads to the one to see the characters as well smoothed down flat rocks. Their entire beings have been washed continuously over, and over again by circumstances, making them smooth, but no more resilient than anyone else to life’s melancholic actions, and they’ve only taken on the appearance of grey weathered weary statues, in a garden of brambles, spots of over grown grass, areas of dead grass, and misplaced rocks. However if one can get past the sombre prose. The weary grey eyed emotionless eyes of the statues that become the players in these stories; one can see a very interesting world. If anyone reads, a Peter Stamm story or a novel of his, they will most certainly say “this is definitely German.” There is no real dexterity to these stories. No poetic prose (though Herta Müller’s prose is poetic) or firework display of literary showmanship that almost self mockingly says “look at how beautiful I am.” Instead the prose is written as if the words were carved out of stone, or chipped out of wood. They are concrete. They do not float like balloons, or rise and fall like the tides. Each has a specific duty, and purpose. Each word knows its own place in the sentence. Each letter is aware of its purpose in syllable and its addition to the sound and execution of the word itself. Every sentence realizes its place in the larger picture of the story. Everything is precise, and makes the story work and run like clockwork. The narrative may come off as very down to earth, minimalist and even clinical its diagnosis of the characters situations; the narrative itself does leave well enough alone to leave a lot of room for the readers to move through the story, and try to understand the connections between characters, and how what is left unsaid and unexplained fits into the story, and finding, at the very least a theory or a very vague explanation for what had happened.
In an interview with “The New Yorker,” Peter Stamm describes two kinds of couples, and the uncertainties that both face, and how they go around facing them, and solving them. The ‘old couple,’ must face the uncertainty of death, its finality, its ambiguous way of working. Whereas ‘young couples,’ deal with the uncertainties of life itself. The future is broad, unknown, and has an absence of colour and brightness to it. It’s just there, like a stark white wall which just sits there, in a menacing looming way. It’ll need to be dealt with one way or another. Peter Stamm mentions how younger people are more serious than people his age are, because they are more worried about life planning (marriage, children, a house, with a mortgage, schooling for the kids, financial responsibilities et cetera), as they are more focused on problem solving. They themselves have already found the tune to their life. They have worked it, they continue to iron out the problems, and fix the problems accordingly. The people in the stories (so far) are all alienated, or alone in one way or another. They meet circumstances that do not fit into their needs. They commit acts seemingly on a whim, with no real emotional procedure beyond that. They do not show any extreme or outrageous outburst. When something happens they do not run away in a furry of emotions or tears. It is almost as if they are assessing the damage. When in “Ice Lake,” Urs finds out that the narrator and Stefanie have cuddled and most likely have unresolved feelings of affection for each other, he accepts it. He falls back and plunges into his own despair and suicide without much of an emotion shown. But underneath there was a current, of emotions that never made it to the surface and in his moment of quiet serene despair committed the act that killed him.
In the same interview with “The New Yorker,” Peter Stamm makes a very important remark with regard to his stories, and his prose – therefore the fiction in general, that he writes:
“It has always been my goal to make literature out of ordinary people’s lives. I don’t like the extremes; I don’t think that they teach us much about ourselves. And very often extreme or willfully original stories are just trying to make up for a lack of empathy on the part of the author.”
Which explains Peter Stamm’s minimalist prose, and his very human characters, that appear like stone statues, in an overgrown garden that has been unattended, by anyone else. Though the concept of, writing about the mundane and the ordinary person is nothing new. Virginia Woolf did just that while writing “Mrs. Dalloway,” however, she pumped it more of a poetic prose, and used more modernist techniques in order to survey the subconsciousness of the characters, and their rich emotional lives. Arguably Charles Dickens did just that – as did Emile Zola, Honoré de Balzac, Leo Tolstoy, Anton Chekhov, and contemporary Alice Munro. What separates Peter Stamm, from them, is simply execution of the work itself. whereas Virigina Woolf pumped it full of modernist techniques, and rich evocative and poetic language, Stamm chisels out the words in a precise manner showing the beauty in a far more down to earth style, rather than pumping it full of anything unnecessary – though both obtain the same goal in the end; just by different means.
With “Outer Suburbs,” by Peter Stamm, is able to show the alienation of the narrator. When his parents call from Switzerland it shows perfectly his out place nature in New York and even in the world:
“In the morning I was awakened by the phone. It was my parents calling from Switzerland, to wish me a merry Christmas. It wasn’t a long conversation, we didn’t’ know what else to say to each other.”
It perfectly exemplifies his down to earth, and straightforward and minimalist prose. There is nothing unnecessary out of place. No extra fat. Everything is surface detail, and take it at face value. However the story itself, shows the strange connection people can make. Even with strangers.
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“(Spring) The Good Air,” by Italo Calvino – From “Marcovaldo or The Seasons in The City,”
Italo Calvino’s father was an agrologist and botanist who also taught floriculture. His mother was also a botanist and a university professor. Italo Calvino’s younger brother became a geologist. The culture of plants, flowers, agriculture and the earth itself, and the natural beauty of the untamed wild, all showed great influence on Italo Calvino’s early fiction. “The Baron in the Trees,” for example Italo Calvino said himself, was written in that same legacy. However Italo Calvino also considered himself a black sheep in the family. His enjoyment of literature, and stories, were put to a far greater esteem to him, then just simple entertainment. This placed him at odds with the rest of his family who had a more scientific view of life. Yet some of Calvino’s work is more than just whimsy fabulist magical realist stories or novels. There is more, structure to them, then just meets their swirling enjoyment. Calvino himself proves that literary works can also be very entertaining and still rewarding.
In his later years Italo Calvino became involved (with the invitation of Raymond Queneau) to join the literary group Oulipo which housed such literary experimental writers as Georges Perec, Roland Barthes, Oskar Pastior, Harry Mathews, and Claude Lévi-Strauss. His short story “The Burning of the Abominable House,” is heavily influenced by the workings of Oulipo – and the “[the complete] Cosmicomics,” could also be a fitted into the category; but much like “If on a winter’s night a traveler,” and “Mr. Palomar,” may fit more into the postmodern thought of Italo Calvino. However the structure remains interesting and certainly at times could be seen as ‘mathematical,’ and does play around with form, therefore the postmodern tendencies and the later influence of Oulipo can become evident.
With “Marcovaldo or The Seasons in the City,” Italo Calvino shows his ability to play with the structure of the short stories in this collection, as well as the influence of his parents love for the natural world, and Italo Calvino’s later involvement and political awakening while he was a young man. I don’t think that Marcovaldo is a man of poverty simply by chance. Part of me thinks that Marcovaldo was a character with social and economic lower class, to show his appreciation for the natural world, and his often attentive eye to the details around him that often change, showing some natural wonders, such as the mushrooms that grew in the cracks of the streets; or the migrating woodcock flying through the air.
With “(Spring) The Good Air,” Marcovaldo sees the natural world, while comparing it to the city that lies below. The city which at one point in time had left him the feeling, of wonder and awe, and showed mankind’s resilience towards nature, now leaves him dissatisfied.
With doctors’ orders, Marcovaldo is forced to take his children up into the nearby countryside for them, to improve their breathing as the Doctor pointed out the children needed fresh clean air. Something they were not getting in the cramped basement suite, in which they live in, cramped with each other: two parents, and six children. Their enjoyment in the countryside, leads Marcovaldo to reflect on the city:
“In the city a few lights came on, in a confused sparkle. Marcovaldo felt again a rush of the feeling he had as a young man, arrive in the city, when those streets, those lights attracted him as if he expected something unknown from them. The swallows plunged head long through the air onto the city.
The he was seized by the sadness of having to go back down there, and in the clotted landscape he figured out the shadow of his neighbourhood: it seemed to him a leaden wasteland, stagnant, carved by the thick scales of the roofs and the shreds of smoke flapping on the stick-like chimney-pots.”
I share the same feelings with Marcovaldo. When I was younger to drive through the dazzlingly lights of the city, compared to the oblivion of shadow and darkness – besides the twinkling lights of far off farms and feed lots, around the small town that I grew up in, I thought the city was some form of utopia. However once one gets to know the idealized version of the place they held to such high esteem, it eventually becomes polluted and corrupted, by reality. However Italo Calvino allows for a use of humour, and often surreal or odd situations to provide an interesting view of nature and the urban conflict.
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“The Homecoming Stranger,” Bei Dao – From “The Waves: and Other Stories,”
Any writer that comes from China will undoubtedly be called a political writer in some form or another. Duo Duo a fellow Misty Poet along with Bei Dao was awarded the prestigious Neustadt International Prize for Literature in two thousand and ten. In doing so he has become the only Chinese writer to have been awarded the prize. In fact Duo Duo’s earlier poems were barbed with political references, and most likely were aimed at the Communist Elite ruling the country at that time. It should come to no shock that Bei Dao, a now dissident and exiled writer, who has lived his life away from his former country who had tried to ‘reform,’ him has become less then optimistic, in his views of ideology and contemporary China. However his magazine “Today,” and the works of the Misty Poets, in general helped form the pro-democracy movement in China. In the Tiananmen Square Protests of nineteen-eighty nine, his poem “The Answer,” was a slogan throughout posters during the protests. However during the shootings and subsequent massacres that had followed, Bei Dao who was in Berlin visiting a literary conference, he became exiled from the country. Fellow poets and writers Gu Cheng, Yang Lian, and Duo Duo, were all exiled away from China. As the Nobel Laureate in Literature in two thousand and nine, had commented on her, that she had not chosen what she had written. It was her life. For the longest time the dictatorship behind the Iron Curtain was all that she knew. Therefore the logical conclusion had happened. She wrote about surviving under a dictatorship. Her experiences had shaped her life. Not the other way around. The same goes with Bei Dao, what he had seen in his life, has allowed for him to comment on the horrible acts of governments in general, has forced him to write the bleak and melancholic work, that describes what he has observed.
In “The Homecoming Stranger,” Bei Dao, more openly deals with political prisoners and reform camps, forced labour, and re-education in a more open way. However the effect comes off in some ways more personal that it does as a more overtly political sniping attack. It deals with the suffering of the individual. How all suffered under the Cultural Revolution – except the dictator and his guards. Even children were not immune to the suffering. “The Homecoming Stranger,” the father’s daughter is full of resentment. Her own life ruined. For twenty years he had been missing. Twenty years sent away. Hidden in a labour camp, facing re-education – to become a proper citizen of the People’s Republic of China – an irony that is never lost on me. In this time his daughter paid, for professing his innocence constantly. Her knees and legs turned to red ribbons, as she was forced to kneel on shards of glass for her impudence.
It is obvious she resents the government for these very reasons. Yet one does feel a sense that the resentment was pushed towards her father. His absence, and her longing for him, added with his abduction and reformation and reshaping of him as an individual; had placed all the woes and problems on her father. For his own individual actions had brought the wraith of the officials down on them. His own arrest and her own punishment from defending him and proclaiming his innocence.
“For all of us life begins with those pale blue copy books, with those words, sentences, and punctuation marks smudged by erasers; or, to put it more precisely, it begins with a certain degree of deception. The teachers delineated life with the halos, but which of them does not into a smoke ring or an iron hoop.”
Such poetic langue and imagery is to be expected throughout his stories. His training is first and foremost in the wordsmithing of poetry. This allows for a greater and more obscure concept of his work. But it does present the message across quiet well. Personally I find it rather enjoyable.
Bei Dao shows the difficult of adjusting to the life and dumb beat of normal life, away from the camps for such a prolong period of time. As it can be seen how the father picks through the garbage looking for a tossed cigarette case. Fear in his voice that he may have written something that he should not have written. But also the picking and scrumming for food, I also had a feeling.
However the ending to which the father presents his own resentful daughter with a bracelet of old discarded tooth brush ends, to which he had crafted through the years; though verging on the sentimental; does the job done right, showing the bonds that connect all us all through the years, and in times of political turmoil.
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“The Saint,” by Gabriel García Márquez the Nobel Laureate in Literature of nineteen-eighty two – From “Strange Pilgrims: and Other Stories,”
I didn’t enjoy “Bon Voyage, Mr. President,” and I won’t lie about it either. I felt it was more of a political message. It lacked Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s usual feel to it. A feeling of bland and listless prose, left bored and wondered what was the point of finishing the story – and when it did, there was a feeling of “well . . .” in the end it was finished. Though it was a poor start to the book itself in my opinion.
“The Saint,” however quickly changed that perception. Written about a man Margarito Duarte who’s from a small Andean town in Colombia, who has traveled to Rome to seek the canonization and recognize the miracle and saint hood of his deceased daughter. His deceased daughter died just after the age of seven. Whose miracle was soon found out when the village had to relocate the village’s dead from where it had, for the construction of a new damn. It is there that the weightless corpse of his daughter is discovered. Intact and preserved as if she were buried just that day.
What is quite lovely I found personally is the discussion of Italy. The description of time passing.
“After lunch Rome would succumb to its August stupor. The afternoon sun remained immobile, in the middle of the sky, and in the two-o ‘clock silence one heard nothing but water, which is the natural voice of Rome. But at about Seven, the windows were thrown open to summon the cool air that began to circulate, and a jubilant crowed took to the streets with no other purpose that to live, in the midst of the midst of the back firing motorcycles, the shouts of melon vendors, and the love songs among the flowers on the terraces.”
Such vibrant nostalgia descried left a sense of Rome in my own mind of traveling. Being described by an outsider was wonderful and beautiful. A real sense of place and time was established. The use of metaphors and detailed points allowed for the photographic snapshot of the city’s idiosyncrasies to be revealed. Wide armed with exaggerated and wonderful expressions of the vendors, trying to out sell their compatriots and competitors. The deserted streets, in the high afternoon. The sound of the fountains, made from ancient artists and sculptors. The masters of their crafts, displayed in wide and full beauty – singing in the real voice of Roman, came straight to tickle the mind’s eye. The quiet cobblestone streets. The clacking and the tapping of the shoes; cafes lay deserted. Even the pigeons stop their cooing to stake out shade and sleep.
This exotic and ancient and almost mystical city with its art depicting myths, it becomes a great place for a preserved dead little girl who looks pristinely human, and the miracle that presents her into the category of sainthood. This Christian mysticism is a perfect blend to show how magical realism works. Myths of saints, who talked with animals, made gardens from the seeds of the Garden of Eden, communicated with angels, healed miraculous people. Spoke and indoctrinated the word of God. Their actions themselves had led to their sainthood. Their very actions were next to the epiphany of what Christianity was – not to what it has become.
This story however is amazing for its magical realism. A man’s constant attempt to get his daughter brought to the attention of Pope for her remarkable death. A miracle that defies nature itself. However countless times the bureaucratic process itself was always a challenge. No one believed him that his daughter was dead and perfectly preserved. Each time he lobbied and focused on her canonization it was nothing more then turned to the door and told to take his fake miracle with him. A nice cheap knock off. Thanks for trying go home. Better luck next time.
The nostalgia is quickly ended however in this story. The once pristine Rome becomes a place of modern ruin. Yet the miracle remains – something that unwillingly refuses to change.
“Among all the extinct fauna, the only survivor was the old lion, who suffered from mange and a cold on his island surrounded by dried waters. No one sang or died of love in the plastic trattorias on the Plazza di Spagna. For the Rome of our memory was by another ancient Rome, with the Ancient Rome of the Caesars.”
What is foreign is a question. What makes something foreign. Yet in the end Gabriel García Márquez expresses that the divine is never foreign. The miracle of Margarito Duarte’s daughter continues to be profound and wonderful. The mysticism of the banal. The wonders of the unexplained. The magical. They are not foreign but are the common place. They go unseen. Yet never unfelt.
When Antonio Tabucchi died earlier this year, there was an empty feeling in the very pit of my stomach. Antonio Tabucchi couldn’t die, was my immediate thinking. Selfishly the concept of one of my favourite authors dying made me, resort to being selfish and childish in my inability to comprehend or want to at least accept that his death had come. However the shock and reaction has since warn off, and I realize – or rather force myself to accept the fact that there would be no more future works by Antonio Tabucchi. There are plenty works that still (need) to be translated into English by the author, but his future output itself, of a new novel has since been dashed by his untimely death.
Antonio Tabucchi has a quality of writing, that in a personal opinion, a writer either has or they don’t have. Tabucchi provides a lucid, distinct and luminous prose, however to call Tabucchi’s work unambiguous would be too far from the truth. Tabucchi’s prose, maybe lucid but it is also like a poetic hallucination, this along with his ‘normal,’ people characters – journalists, resistance, scholars, wanders, poets, widows as well as children; allow for him to write elegant and clever stories, and short novels, that explore both politics as well as the humanity of his characters, to which both author and character are able to share empathy. His ability to write about the lingering smells and tastes of a meal (such as in Pereira Declares, whose fondness of omelette’s and lemonade) as well as his ability to write about the philosophical and political, via dialogue can be brought into contrast of his culinary descriptions.
“She thought how bogus all writing really was – the implacable tyranny of circumscribing words, of verbs and adjectives that imprison things, hardening them into a glass fixity, like a dragonfly caught for centuries in a rock, which keeps the appearance of a dragonfly but is one no longer. Such is writing, with its capacity to pin down the present and the recent past and distance them, by centuries, from us.”
“Rooms,” by Antonio Tabucchi deals with the relationship between brothers and sister. If memory serves me correct the brother was one a scholar. A man of great importance; which leads to traces of “Waiting for Winter,” where the dead husband who was a writer, was also held to great esteem in the community and the elite of society, whose mourning for one of their own is described by the widow of the writer. That same could be said for “Rooms,” where the brother is a scholar, and whose importance and rising through the ranks, has led to him becoming acquainted with higher members of society. It would not be a surprise if the brother and his sister had attended the funeral and wake of the writer themselves.
Now the brother has fallen into ill health, and appears to suffer great pains. The sister herself takes care of her brother, in his suffering and long drawn out process of death itself. But what makes this story work is the prose itself. Highly defined literary metaphors, where the past and the present becomes descriptive, but also encased in amber like a prehistoric bug – or the fossil of some long since dead dinosaur, but the beauty of the prose itself carries the weight behind this short story, as it does most of the short stories in this collection, allow for a more show approach rather than a “storytelling,” approach where the action is described via oral and verbal ordeals. The work itself encases moments like memories or photographs. These moments, full of touching moments, and emotions. They remind one of their own feelings and emotions. Scenes, and moments that have long since faded away, and yet remain in the not so distant past, and with a mixture of nostalgia becomes moments of enjoyment. Like the time my father showed me, what lies inside of a cat tales (the plant) the cotton like fluff, that popped out of the brown felt casing of the plant, at the time was what clouds were made up of. To a degree that is what Tabucchi’s prose is like. It captures and encases the moments, and “hardening them into a glass fixity,” creating little jewels, gems, and crystals of literature itself, just waiting to be unearthed.
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“Feather in the Hair,” by Ersi Sotiropoulos – From: “Landscape with Dog: and Other Stories,”
In the autumn of two-thousand and eleven, Ersi Sotiropoulos, lamented on the current state (and what was just the beginning of a very long drawn out process that will most likely continue) of Greece and its debt crisis. She uses her signature style to remark on Greece’s past image, its complicate relationship with Europe (much like the UK), and the incompetence of the Greek politicians who have done nothing but to continue to add fuel to an already blazing out of control fire – not to mention her accusation remarks against Germany, and ability to open up old wounds, while maintain a strong Green nationalist stance, with plenty of spice and garlic to boot.
Here are a few remarks that the author said during her interview with BBC Radio 4 “The View from Greece by Ersi Sotiropoulos,”
“Autumn this year in Greece is darker than in other years – a season of insecurity and distress. The signs of recession are everywhere: in the centre of Athens shops are closing one after another. Immigrants squat in dilapidated buildings, the trash piles up in the streets.
The decline has been swift – meanwhile immigrants continue to arrive in a country where there is no work and no social security. What will happen to all these people who are coming here already hungry and exhausted? Hunger brings violence, we know that. The party’s over, I say to myself, and and Greece will be (only) the first to fall.”
The author is very right with that comment. Last I had heard, violence in Greece had gone up a whole 90% -- or more. Suicide had raisen 30% - 40%. The outlook continues to look grim, even with the prospect of another Greek election coming up in a few weeks; and all the past referendums, have done nothing so far to help improve the situation, or inspired any hope or caused or determined a solution for a continuous long term problem.
“I walk through a collapsing city, a city paralysed by the strikes, where rubbish from the past several weeks still sits uncollected in the streets and wonder – is this place really a part of Europe?”
There is a definitely a sense of alienation, and more importantly a real sense of betrayal, as Greece now starts to wonder about its own membership in the “Eurozone,” seeing as in a blink of an eye the ruling people and government of Greece, was forced into taking some: “austerity measures demanded by the IMF and the European Central Bank.” From the sounds of it, this lead to steep cuts in social programs, large cuts in public sectors, cuts in pension plans, outrageous tax increases – that even the minimal wage would have to pay (even though they wouldn’t be able to afford), the Greek state assets were to be privatized and sold to investors and banks, at a very shrunken down discounted price. From here people took to the streets, the outrage, the anger, the protests, the betrayal was shown in the faces and at times outrageous gestures and actions of the people of Greece. But the message was clear – There was a big problem.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada also continues this demand for a solution. However, it doesn’t appear that Prime Minister Stephen Harper, has come up with any solution himself; as Canadian resources themselves are sold off and given away to other countries for manufacturing, without concern for the future and the fact that will cause many to worry for Canada’s economy: “What happens when Alberta’s Oil Sands run out,” what about Saskatchewan’s pot ash ceases to be Saskatchewan’s let alone Canadian? What will we do when the Northern Diamond mines, become nothing more than holes in the ground. The British Columbian lumber trade and market has since come into major problems. The fishing industries of the Atlantic Provinces are no longer a, abundant resource – since over fished for the over consumption for the rest of the world. Quebec has no resources and the protests of a tuition increase in the province further shows a decline, in economic stability in an otherwise economically stable country in a sea of sinking ships – and further shows the ever increasing divide between the lower privileged and the very highly privileged. Yet many in the rest of Canada (well at least from where I am from) view the Quebec student protests as immature, and spoiled – seeing as Quebec pays the lowest tuition!
The reason why this is written is because the more, I hear about the Greece debt crisis and its problems that continue to surround it, and what Greece is turning into, the more the stories of this collection change. Greece starts turning into a wasteland; a place that resembles more of a penal colony or Alcatraz then a place of once cultural beauty, and splendor – which has given birth to the first documented account and idea, of democracy, and the Olympics; which this year might be more political than at first thought possible – if that’s possible for the Olympics.
“Feather in the Hair,” itself (I think) took place, in Italy, another country hit hard by the recession, and also a cultural epicenter. The short story appears to concern the relationship between mother and daughter and the changing landscape of the city. Relationships themselves, are at the focal point of these stories, and the relationship between Greece and Continental Europe (especially Germany) makes for an interesting premise, while reading these short stories.
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“In the Outer Suburbs,” by Peter Stamm – From “In Strange Gardens: and Other Stories,”
Peter Stamm’s stories at times can come across as flat. The prose which is austere, somber and grave, leads to the one to see the characters as well smoothed down flat rocks. Their entire beings have been washed continuously over, and over again by circumstances, making them smooth, but no more resilient than anyone else to life’s melancholic actions, and they’ve only taken on the appearance of grey weathered weary statues, in a garden of brambles, spots of over grown grass, areas of dead grass, and misplaced rocks. However if one can get past the sombre prose. The weary grey eyed emotionless eyes of the statues that become the players in these stories; one can see a very interesting world. If anyone reads, a Peter Stamm story or a novel of his, they will most certainly say “this is definitely German.” There is no real dexterity to these stories. No poetic prose (though Herta Müller’s prose is poetic) or firework display of literary showmanship that almost self mockingly says “look at how beautiful I am.” Instead the prose is written as if the words were carved out of stone, or chipped out of wood. They are concrete. They do not float like balloons, or rise and fall like the tides. Each has a specific duty, and purpose. Each word knows its own place in the sentence. Each letter is aware of its purpose in syllable and its addition to the sound and execution of the word itself. Every sentence realizes its place in the larger picture of the story. Everything is precise, and makes the story work and run like clockwork. The narrative may come off as very down to earth, minimalist and even clinical its diagnosis of the characters situations; the narrative itself does leave well enough alone to leave a lot of room for the readers to move through the story, and try to understand the connections between characters, and how what is left unsaid and unexplained fits into the story, and finding, at the very least a theory or a very vague explanation for what had happened.
In an interview with “The New Yorker,” Peter Stamm describes two kinds of couples, and the uncertainties that both face, and how they go around facing them, and solving them. The ‘old couple,’ must face the uncertainty of death, its finality, its ambiguous way of working. Whereas ‘young couples,’ deal with the uncertainties of life itself. The future is broad, unknown, and has an absence of colour and brightness to it. It’s just there, like a stark white wall which just sits there, in a menacing looming way. It’ll need to be dealt with one way or another. Peter Stamm mentions how younger people are more serious than people his age are, because they are more worried about life planning (marriage, children, a house, with a mortgage, schooling for the kids, financial responsibilities et cetera), as they are more focused on problem solving. They themselves have already found the tune to their life. They have worked it, they continue to iron out the problems, and fix the problems accordingly. The people in the stories (so far) are all alienated, or alone in one way or another. They meet circumstances that do not fit into their needs. They commit acts seemingly on a whim, with no real emotional procedure beyond that. They do not show any extreme or outrageous outburst. When something happens they do not run away in a furry of emotions or tears. It is almost as if they are assessing the damage. When in “Ice Lake,” Urs finds out that the narrator and Stefanie have cuddled and most likely have unresolved feelings of affection for each other, he accepts it. He falls back and plunges into his own despair and suicide without much of an emotion shown. But underneath there was a current, of emotions that never made it to the surface and in his moment of quiet serene despair committed the act that killed him.
In the same interview with “The New Yorker,” Peter Stamm makes a very important remark with regard to his stories, and his prose – therefore the fiction in general, that he writes:
“It has always been my goal to make literature out of ordinary people’s lives. I don’t like the extremes; I don’t think that they teach us much about ourselves. And very often extreme or willfully original stories are just trying to make up for a lack of empathy on the part of the author.”
Which explains Peter Stamm’s minimalist prose, and his very human characters, that appear like stone statues, in an overgrown garden that has been unattended, by anyone else. Though the concept of, writing about the mundane and the ordinary person is nothing new. Virginia Woolf did just that while writing “Mrs. Dalloway,” however, she pumped it more of a poetic prose, and used more modernist techniques in order to survey the subconsciousness of the characters, and their rich emotional lives. Arguably Charles Dickens did just that – as did Emile Zola, Honoré de Balzac, Leo Tolstoy, Anton Chekhov, and contemporary Alice Munro. What separates Peter Stamm, from them, is simply execution of the work itself. whereas Virigina Woolf pumped it full of modernist techniques, and rich evocative and poetic language, Stamm chisels out the words in a precise manner showing the beauty in a far more down to earth style, rather than pumping it full of anything unnecessary – though both obtain the same goal in the end; just by different means.
With “Outer Suburbs,” by Peter Stamm, is able to show the alienation of the narrator. When his parents call from Switzerland it shows perfectly his out place nature in New York and even in the world:
“In the morning I was awakened by the phone. It was my parents calling from Switzerland, to wish me a merry Christmas. It wasn’t a long conversation, we didn’t’ know what else to say to each other.”
It perfectly exemplifies his down to earth, and straightforward and minimalist prose. There is nothing unnecessary out of place. No extra fat. Everything is surface detail, and take it at face value. However the story itself, shows the strange connection people can make. Even with strangers.
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“(Spring) The Good Air,” by Italo Calvino – From “Marcovaldo or The Seasons in The City,”
Italo Calvino’s father was an agrologist and botanist who also taught floriculture. His mother was also a botanist and a university professor. Italo Calvino’s younger brother became a geologist. The culture of plants, flowers, agriculture and the earth itself, and the natural beauty of the untamed wild, all showed great influence on Italo Calvino’s early fiction. “The Baron in the Trees,” for example Italo Calvino said himself, was written in that same legacy. However Italo Calvino also considered himself a black sheep in the family. His enjoyment of literature, and stories, were put to a far greater esteem to him, then just simple entertainment. This placed him at odds with the rest of his family who had a more scientific view of life. Yet some of Calvino’s work is more than just whimsy fabulist magical realist stories or novels. There is more, structure to them, then just meets their swirling enjoyment. Calvino himself proves that literary works can also be very entertaining and still rewarding.
In his later years Italo Calvino became involved (with the invitation of Raymond Queneau) to join the literary group Oulipo which housed such literary experimental writers as Georges Perec, Roland Barthes, Oskar Pastior, Harry Mathews, and Claude Lévi-Strauss. His short story “The Burning of the Abominable House,” is heavily influenced by the workings of Oulipo – and the “[the complete] Cosmicomics,” could also be a fitted into the category; but much like “If on a winter’s night a traveler,” and “Mr. Palomar,” may fit more into the postmodern thought of Italo Calvino. However the structure remains interesting and certainly at times could be seen as ‘mathematical,’ and does play around with form, therefore the postmodern tendencies and the later influence of Oulipo can become evident.
With “Marcovaldo or The Seasons in the City,” Italo Calvino shows his ability to play with the structure of the short stories in this collection, as well as the influence of his parents love for the natural world, and Italo Calvino’s later involvement and political awakening while he was a young man. I don’t think that Marcovaldo is a man of poverty simply by chance. Part of me thinks that Marcovaldo was a character with social and economic lower class, to show his appreciation for the natural world, and his often attentive eye to the details around him that often change, showing some natural wonders, such as the mushrooms that grew in the cracks of the streets; or the migrating woodcock flying through the air.
With “(Spring) The Good Air,” Marcovaldo sees the natural world, while comparing it to the city that lies below. The city which at one point in time had left him the feeling, of wonder and awe, and showed mankind’s resilience towards nature, now leaves him dissatisfied.
With doctors’ orders, Marcovaldo is forced to take his children up into the nearby countryside for them, to improve their breathing as the Doctor pointed out the children needed fresh clean air. Something they were not getting in the cramped basement suite, in which they live in, cramped with each other: two parents, and six children. Their enjoyment in the countryside, leads Marcovaldo to reflect on the city:
“In the city a few lights came on, in a confused sparkle. Marcovaldo felt again a rush of the feeling he had as a young man, arrive in the city, when those streets, those lights attracted him as if he expected something unknown from them. The swallows plunged head long through the air onto the city.
The he was seized by the sadness of having to go back down there, and in the clotted landscape he figured out the shadow of his neighbourhood: it seemed to him a leaden wasteland, stagnant, carved by the thick scales of the roofs and the shreds of smoke flapping on the stick-like chimney-pots.”
I share the same feelings with Marcovaldo. When I was younger to drive through the dazzlingly lights of the city, compared to the oblivion of shadow and darkness – besides the twinkling lights of far off farms and feed lots, around the small town that I grew up in, I thought the city was some form of utopia. However once one gets to know the idealized version of the place they held to such high esteem, it eventually becomes polluted and corrupted, by reality. However Italo Calvino allows for a use of humour, and often surreal or odd situations to provide an interesting view of nature and the urban conflict.
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“The Homecoming Stranger,” Bei Dao – From “The Waves: and Other Stories,”
Any writer that comes from China will undoubtedly be called a political writer in some form or another. Duo Duo a fellow Misty Poet along with Bei Dao was awarded the prestigious Neustadt International Prize for Literature in two thousand and ten. In doing so he has become the only Chinese writer to have been awarded the prize. In fact Duo Duo’s earlier poems were barbed with political references, and most likely were aimed at the Communist Elite ruling the country at that time. It should come to no shock that Bei Dao, a now dissident and exiled writer, who has lived his life away from his former country who had tried to ‘reform,’ him has become less then optimistic, in his views of ideology and contemporary China. However his magazine “Today,” and the works of the Misty Poets, in general helped form the pro-democracy movement in China. In the Tiananmen Square Protests of nineteen-eighty nine, his poem “The Answer,” was a slogan throughout posters during the protests. However during the shootings and subsequent massacres that had followed, Bei Dao who was in Berlin visiting a literary conference, he became exiled from the country. Fellow poets and writers Gu Cheng, Yang Lian, and Duo Duo, were all exiled away from China. As the Nobel Laureate in Literature in two thousand and nine, had commented on her, that she had not chosen what she had written. It was her life. For the longest time the dictatorship behind the Iron Curtain was all that she knew. Therefore the logical conclusion had happened. She wrote about surviving under a dictatorship. Her experiences had shaped her life. Not the other way around. The same goes with Bei Dao, what he had seen in his life, has allowed for him to comment on the horrible acts of governments in general, has forced him to write the bleak and melancholic work, that describes what he has observed.
In “The Homecoming Stranger,” Bei Dao, more openly deals with political prisoners and reform camps, forced labour, and re-education in a more open way. However the effect comes off in some ways more personal that it does as a more overtly political sniping attack. It deals with the suffering of the individual. How all suffered under the Cultural Revolution – except the dictator and his guards. Even children were not immune to the suffering. “The Homecoming Stranger,” the father’s daughter is full of resentment. Her own life ruined. For twenty years he had been missing. Twenty years sent away. Hidden in a labour camp, facing re-education – to become a proper citizen of the People’s Republic of China – an irony that is never lost on me. In this time his daughter paid, for professing his innocence constantly. Her knees and legs turned to red ribbons, as she was forced to kneel on shards of glass for her impudence.
It is obvious she resents the government for these very reasons. Yet one does feel a sense that the resentment was pushed towards her father. His absence, and her longing for him, added with his abduction and reformation and reshaping of him as an individual; had placed all the woes and problems on her father. For his own individual actions had brought the wraith of the officials down on them. His own arrest and her own punishment from defending him and proclaiming his innocence.
“For all of us life begins with those pale blue copy books, with those words, sentences, and punctuation marks smudged by erasers; or, to put it more precisely, it begins with a certain degree of deception. The teachers delineated life with the halos, but which of them does not into a smoke ring or an iron hoop.”
Such poetic langue and imagery is to be expected throughout his stories. His training is first and foremost in the wordsmithing of poetry. This allows for a greater and more obscure concept of his work. But it does present the message across quiet well. Personally I find it rather enjoyable.
Bei Dao shows the difficult of adjusting to the life and dumb beat of normal life, away from the camps for such a prolong period of time. As it can be seen how the father picks through the garbage looking for a tossed cigarette case. Fear in his voice that he may have written something that he should not have written. But also the picking and scrumming for food, I also had a feeling.
However the ending to which the father presents his own resentful daughter with a bracelet of old discarded tooth brush ends, to which he had crafted through the years; though verging on the sentimental; does the job done right, showing the bonds that connect all us all through the years, and in times of political turmoil.
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“The Saint,” by Gabriel García Márquez the Nobel Laureate in Literature of nineteen-eighty two – From “Strange Pilgrims: and Other Stories,”
I didn’t enjoy “Bon Voyage, Mr. President,” and I won’t lie about it either. I felt it was more of a political message. It lacked Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s usual feel to it. A feeling of bland and listless prose, left bored and wondered what was the point of finishing the story – and when it did, there was a feeling of “well . . .” in the end it was finished. Though it was a poor start to the book itself in my opinion.
“The Saint,” however quickly changed that perception. Written about a man Margarito Duarte who’s from a small Andean town in Colombia, who has traveled to Rome to seek the canonization and recognize the miracle and saint hood of his deceased daughter. His deceased daughter died just after the age of seven. Whose miracle was soon found out when the village had to relocate the village’s dead from where it had, for the construction of a new damn. It is there that the weightless corpse of his daughter is discovered. Intact and preserved as if she were buried just that day.
What is quite lovely I found personally is the discussion of Italy. The description of time passing.
“After lunch Rome would succumb to its August stupor. The afternoon sun remained immobile, in the middle of the sky, and in the two-o ‘clock silence one heard nothing but water, which is the natural voice of Rome. But at about Seven, the windows were thrown open to summon the cool air that began to circulate, and a jubilant crowed took to the streets with no other purpose that to live, in the midst of the midst of the back firing motorcycles, the shouts of melon vendors, and the love songs among the flowers on the terraces.”
Such vibrant nostalgia descried left a sense of Rome in my own mind of traveling. Being described by an outsider was wonderful and beautiful. A real sense of place and time was established. The use of metaphors and detailed points allowed for the photographic snapshot of the city’s idiosyncrasies to be revealed. Wide armed with exaggerated and wonderful expressions of the vendors, trying to out sell their compatriots and competitors. The deserted streets, in the high afternoon. The sound of the fountains, made from ancient artists and sculptors. The masters of their crafts, displayed in wide and full beauty – singing in the real voice of Roman, came straight to tickle the mind’s eye. The quiet cobblestone streets. The clacking and the tapping of the shoes; cafes lay deserted. Even the pigeons stop their cooing to stake out shade and sleep.
This exotic and ancient and almost mystical city with its art depicting myths, it becomes a great place for a preserved dead little girl who looks pristinely human, and the miracle that presents her into the category of sainthood. This Christian mysticism is a perfect blend to show how magical realism works. Myths of saints, who talked with animals, made gardens from the seeds of the Garden of Eden, communicated with angels, healed miraculous people. Spoke and indoctrinated the word of God. Their actions themselves had led to their sainthood. Their very actions were next to the epiphany of what Christianity was – not to what it has become.
This story however is amazing for its magical realism. A man’s constant attempt to get his daughter brought to the attention of Pope for her remarkable death. A miracle that defies nature itself. However countless times the bureaucratic process itself was always a challenge. No one believed him that his daughter was dead and perfectly preserved. Each time he lobbied and focused on her canonization it was nothing more then turned to the door and told to take his fake miracle with him. A nice cheap knock off. Thanks for trying go home. Better luck next time.
The nostalgia is quickly ended however in this story. The once pristine Rome becomes a place of modern ruin. Yet the miracle remains – something that unwillingly refuses to change.
“Among all the extinct fauna, the only survivor was the old lion, who suffered from mange and a cold on his island surrounded by dried waters. No one sang or died of love in the plastic trattorias on the Plazza di Spagna. For the Rome of our memory was by another ancient Rome, with the Ancient Rome of the Caesars.”
What is foreign is a question. What makes something foreign. Yet in the end Gabriel García Márquez expresses that the divine is never foreign. The miracle of Margarito Duarte’s daughter continues to be profound and wonderful. The mysticism of the banal. The wonders of the unexplained. The magical. They are not foreign but are the common place. They go unseen. Yet never unfelt.
The Short Story Review No. XIII Introduction
Hello Gentle Reader
Alice Walker the author of the novel “The Colour Purple,” which had won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in nineteen-eighty three, has refused a Israeli edition of her award winning novel on political grounds. The author herself is part of the Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions movement, which takes a political stance against the Israeli government, and is in favour of a two state solution between what is known as the Gaza Bank and Modern Israel. Alice Walker has written a letter to Yediot Books the hopefully publisher of her translated novel, on her stance of the matter. In a latter posted on the website of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, Alice Walker went on to say:
“As you may know, last Fall in South Africa the Russell Tribunal on Palestine met and determined that Israel is guilty of apartheid and persecution of the Palestinian people, both inside Israel and also in the Occupied Territories. The testimony we heard, both from Israelis and Palestinians (I was a jurist) was devastating. I grew up under American apartheid and this was far worse. Indeed, many South Africans who attended, including Desmond Tutu, felt the Israeli version of these crimes is worse even than what they suffered under the white supremacist regimes that dominated South Africa for so long.”
It is with this political stance, that Alice Walker believes that by withholding the novel, that she will ensure that the people of both Israel and the Occupied Territories to come to a reasonable solution that will benefit both states.
While some have praised Alice Walker’s integrity, others have been less warm in their reception of her choice. Claiming her desire of collective punishment, of all of Israel is uncalled for – based on the historical problems that the Jewish population themselves, have had to face.
On my own personal note, I think it’s difficult to judge this particular stance from either perspective. The conflict between Israel and the Palestine people is a complicated issue in which I know little of. First and foremost, I have never been to Israel. Second, what I receive about information between the conflict between Israel and the Occupied Territories, is by media alone, and therefore certainly biased, and shaded in with its own political affiliations. However to boycott something in which I know little about, is ridiculous to me. The conflict and dispute itself is long and complicated and goes back many years and if one wants to get right down to it, down to the very beginning of Israel’s formation in ancient times. Alice Walker herself uses and names the Russell Tribunal on Palestine and the verdict that Israel is guilt of apartheid, much worst then even South Africa’s supremacy, for me looked more like an ideological naïve attempt that a bunch of human rights activists would stand up and say such a thing. In the end the tribunal will/has done nothing. Alice Walker’s boycott will do nothing either. It may even further seal the concrete views of Israel towards toward Occupied Territories, as right, and may have to prove the Jewish residence against pressure, on their own stands.
However to call Alice Walker, self-absorbed is not entirely right. To call her ideologically naïve is perhaps a better way of stating the matter.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Alice Walker the author of the novel “The Colour Purple,” which had won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in nineteen-eighty three, has refused a Israeli edition of her award winning novel on political grounds. The author herself is part of the Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions movement, which takes a political stance against the Israeli government, and is in favour of a two state solution between what is known as the Gaza Bank and Modern Israel. Alice Walker has written a letter to Yediot Books the hopefully publisher of her translated novel, on her stance of the matter. In a latter posted on the website of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, Alice Walker went on to say:
“As you may know, last Fall in South Africa the Russell Tribunal on Palestine met and determined that Israel is guilty of apartheid and persecution of the Palestinian people, both inside Israel and also in the Occupied Territories. The testimony we heard, both from Israelis and Palestinians (I was a jurist) was devastating. I grew up under American apartheid and this was far worse. Indeed, many South Africans who attended, including Desmond Tutu, felt the Israeli version of these crimes is worse even than what they suffered under the white supremacist regimes that dominated South Africa for so long.”
It is with this political stance, that Alice Walker believes that by withholding the novel, that she will ensure that the people of both Israel and the Occupied Territories to come to a reasonable solution that will benefit both states.
While some have praised Alice Walker’s integrity, others have been less warm in their reception of her choice. Claiming her desire of collective punishment, of all of Israel is uncalled for – based on the historical problems that the Jewish population themselves, have had to face.
On my own personal note, I think it’s difficult to judge this particular stance from either perspective. The conflict between Israel and the Palestine people is a complicated issue in which I know little of. First and foremost, I have never been to Israel. Second, what I receive about information between the conflict between Israel and the Occupied Territories, is by media alone, and therefore certainly biased, and shaded in with its own political affiliations. However to boycott something in which I know little about, is ridiculous to me. The conflict and dispute itself is long and complicated and goes back many years and if one wants to get right down to it, down to the very beginning of Israel’s formation in ancient times. Alice Walker herself uses and names the Russell Tribunal on Palestine and the verdict that Israel is guilt of apartheid, much worst then even South Africa’s supremacy, for me looked more like an ideological naïve attempt that a bunch of human rights activists would stand up and say such a thing. In the end the tribunal will/has done nothing. Alice Walker’s boycott will do nothing either. It may even further seal the concrete views of Israel towards toward Occupied Territories, as right, and may have to prove the Jewish residence against pressure, on their own stands.
However to call Alice Walker, self-absorbed is not entirely right. To call her ideologically naïve is perhaps a better way of stating the matter.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Thursday, 14 June 2012
IMPAC Literary Dublin Award Winner
Hello Gentle Reader
To continue with last weeks, discussion of the literary news, and the brief discussion of the IMPAC Literary Dublin Award's shortlist, and now the revealing of the winner was announced yesterday. Jon McGregor a British author (in a previous post I had misidentified the novelist as a Scottish writer) has won the IMPAC Literary Dublin Award, for his third novel “Even the Dogs,” about an alcoholic and the various drug addicts that surround him. The judges of this year’s award praised the novels fierce experimentation with narrative technique that engages the readers with the book itself, and grapples into the situations of the characters themselves. They go on to praise is ability to craft a complex and compelling story in such a shorter frame of a novel. Personally after reading about the shortlisted authors, I would not have guessed that any of the authors would have won, on the simple descriptions of their own. The description of “Even the Dogs,” didn’t sound all that interesting to me at first glance. A novel about an alcoholic, who dies and the addicts that surround him – for me sounded like a moral novel, which was to leave readers with the impression of “don’t do drugs kids.” However Jon McGregor’s novel doesn’t sound so moralistic as it does sound like a novel of face value, and allows for the readers and characters to speak for themselves. Jon McGregor himself had stated that having any agenda in a story destroys the openness with the characters, and lose sight of where the story is going. Jon McGregor continues with his interview to go on and explain to his choice to write about the subject matter of the less extraordinary people of the world, rather than the extraordinary people who in their success now face moral dilemmas, of money, office politics, and addictions; rather Jon McGregor goes on to point out that it has all been said and done. Everyone has done the same old song and dance, throughout literature history and even in today’s world. As he points out the story or novel with a twenty page passage of a brain surgeon whose playing racket ball. This is where Jon McGregor and I can agree completely on. A (fictional) neurosurgeon or doctor or political ambassador or wealthy lawyer and I have little in common. Their situations or their problems maybe universal, and yet. A doctor whose marriage is fallen apart, whose children despise him or her, who copes with alcohol, makes poor decision on the job, et cetera is a human and universal themes of suffering, but the success of the character in his career or (earlier life) leads to some alienation between character and reader.
The same resonates with political novels that deal with the narrator being a revolutionary or rebel, it is difficult to feel a sense of mutual understanding when the experience is different, leaving the novel to become a political message or a political piece of work rather than one brought on by its own individual merit. Jon McGregor’s novel also risks the possibility of doing this, dealing with an area that most people would rather avoid all together. But with it Jon McGregor is able to go beyond the superficial elements of the novel, and is able to discuss universal human suffering as a whole, and the modern worlds reality of disposed souls.
In all an interesting win, and most likely a deserving win as well.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
To continue with last weeks, discussion of the literary news, and the brief discussion of the IMPAC Literary Dublin Award's shortlist, and now the revealing of the winner was announced yesterday. Jon McGregor a British author (in a previous post I had misidentified the novelist as a Scottish writer) has won the IMPAC Literary Dublin Award, for his third novel “Even the Dogs,” about an alcoholic and the various drug addicts that surround him. The judges of this year’s award praised the novels fierce experimentation with narrative technique that engages the readers with the book itself, and grapples into the situations of the characters themselves. They go on to praise is ability to craft a complex and compelling story in such a shorter frame of a novel. Personally after reading about the shortlisted authors, I would not have guessed that any of the authors would have won, on the simple descriptions of their own. The description of “Even the Dogs,” didn’t sound all that interesting to me at first glance. A novel about an alcoholic, who dies and the addicts that surround him – for me sounded like a moral novel, which was to leave readers with the impression of “don’t do drugs kids.” However Jon McGregor’s novel doesn’t sound so moralistic as it does sound like a novel of face value, and allows for the readers and characters to speak for themselves. Jon McGregor himself had stated that having any agenda in a story destroys the openness with the characters, and lose sight of where the story is going. Jon McGregor continues with his interview to go on and explain to his choice to write about the subject matter of the less extraordinary people of the world, rather than the extraordinary people who in their success now face moral dilemmas, of money, office politics, and addictions; rather Jon McGregor goes on to point out that it has all been said and done. Everyone has done the same old song and dance, throughout literature history and even in today’s world. As he points out the story or novel with a twenty page passage of a brain surgeon whose playing racket ball. This is where Jon McGregor and I can agree completely on. A (fictional) neurosurgeon or doctor or political ambassador or wealthy lawyer and I have little in common. Their situations or their problems maybe universal, and yet. A doctor whose marriage is fallen apart, whose children despise him or her, who copes with alcohol, makes poor decision on the job, et cetera is a human and universal themes of suffering, but the success of the character in his career or (earlier life) leads to some alienation between character and reader.
The same resonates with political novels that deal with the narrator being a revolutionary or rebel, it is difficult to feel a sense of mutual understanding when the experience is different, leaving the novel to become a political message or a political piece of work rather than one brought on by its own individual merit. Jon McGregor’s novel also risks the possibility of doing this, dealing with an area that most people would rather avoid all together. But with it Jon McGregor is able to go beyond the superficial elements of the novel, and is able to discuss universal human suffering as a whole, and the modern worlds reality of disposed souls.
In all an interesting win, and most likely a deserving win as well.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Thursday, 7 June 2012
Some Literary News
Hello Gentle Reader
Paul Sussman a thriller writer whose work was often called an ‘intelligent readers answers to Dan Browns ‘Da Vinci Code.’’ According to the author’s wife, who had shared the terrible news with fans, Paul Sussman suffered a raptured aneurysm and died suddenly. Paul Sussman’s life has been extraordinary in its relatively short forty five years. According to “The Guardian,” who Paul Sussman was also a former freelance contributor too, Paul Sussman had odd jobs, such as a gravedigger in France, a cigar seller in Harrods, and had toured all of Europe with the production of ‘James and the Giant Peach.’ Paul Sussman also contributed to ‘The Independent,’ ‘The Daily Standard,’ and ‘CNN,’s website – all of that before he started working for ‘The Big Issue,’ for seven years; and in nineteen-ninety eight Paul Sussman’s deep love of archeology landed him an invitation to travel and participate in a dig at the Valley of the Kings. Paul Sussman leaves behind four books of fiction – one due to come out shortly (in Canada November six).
Ray Bradbury also at the age of ninety one has also passed away recently. Known for his forays into the deep genre fiction of science fiction, fantasy and horror, Ray Bradbury was a staunch supporter of genre’s merits of entertainment, and a man renown in the world of books, in and outside of the genre(s) that he wrote in. His most popular and well known book “Fahrenheit-451,” discusses a futurist world were books are obsolete ignorance is encouraged, and censorship widespread. With it Ray Bradbury, had solidified the Cold War, and the paranoia surrounding it. Ray Bradbury however wrote for the television as well. Including “The Twilight Zone,” and “Alfred Hitchcock Presents.” Now dead, Ray Bradbury will be mourned by his fans and the genre community and the literary world, for which he had been a part of for so long. However I doubt personally that Ray Bradbury will be forgotten.
On lighter yet bittersweet note, the Orange Prize for two-thousand and twelve has been awarded, but with the excitement, there is also a sense of a bitter bite to this as well. Orange telecommunications is withdrawing its sponsorship to focus on film in the United Kingdom. However this may not be an end to the prize itself; however its future is still uncertain. Madeline Miller, a teacher of Latin and Greek, with her debut novel “The Song of Achilles,” has won the prize this year. Many have said that the novel itself has come out and been a product of circumstances, with Greek myths always a place of inspiration for writers, and recently Homer’s “Iliad,” was back on the market, in a edition, and advertised, as if it was a new release. In many ways the winning of this award can be likened or compared to Hilary Mantel’s novel “Wolf Hall,” winning The Booker prize in two thousand and nine, as her novel about Thomas Cromwell is a part of the trend and rejuvenation into the history of King Henry the VIII with such shows as “The Tudors.” A judge for the Orange Prize, has stood by the choice, saying that Miller brings a new freshness to an age old story, and allows for younger generations to become acquainted with the story itself. This win comes to quite a surprise to many as Madeline Miller was up against former Booker winner Anne Enright with her novel “The Forgotten Waltz,” as well as the favoured writer this year Cynthia Ozick and her Henry James inspired novel “Foreign Bodies,” and former Orange Prize winner Ann Patchett with her novel “Bel Canto.” In many ways congratulations are in order to Ms. Madeline Miller, and her debut novel that breathes fresh air into an ancient story.
Continuing with the coverage of literary awards, the IMPAC Literary Dublin Award has also announced (quite some time ago) its own shortlist for two thousand and twelve. Such authors like Herta Müller and Orhan Pamuk as well as the cantankerous French man of letters Michel Houellebecq, have received the award. This year’s shortlisted authors include Jennifer Egan and her award winning novel “A Visit from the Goon Squad.” Two translated novels have also made the cut. The first being from a Israeli author Yishai Sarid and his novel “Limassoi,” about a secret service agent who is assigned an undercover mission as a novelist to spy on a Palestine poets terrorist son. Brazil’s Cristovão Tezza and his novel “The Eternal Son,” about a father and his down syndrome child (reminds me a lot about something Kenzaburo Oe may have written). David Bergen’s novel “The Matter with Morris,” about a columnist who searches for meaning in his life, and was shortlisted for the Giller Prize. Aminatta Forna who won the commonwealth prize with her novel “The Memory of Love.” A Scottish writer who follows in the same vein of Irvine Welsh has written a novel about the death of an alcoholic and the junkies that surround him in “Even the Dogs.” Next comes another American author with his very American novel “Lean on Pete,” written by Willy Vlautin recounts the story of a boy and his horse (hi-ho Silver!). Tim Pears novel “Landed,” is about a man returning to the Welsh borders of his childhood. The last novel “Rocks in the Belly,” recounts a child’s neglect and perceived neglect as his mother fosters other boys and the jealousy that builds up like a rotting fungi in his stomach, and poisons his life.
It’ll be interesting to see who wins the Prize, and furthers the career of already established authors or a debut novelist. On June Thirteenth the prize winner will be announced.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Paul Sussman a thriller writer whose work was often called an ‘intelligent readers answers to Dan Browns ‘Da Vinci Code.’’ According to the author’s wife, who had shared the terrible news with fans, Paul Sussman suffered a raptured aneurysm and died suddenly. Paul Sussman’s life has been extraordinary in its relatively short forty five years. According to “The Guardian,” who Paul Sussman was also a former freelance contributor too, Paul Sussman had odd jobs, such as a gravedigger in France, a cigar seller in Harrods, and had toured all of Europe with the production of ‘James and the Giant Peach.’ Paul Sussman also contributed to ‘The Independent,’ ‘The Daily Standard,’ and ‘CNN,’s website – all of that before he started working for ‘The Big Issue,’ for seven years; and in nineteen-ninety eight Paul Sussman’s deep love of archeology landed him an invitation to travel and participate in a dig at the Valley of the Kings. Paul Sussman leaves behind four books of fiction – one due to come out shortly (in Canada November six).
Ray Bradbury also at the age of ninety one has also passed away recently. Known for his forays into the deep genre fiction of science fiction, fantasy and horror, Ray Bradbury was a staunch supporter of genre’s merits of entertainment, and a man renown in the world of books, in and outside of the genre(s) that he wrote in. His most popular and well known book “Fahrenheit-451,” discusses a futurist world were books are obsolete ignorance is encouraged, and censorship widespread. With it Ray Bradbury, had solidified the Cold War, and the paranoia surrounding it. Ray Bradbury however wrote for the television as well. Including “The Twilight Zone,” and “Alfred Hitchcock Presents.” Now dead, Ray Bradbury will be mourned by his fans and the genre community and the literary world, for which he had been a part of for so long. However I doubt personally that Ray Bradbury will be forgotten.
On lighter yet bittersweet note, the Orange Prize for two-thousand and twelve has been awarded, but with the excitement, there is also a sense of a bitter bite to this as well. Orange telecommunications is withdrawing its sponsorship to focus on film in the United Kingdom. However this may not be an end to the prize itself; however its future is still uncertain. Madeline Miller, a teacher of Latin and Greek, with her debut novel “The Song of Achilles,” has won the prize this year. Many have said that the novel itself has come out and been a product of circumstances, with Greek myths always a place of inspiration for writers, and recently Homer’s “Iliad,” was back on the market, in a edition, and advertised, as if it was a new release. In many ways the winning of this award can be likened or compared to Hilary Mantel’s novel “Wolf Hall,” winning The Booker prize in two thousand and nine, as her novel about Thomas Cromwell is a part of the trend and rejuvenation into the history of King Henry the VIII with such shows as “The Tudors.” A judge for the Orange Prize, has stood by the choice, saying that Miller brings a new freshness to an age old story, and allows for younger generations to become acquainted with the story itself. This win comes to quite a surprise to many as Madeline Miller was up against former Booker winner Anne Enright with her novel “The Forgotten Waltz,” as well as the favoured writer this year Cynthia Ozick and her Henry James inspired novel “Foreign Bodies,” and former Orange Prize winner Ann Patchett with her novel “Bel Canto.” In many ways congratulations are in order to Ms. Madeline Miller, and her debut novel that breathes fresh air into an ancient story.
Continuing with the coverage of literary awards, the IMPAC Literary Dublin Award has also announced (quite some time ago) its own shortlist for two thousand and twelve. Such authors like Herta Müller and Orhan Pamuk as well as the cantankerous French man of letters Michel Houellebecq, have received the award. This year’s shortlisted authors include Jennifer Egan and her award winning novel “A Visit from the Goon Squad.” Two translated novels have also made the cut. The first being from a Israeli author Yishai Sarid and his novel “Limassoi,” about a secret service agent who is assigned an undercover mission as a novelist to spy on a Palestine poets terrorist son. Brazil’s Cristovão Tezza and his novel “The Eternal Son,” about a father and his down syndrome child (reminds me a lot about something Kenzaburo Oe may have written). David Bergen’s novel “The Matter with Morris,” about a columnist who searches for meaning in his life, and was shortlisted for the Giller Prize. Aminatta Forna who won the commonwealth prize with her novel “The Memory of Love.” A Scottish writer who follows in the same vein of Irvine Welsh has written a novel about the death of an alcoholic and the junkies that surround him in “Even the Dogs.” Next comes another American author with his very American novel “Lean on Pete,” written by Willy Vlautin recounts the story of a boy and his horse (hi-ho Silver!). Tim Pears novel “Landed,” is about a man returning to the Welsh borders of his childhood. The last novel “Rocks in the Belly,” recounts a child’s neglect and perceived neglect as his mother fosters other boys and the jealousy that builds up like a rotting fungi in his stomach, and poisons his life.
It’ll be interesting to see who wins the Prize, and furthers the career of already established authors or a debut novelist. On June Thirteenth the prize winner will be announced.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Saturday, 2 June 2012
A Sudden Passing
Hello Gentle Reader
It would appear that I coincidentally find news of sudden passing’s of some of the world’s greatest authors, by simple chance. One of Mexico’s greatest and world renowned authors has passed away on May fifteenth, at the age of eight three, from a sudden illness. Carlos Fuentes a prolific author of novels, plays, essays, and political commentary. A constant contender and name usually thrown into the pot along with other such writers as Adonis, Antonio Tabucchi, and Peter Nadas. However after an internal hemorrhage Carlos Fuentes career and Nobel Prize odds were dashed, and many readers home and abroad, are now devastated at the loss of talent that the world will now suffer. I have yet to be acquainted with the author, though I have known about him for quite a while. I look forward to myself in the near future to read his works, and have a, deep appreciation for them, as readers before me have had as well.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
It would appear that I coincidentally find news of sudden passing’s of some of the world’s greatest authors, by simple chance. One of Mexico’s greatest and world renowned authors has passed away on May fifteenth, at the age of eight three, from a sudden illness. Carlos Fuentes a prolific author of novels, plays, essays, and political commentary. A constant contender and name usually thrown into the pot along with other such writers as Adonis, Antonio Tabucchi, and Peter Nadas. However after an internal hemorrhage Carlos Fuentes career and Nobel Prize odds were dashed, and many readers home and abroad, are now devastated at the loss of talent that the world will now suffer. I have yet to be acquainted with the author, though I have known about him for quite a while. I look forward to myself in the near future to read his works, and have a, deep appreciation for them, as readers before me have had as well.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Thursday, 31 May 2012
Death With Interruptions
Hello Gentle Reader
Death is a cliché. Every time someone mentions death in some artistic way or says that this book, that deals with death or this picture here really depicts death, or that television show is about death as if it is human in a comedic sense – it all is just cliché. The subject of death, in any way be it philosophical, artistic, reality or just as a plot device is just something that to me is cliché, and boring. Admittedly death will be part of all works in some way or another – a characters parent has recently died, or there are brief mentions of a character or a relationship of sorts to a character that has passed away. Death is just the shadow on the outskirts of the story. The ghastly morbid pictures that can be seen everywhere though. As if in someone or another, society itself and the human individual itself is obsessed with the our own ambiguous mortal fate. Some people embrace it – with skull and crossbones tattooed on their arms; others use it as a gimmick or some marketing scheme to attract a certain kind of group of people, who think they are edgy because they are all into the concept of death or that they are really deep because they think about death often. If anything death is just a concept and marketing ploy that has been exaggerated and blown far from the extreme that it no longer has any real function besides its intended natural purpose in society. The idea of philosophising about death, or talking about death, writing about it, and using it in some comedic sense, has all been done before, and is not something that particularly interests me because of the fact that it almost feels like it has all be done before. There is no denying that death is part of the human experience. There is no doubt that death is part of every human culture that has existed throughout the time line of human history. From Hades the god of the Greek underworld and his Roman counterpart Pluto, to the ancient Egyptian god Osiris who was killed and cut up by his brother Set – not to mention the Jackal headed god Anubis; in Japan (Shinto) Izanami is the goddess of both creation and death; in contemporary society Santa Muerte or Holy Death (Saint Death) is a rising cult figure in Mexico, to even Christian beliefs with the concept of the angel of death Uriel and the misunderstanding or the theory that Satan itself is the angel of death. In the end the human experience is surrounded by the mysterious and ambiguous concept of death, however the concept itself has been explored far too much.
Even to this day it is still being explored and talked about, in fiction and in works. One just has to look around and see it plastered all over. Young adult fiction at the moment has found its niche with this trend, from undead love interest between the living and the dead, or being haunted by a loved one or a love that transcends life itself; or for young adult men it is about the perseverance of the human spirit to survive against the odds. If one requires examples, one can say J.K. Rowling’s novels (her “Harry Potter,” Series) really focus on death – it’s about the idea of trying to conquer death itself. This new up and coming film series “The Hunger Games,” focuses on death in a dystopian world but also focuses on politics – but right now it looks to be about the survival against the odds – it is also very popular piece of work, being a continual seller over the Christmas season. Yet it’s trite, trivial and has been over done before.
Realizing I needed a book, because I myself was running out of books to read, and just looking for some to read that was cheap, and may have been somewhat interesting. While hunting around, I couldn’t find anything of real interest and decided to play it safe, and grabbed another book by the Nobel Prize winning author in nineteen-ninety eight Jose Saramago and his novel “Death with Interruptions,” or if you are in the United Kingdom it is “Death with Intervals.” With the above being said, I thought to myself this sounds really cliché and that I am not going to enjoy this, but I needed something to read, and needed something to review for the blog and I went off and bought it anyway. However I was surprised as well, while reading this book.
It certainly feels like my vocabulary has increased, immensely. Which at times became a condescending plenteous and patronizing annoyance to me, that I didn’t know what some of these words meant. Which brought me back to do the days of being young when I used words that seemed so adult to me and foreign and grown up to me; I used these words everyday sentences, and the looks that were given to me, as laughable humored condescending smiles often discouraged me and made me angry. Reading some of these words, here and the exposure of my ignorance to some words still, however it was more of a vocabulary lesson more than anything else.
Jose Saramago’s novels, read more like an oral folk tale. As if someone is reading the transcript of some conversations between random people that just happen to make up the story or the novel; or another way to look at it, is that Jose Saramago really quite literarily takes the concept of the third person narration, as being a fly on the wall and then suspends character development and psychological insight in favour or observation of the characters or rather just listening to the characters. While this worked rather well for his novel “Blindess,” because the characters themselves were blind and therefore names, even characterization was put on hold because of the lack of site, however when it came to this novel personally it felt more like a sense of laziness or a lack of really wanting to put the effort into psychological in-depth and characterization, instead favouring sociological insights and political criticism and one’s own views on the state and affairs of political messes. Though there are many memorable quotations and memorable discussions of the philosophy of death, and there is plenty of food for thought – a whole buffet worth really; it felt more like a discussion or a transcript for the first bit, and was becoming more of a tedious read than anything else. However one of my favourite lines is the following:
“We will continue to philosophize since that is what we were born to do, even if all we have to philosophize about is the void, What for, I don’t know what for, All right, then, why, Because philosophy needs death as much as religions do, if we philosophize it’s in order to know that we will die, as monsieur de Montaigne said, to philosophize is to learn to learn how to die.”
This is how the entire books is written. These run on sentences, and long winded sentences would make even the sentences of Virginia Woolf appear normal. If one looks carefully at the quotation above, certain words are capitalized at the ending of a coma (,) and others are not. The capitalized words are, the beginning of a new characters speech. This can become quite tiresome after all the re-reading to see who is talking when and where. The constant political and moral and philosophical conversations, appear less and less like a political allegory after a while, as the book was first intended to be (or what the back of the book said it was going to be) and instead comes off or across as the author himself have a discussion with himself, about the nature of death, morality and political and moral issues. As a reader it certainly felt like, I was being alienated and that I just happen to be standing in a large group of people chatting about the same discussion while completely ignoring me as a reader.
However half way through the novel, its tedious and tiresome reading starts to take a different view and outlook. What at first becomes a crisis of control or a crisis of religious proportions of how do we get believers to believe in what we say there is to believe in, if the greatest fear of all is taken away? How can there be hope without fear? When it starts to shift away from the macro point of view of this unnamed country plagued by the inability to die, and people ageing and getting hurt, and still getting sick and yet still unable to die – and started to focus on a smaller stage, or a more personal stage then it gets interesting.
‘death’ with a small “D,” becomes a human character itself. She feels for a cellist who she cannot bring herself to kill. With a moving towards a smaller cast of characters, it starts to get a little more interesting. But after a while, again Jose Saramago falls into clichés. In the end it felt like I was just reading another variation of the Orpheus myth, and when Jose Saramago tried to tie the two story lines together it felt weak. The protagonist ‘death,’ felt one dimensional and I think that personally Jose Saramago focused too much on larger idea’s or the larger picture that he never allowed his characters development and again came off as more of a fictional discussion of his political idea’s and his views and thoughts rather than anything that was new or intriguing to me as a reader. In the end by far “Blindess,” was a better book.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Death is a cliché. Every time someone mentions death in some artistic way or says that this book, that deals with death or this picture here really depicts death, or that television show is about death as if it is human in a comedic sense – it all is just cliché. The subject of death, in any way be it philosophical, artistic, reality or just as a plot device is just something that to me is cliché, and boring. Admittedly death will be part of all works in some way or another – a characters parent has recently died, or there are brief mentions of a character or a relationship of sorts to a character that has passed away. Death is just the shadow on the outskirts of the story. The ghastly morbid pictures that can be seen everywhere though. As if in someone or another, society itself and the human individual itself is obsessed with the our own ambiguous mortal fate. Some people embrace it – with skull and crossbones tattooed on their arms; others use it as a gimmick or some marketing scheme to attract a certain kind of group of people, who think they are edgy because they are all into the concept of death or that they are really deep because they think about death often. If anything death is just a concept and marketing ploy that has been exaggerated and blown far from the extreme that it no longer has any real function besides its intended natural purpose in society. The idea of philosophising about death, or talking about death, writing about it, and using it in some comedic sense, has all been done before, and is not something that particularly interests me because of the fact that it almost feels like it has all be done before. There is no denying that death is part of the human experience. There is no doubt that death is part of every human culture that has existed throughout the time line of human history. From Hades the god of the Greek underworld and his Roman counterpart Pluto, to the ancient Egyptian god Osiris who was killed and cut up by his brother Set – not to mention the Jackal headed god Anubis; in Japan (Shinto) Izanami is the goddess of both creation and death; in contemporary society Santa Muerte or Holy Death (Saint Death) is a rising cult figure in Mexico, to even Christian beliefs with the concept of the angel of death Uriel and the misunderstanding or the theory that Satan itself is the angel of death. In the end the human experience is surrounded by the mysterious and ambiguous concept of death, however the concept itself has been explored far too much.
Even to this day it is still being explored and talked about, in fiction and in works. One just has to look around and see it plastered all over. Young adult fiction at the moment has found its niche with this trend, from undead love interest between the living and the dead, or being haunted by a loved one or a love that transcends life itself; or for young adult men it is about the perseverance of the human spirit to survive against the odds. If one requires examples, one can say J.K. Rowling’s novels (her “Harry Potter,” Series) really focus on death – it’s about the idea of trying to conquer death itself. This new up and coming film series “The Hunger Games,” focuses on death in a dystopian world but also focuses on politics – but right now it looks to be about the survival against the odds – it is also very popular piece of work, being a continual seller over the Christmas season. Yet it’s trite, trivial and has been over done before.
Realizing I needed a book, because I myself was running out of books to read, and just looking for some to read that was cheap, and may have been somewhat interesting. While hunting around, I couldn’t find anything of real interest and decided to play it safe, and grabbed another book by the Nobel Prize winning author in nineteen-ninety eight Jose Saramago and his novel “Death with Interruptions,” or if you are in the United Kingdom it is “Death with Intervals.” With the above being said, I thought to myself this sounds really cliché and that I am not going to enjoy this, but I needed something to read, and needed something to review for the blog and I went off and bought it anyway. However I was surprised as well, while reading this book.
It certainly feels like my vocabulary has increased, immensely. Which at times became a condescending plenteous and patronizing annoyance to me, that I didn’t know what some of these words meant. Which brought me back to do the days of being young when I used words that seemed so adult to me and foreign and grown up to me; I used these words everyday sentences, and the looks that were given to me, as laughable humored condescending smiles often discouraged me and made me angry. Reading some of these words, here and the exposure of my ignorance to some words still, however it was more of a vocabulary lesson more than anything else.
Jose Saramago’s novels, read more like an oral folk tale. As if someone is reading the transcript of some conversations between random people that just happen to make up the story or the novel; or another way to look at it, is that Jose Saramago really quite literarily takes the concept of the third person narration, as being a fly on the wall and then suspends character development and psychological insight in favour or observation of the characters or rather just listening to the characters. While this worked rather well for his novel “Blindess,” because the characters themselves were blind and therefore names, even characterization was put on hold because of the lack of site, however when it came to this novel personally it felt more like a sense of laziness or a lack of really wanting to put the effort into psychological in-depth and characterization, instead favouring sociological insights and political criticism and one’s own views on the state and affairs of political messes. Though there are many memorable quotations and memorable discussions of the philosophy of death, and there is plenty of food for thought – a whole buffet worth really; it felt more like a discussion or a transcript for the first bit, and was becoming more of a tedious read than anything else. However one of my favourite lines is the following:
“We will continue to philosophize since that is what we were born to do, even if all we have to philosophize about is the void, What for, I don’t know what for, All right, then, why, Because philosophy needs death as much as religions do, if we philosophize it’s in order to know that we will die, as monsieur de Montaigne said, to philosophize is to learn to learn how to die.”
This is how the entire books is written. These run on sentences, and long winded sentences would make even the sentences of Virginia Woolf appear normal. If one looks carefully at the quotation above, certain words are capitalized at the ending of a coma (,) and others are not. The capitalized words are, the beginning of a new characters speech. This can become quite tiresome after all the re-reading to see who is talking when and where. The constant political and moral and philosophical conversations, appear less and less like a political allegory after a while, as the book was first intended to be (or what the back of the book said it was going to be) and instead comes off or across as the author himself have a discussion with himself, about the nature of death, morality and political and moral issues. As a reader it certainly felt like, I was being alienated and that I just happen to be standing in a large group of people chatting about the same discussion while completely ignoring me as a reader.
However half way through the novel, its tedious and tiresome reading starts to take a different view and outlook. What at first becomes a crisis of control or a crisis of religious proportions of how do we get believers to believe in what we say there is to believe in, if the greatest fear of all is taken away? How can there be hope without fear? When it starts to shift away from the macro point of view of this unnamed country plagued by the inability to die, and people ageing and getting hurt, and still getting sick and yet still unable to die – and started to focus on a smaller stage, or a more personal stage then it gets interesting.
‘death’ with a small “D,” becomes a human character itself. She feels for a cellist who she cannot bring herself to kill. With a moving towards a smaller cast of characters, it starts to get a little more interesting. But after a while, again Jose Saramago falls into clichés. In the end it felt like I was just reading another variation of the Orpheus myth, and when Jose Saramago tried to tie the two story lines together it felt weak. The protagonist ‘death,’ felt one dimensional and I think that personally Jose Saramago focused too much on larger idea’s or the larger picture that he never allowed his characters development and again came off as more of a fictional discussion of his political idea’s and his views and thoughts rather than anything that was new or intriguing to me as a reader. In the end by far “Blindess,” was a better book.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Thursday, 24 May 2012
Ghosts
Hello Gentle Reader
There is something, strangely appealing for people, about the private investigator life style that each of us imagine – well generally speaking that is. There is the life of hunting down (alleged) crooks, getting the beautiful woman (or man), dealing with the excitement of daily life, and of course walking the razors edge. Of course that is just what we suspect. What we hope for. What we imagine. Of course, the life of a private investigator can be anything but. One upon a time, Gentle Reader, I had met a private investigator, whose life was as mundane and mediocre as the rest of ours. He simple explained he does his job, and goes home. His job as a private investigator was just that dull, boring and nothing but, at the time of our simple meet and greet, he was working as a security guard. He simply got up in the morning – or at the beginning of dusk, and went to work. That was it that was all. He did nothing else. His life simply was just like the rest of ours. No dangerous adventures. No seedy underworld in need of investigating or probing. It was simply just that. A world like the rest of ours. He just sat there or stood there, following the protocol. Accidently messing up here and there, simply out of boredom. His life was nothing special at all. There was very little walking the razor edge of his life. Though to a degree it could be seen that he felt comfortable in his job, because he never quite or left it. He continued on right through and through – or at least that is what I assume. There was no James Bond (though is more espionage and intelligence agency kind of gun) grabbing the sexy girls, and making love every so often. There was nothing of the sort. No hidden gadgets. No saving the world, from the shadows that lurk around us. It was just simply what it was, just a life, and just a world. Maybe sometimes one does surveillance, on someone else. Of course that someone else is not expecting that they are being watched. The investigator watches everything – anything out of the ordinarily. Eventually enough watching leads to facts about, the routine of whoever is being watched. For example the person being watched, falls into certain routines. For example those routine might follow like the following:
5:30pm – subject leaves work office
6:00pm – subject arrives home, from office.
7:00pm – subject eats supper.
7:15 – 7:30pm – subject cleans up from supper.
7:30pm – 9:00pm – subject watches television
9:15pm – subject, goes through work – that has been brought home.
9:45pm – subject goes on computer
– subject checks e-mail
– browses internet
10:00pm – subject fixes himself/herself/itself a snake.
10:05pm – subject receives phone call
10:15pm – subject goes and watches television
10:30 -11:30pm – subject watches television
11:30pm – subject heads upstairs and gets ready to bed.
12:00am – subject has gone to bed
6:00am – subject is up.
6:00am – 7:00am – subject gets ready for work
– subject showers
– brushes teeth
– brushes hair
– gets dressed
– eats breakfast
7:15am – subject enjoys cup of coffee watches television
7:30am – subject leaves for work
8:00am – subject arrives at work
12:00pm – subject leaves for lunch
12:15pm – subject enters park and has lunch on park bench
12:30pm – subject goes for short walk
12:45pm – subject heads back to office
1:00pm – subject arrives back in office
5:30pm – subject leaves work office.
Eventually all this becomes routine to the investigator, becoming more absorbed into the subjects life and routine rather than that of their own. Of course there do come times, though when something else happens, time to time. Eventually the investigator begins to chip away at the facade of normalcy and see’s there is something far more sinister beneath it all. Eventually the investigator learns that the subject has a mistress. The investigator learns that the subject is mildly involved in drugs. This is what makes it all that more interesting. The investigator simply becomes the fly on the wall. The gray between the black and the white.
There is something about stories of closed spaces, which I enjoy. The claustrophobia of the closed space. The details soon become very familiar and slowly begin to become more and more bleak and more and more mundane, and more and more of a pain to look at. The mind begins to crave something else. Slowly and surely everything begins to lose that edge. The defined boundaries of sanity and insanity are slowly being tested.
Sleep becomes neither a saviour or a necessity. It’s just the nihilistic desire to do something, that in the end amounts to nothing. There is that slow feeling of cabin fever, prickling over the skin, like goose flesh that make such a story for me so interesting and ye so horrifying. Of course I like a story that takes place over a large as well, but when placed within a very small confinement or perimeter the story is forced to make certain adjustments, like following the slow decent into insanity. The psychological impact of lack of socialization or going outside, or have something to entertain the mind. This is what “Ghosts,” is about. This is what I enjoyed the most about this short little novella. Is the compact, claustrophobic space.
Each character is named after a colour. There is Mr. White, he hires a private investigator by the name of Blue, to watch on another person Black. Blue watches from a pre-paid apartment window Black. Both Blue and Black are located on Orange Street. Blue is engaged to Mrs. Blue. A person by the name of Red also makes an appearance – as a bartender; as well as a prostitute by the name of Violet. Blue’s mentor was another private investigator who goes by the name of Brown, who has since retired from the business and lives down in the Florida and spends most of his time fishing. Then there is an old coroner by the name of Doctor Gold – or simplified to Gold, who is on the search for the killer of a child.
For a novella of seventy pages or so, writing about the simple mundane activities of a man, who watches another man who does nothing, but reflects and writes, not to mention grocery shop’s among other odds and ends of no real particular interest; and yet it is still a interesting and compelling read – not that I can explain how. Perhaps there is just that feeling that something is going to happen – something or anything is going to happen – and then something’s do happen.
Blue is not the kind of person who can sit there, and do nothing and feel great about making money. He is not one who can fall into lethargy. Eventually blues disguises himself as an old man by the name of Jimmy Rose, and meets Black on the street. The two get to talking, and Black reveals that Jimmy Rose/Blue, looks a lot like Walt Whitman. The two then have a discussion about Walt Whitman. Again the two meet, and have a different conversation, this time about Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story titled “Wakefield,” about a man who gets up and leaves his home, and goes and lives into another apartment up till twenty years, without anyone knowing. It is a strict allusion to this novella titled “Ghosts.”
It’s an interesting read. Minimalist in its form. It is not something that is written in a flowery language. It’s cerebral and lucid. Everything moves like the ink from a fountain pen that Black might be writing in. However, it is not by any means the most believable story. But the thought of a man sitting in an apartment and doing nothing but watching some else, for some reason seems like such a neat story – it has been done before; but the thought of such a closed space environment always is strikingly interesting.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
There is something, strangely appealing for people, about the private investigator life style that each of us imagine – well generally speaking that is. There is the life of hunting down (alleged) crooks, getting the beautiful woman (or man), dealing with the excitement of daily life, and of course walking the razors edge. Of course that is just what we suspect. What we hope for. What we imagine. Of course, the life of a private investigator can be anything but. One upon a time, Gentle Reader, I had met a private investigator, whose life was as mundane and mediocre as the rest of ours. He simple explained he does his job, and goes home. His job as a private investigator was just that dull, boring and nothing but, at the time of our simple meet and greet, he was working as a security guard. He simply got up in the morning – or at the beginning of dusk, and went to work. That was it that was all. He did nothing else. His life simply was just like the rest of ours. No dangerous adventures. No seedy underworld in need of investigating or probing. It was simply just that. A world like the rest of ours. He just sat there or stood there, following the protocol. Accidently messing up here and there, simply out of boredom. His life was nothing special at all. There was very little walking the razor edge of his life. Though to a degree it could be seen that he felt comfortable in his job, because he never quite or left it. He continued on right through and through – or at least that is what I assume. There was no James Bond (though is more espionage and intelligence agency kind of gun) grabbing the sexy girls, and making love every so often. There was nothing of the sort. No hidden gadgets. No saving the world, from the shadows that lurk around us. It was just simply what it was, just a life, and just a world. Maybe sometimes one does surveillance, on someone else. Of course that someone else is not expecting that they are being watched. The investigator watches everything – anything out of the ordinarily. Eventually enough watching leads to facts about, the routine of whoever is being watched. For example the person being watched, falls into certain routines. For example those routine might follow like the following:
5:30pm – subject leaves work office
6:00pm – subject arrives home, from office.
7:00pm – subject eats supper.
7:15 – 7:30pm – subject cleans up from supper.
7:30pm – 9:00pm – subject watches television
9:15pm – subject, goes through work – that has been brought home.
9:45pm – subject goes on computer
– subject checks e-mail
– browses internet
10:00pm – subject fixes himself/herself/itself a snake.
10:05pm – subject receives phone call
10:15pm – subject goes and watches television
10:30 -11:30pm – subject watches television
11:30pm – subject heads upstairs and gets ready to bed.
12:00am – subject has gone to bed
6:00am – subject is up.
6:00am – 7:00am – subject gets ready for work
– subject showers
– brushes teeth
– brushes hair
– gets dressed
– eats breakfast
7:15am – subject enjoys cup of coffee watches television
7:30am – subject leaves for work
8:00am – subject arrives at work
12:00pm – subject leaves for lunch
12:15pm – subject enters park and has lunch on park bench
12:30pm – subject goes for short walk
12:45pm – subject heads back to office
1:00pm – subject arrives back in office
5:30pm – subject leaves work office.
Eventually all this becomes routine to the investigator, becoming more absorbed into the subjects life and routine rather than that of their own. Of course there do come times, though when something else happens, time to time. Eventually the investigator begins to chip away at the facade of normalcy and see’s there is something far more sinister beneath it all. Eventually the investigator learns that the subject has a mistress. The investigator learns that the subject is mildly involved in drugs. This is what makes it all that more interesting. The investigator simply becomes the fly on the wall. The gray between the black and the white.
There is something about stories of closed spaces, which I enjoy. The claustrophobia of the closed space. The details soon become very familiar and slowly begin to become more and more bleak and more and more mundane, and more and more of a pain to look at. The mind begins to crave something else. Slowly and surely everything begins to lose that edge. The defined boundaries of sanity and insanity are slowly being tested.
Sleep becomes neither a saviour or a necessity. It’s just the nihilistic desire to do something, that in the end amounts to nothing. There is that slow feeling of cabin fever, prickling over the skin, like goose flesh that make such a story for me so interesting and ye so horrifying. Of course I like a story that takes place over a large as well, but when placed within a very small confinement or perimeter the story is forced to make certain adjustments, like following the slow decent into insanity. The psychological impact of lack of socialization or going outside, or have something to entertain the mind. This is what “Ghosts,” is about. This is what I enjoyed the most about this short little novella. Is the compact, claustrophobic space.
Each character is named after a colour. There is Mr. White, he hires a private investigator by the name of Blue, to watch on another person Black. Blue watches from a pre-paid apartment window Black. Both Blue and Black are located on Orange Street. Blue is engaged to Mrs. Blue. A person by the name of Red also makes an appearance – as a bartender; as well as a prostitute by the name of Violet. Blue’s mentor was another private investigator who goes by the name of Brown, who has since retired from the business and lives down in the Florida and spends most of his time fishing. Then there is an old coroner by the name of Doctor Gold – or simplified to Gold, who is on the search for the killer of a child.
For a novella of seventy pages or so, writing about the simple mundane activities of a man, who watches another man who does nothing, but reflects and writes, not to mention grocery shop’s among other odds and ends of no real particular interest; and yet it is still a interesting and compelling read – not that I can explain how. Perhaps there is just that feeling that something is going to happen – something or anything is going to happen – and then something’s do happen.
Blue is not the kind of person who can sit there, and do nothing and feel great about making money. He is not one who can fall into lethargy. Eventually blues disguises himself as an old man by the name of Jimmy Rose, and meets Black on the street. The two get to talking, and Black reveals that Jimmy Rose/Blue, looks a lot like Walt Whitman. The two then have a discussion about Walt Whitman. Again the two meet, and have a different conversation, this time about Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story titled “Wakefield,” about a man who gets up and leaves his home, and goes and lives into another apartment up till twenty years, without anyone knowing. It is a strict allusion to this novella titled “Ghosts.”
It’s an interesting read. Minimalist in its form. It is not something that is written in a flowery language. It’s cerebral and lucid. Everything moves like the ink from a fountain pen that Black might be writing in. However, it is not by any means the most believable story. But the thought of a man sitting in an apartment and doing nothing but watching some else, for some reason seems like such a neat story – it has been done before; but the thought of such a closed space environment always is strikingly interesting.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
Thursday, 17 May 2012
Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness & Aghwee the Sky Monster
Hello Gentle Reader
** There will be No Short Story Review this month, because I have become very busy at the moment.**
In these novels of this volume of four short novels by the Nobel Prize winning writer and the second Japanese writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature Kenzaburō Ōe, there certainly are certain themes and concepts that are constantly seen throughout these four novels Gentle Reader. Damaged people, certainly is one of those themes that come up with the writing of this writer. The author himself has a brain damaged son born in nineteen-sixty three, who has inspired his “idiot boy,” stories and novels, which have populated his autobiographical outlook of writing, and his ability and desire, to exorcise these demons or troubles. From the first time he heard the Emperor of Japan’s voice; on the radio renounce his divinity and the destruction that the war in which he had grown up in, as a child and wrenched him away from the world of childhood innocence and naivety, into a world of barbaric behavior with a rather ambivalent moral compass. This had lead to his existential themes in his work, where the adult characters wish they could head back inside the childhood shell, in which they were painfully wretched away from; like a piglet taken away from the nipple of their mother. These existential characters then act on sexual impulses and violent behavior that isolates them on to the fringes of society that, then allows Kenzaburō Ōe to give his own social criticism of what he sees. These characters and the characters that are separated from the paradise of childhood, and the people they become remind me in many ways of the people in the photographs of the photographer Diane Arbus with her photographs of the people living on the fringes of society.
“Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” was written in nineteen-sixty nine, in the year nineteen-seventy two “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away.” In this collection of novels titled “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” – “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” is the first novel that one reads, even though it is the last novel in this collection that was written. “Prize Stock,” the second novel in this collection, is the earliest written in this collection, published in the year nineteen-fifty seven, and it had won the prestigious Japanese literary award the Akutagawa Prize. The consensus however if one reads this collection of four short novels, is that by far “Prize Stock,” being the best written out of all four. While “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” and “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” are the more challenging, but are not the most popular or well respected by the reader. One of the reasons being I think is that while reading, “Teach Us to Outgrow our Madness,” is that it felt like it was re-written version of “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” – which now would be best to say is that “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” is a re-written version of “Teach us to Outgrow Our Madness.”
The core concepts are still there, with both of these novels. For one, both novels deal with the parent-child relationship, between both the son of the novels and the mother. The father in both novels of the narrator has gone absolutely mad and has secluded himself. Isolating himself away from the world. While the mother in both novels, is an antagonistic creature. The kind of person who greatly causes many problems for the narrator himself.
In all, it felt like a cheated trick while reading this novel. The similarities were greatly similar, and it was difficult to read one without, thinking of the similarities with the other. One of the major differences though between both novels, is that “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” has a brain damaged child in it, and concerns more specifically with the relationship between the child, and the rather obese father. Where as “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” does not have a brain damaged child, but rather focuses on the relationship between father and son, simply by the parental relationship between the father falling into the depths of insanity and the narrator as the son. Not like “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” where it focused on the relationship between the relationship as the narrator or the obese father, as the father and the brain damaged child as son, with the mad father now deceased in the background. These are the only differences between the two novels. The rest is all recycled. The themes, the style itself – there are no quotation marks, and moves in a rather disjointed time line; and the relationships between the characters if slight reversed or changed, still echo the similarities. It felt like a cheap cheat of a trick.
Aghwee the Sky Monster
Written in the year nineteen-sixty four “Aghwee the Sky Monster,” is one of the first novels, that deal with Kenzaburō Ōe’s theme and his ability to concept in dealing with the birth of his first born son, who happened to be brain damaged. The character D in this story had a brain damaged child born to him. The doctor himself had said that the child itself had a brain hernia. Together with the doctor, D starves the child to death. However he later learns that what was first suspected of being a brain hernia was actually a benign tumour. What comes next is his subsequent descent into madness over his grief of what he had done to his child, and the fact that he is now haunted by “Aghwee,” a fat baby the size of kangaroo in a white cotton gown. This leads to him become a lunatic and his inability to work, and refusal to leave his home, and his entire life falling apart. Which then leads to his father to hire the narrator as a companion; kind of a caretaker and chauffer, for his now insane son.
“Alone in my room, I wear a piratical black patch over my right eye. The eye may look all right, but the truth is I have barely any sight in it...when I look at this world with both eyes I see two worlds perfectly superimposed. A vague and shadowy world on top of one that is bright and vivid. I can be walking down a paved street when a sense of peril and unbalance will stop me like a rat just scurried out of a sewer..Or I'll discover a film of unhappiness and fatigue on the face of a cheerful friend and clog the flow of easy chat with my stutter,”
This is the opening of this short little novel, and is an intriguing beginning to a good short novella, one of my favourites with “Prize Stock,” which in all brings this entire collection of four short novels to a fifty/fifty appreciation. On a personal view of opinion, as a reader, I would recommend this collection to any reader who has patience, and is interested in Japanese literature, to start here when reading Kenzaburō Ōe to become acquainted with his themes, and also just for the two novels “Prize Stock,” and “Aghwee the Sky Monster.”
While reading “Aghwee the Sky Monster,” it felt like, reading a novel that Haruki Murakami would have written. In essence it is a ghost story. A sad somewhat depressing ghost story, which deals with the relationship between father and son, and the grief a father, feels for what maybe seen as a selfish and immature action to save his son out of mercy and yet in the end he feels an immense sense of grief because his only and first born child is dead. From there something snaps in his mind. A screw came loose metaphorically and in his grief “Aghwee,” – the only word his son could say before his death; is formed, and becomes his companion. From there on out, D’s life falls apart bit by bit. His wife leaves him, and his mistress, can no longer wait around for him. D’s former life becomes a mere shadow to the present situation of the aftermath of his mental breakdown and the appearance of his invisible and imaginary friend “Aghwee.”
Yet matters become more complicated when the narrator begins to question of “Aghwee,” really exists for D, or if it is all just a ploy for his own unseen motive until it is all but too late.
The description of how the sky, is full of all the people a person looses, is one of the most beautiful and memorable moments of this novella. The story itself about human companionship, itself is a wonderful story, much like “Prize Stock,” was. Both deal with some of the continual themes and criticisms that Kenzaburō Ōe deal with. I also have to admit that these four short novels are the only ones that I have read by this author and finished. As previously admitted, his novel “Somersault,” was attempted a few years ago and failed miserably and, since then was very unsure of reading anything by this author. However, with the completion of these novels, by the author, there is a renewed interested in him and his work.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
** There will be No Short Story Review this month, because I have become very busy at the moment.**
In these novels of this volume of four short novels by the Nobel Prize winning writer and the second Japanese writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature Kenzaburō Ōe, there certainly are certain themes and concepts that are constantly seen throughout these four novels Gentle Reader. Damaged people, certainly is one of those themes that come up with the writing of this writer. The author himself has a brain damaged son born in nineteen-sixty three, who has inspired his “idiot boy,” stories and novels, which have populated his autobiographical outlook of writing, and his ability and desire, to exorcise these demons or troubles. From the first time he heard the Emperor of Japan’s voice; on the radio renounce his divinity and the destruction that the war in which he had grown up in, as a child and wrenched him away from the world of childhood innocence and naivety, into a world of barbaric behavior with a rather ambivalent moral compass. This had lead to his existential themes in his work, where the adult characters wish they could head back inside the childhood shell, in which they were painfully wretched away from; like a piglet taken away from the nipple of their mother. These existential characters then act on sexual impulses and violent behavior that isolates them on to the fringes of society that, then allows Kenzaburō Ōe to give his own social criticism of what he sees. These characters and the characters that are separated from the paradise of childhood, and the people they become remind me in many ways of the people in the photographs of the photographer Diane Arbus with her photographs of the people living on the fringes of society.
“Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” was written in nineteen-sixty nine, in the year nineteen-seventy two “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away.” In this collection of novels titled “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” – “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” is the first novel that one reads, even though it is the last novel in this collection that was written. “Prize Stock,” the second novel in this collection, is the earliest written in this collection, published in the year nineteen-fifty seven, and it had won the prestigious Japanese literary award the Akutagawa Prize. The consensus however if one reads this collection of four short novels, is that by far “Prize Stock,” being the best written out of all four. While “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” and “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” are the more challenging, but are not the most popular or well respected by the reader. One of the reasons being I think is that while reading, “Teach Us to Outgrow our Madness,” is that it felt like it was re-written version of “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” – which now would be best to say is that “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” is a re-written version of “Teach us to Outgrow Our Madness.”
The core concepts are still there, with both of these novels. For one, both novels deal with the parent-child relationship, between both the son of the novels and the mother. The father in both novels of the narrator has gone absolutely mad and has secluded himself. Isolating himself away from the world. While the mother in both novels, is an antagonistic creature. The kind of person who greatly causes many problems for the narrator himself.
In all, it felt like a cheated trick while reading this novel. The similarities were greatly similar, and it was difficult to read one without, thinking of the similarities with the other. One of the major differences though between both novels, is that “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” has a brain damaged child in it, and concerns more specifically with the relationship between the child, and the rather obese father. Where as “The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away,” does not have a brain damaged child, but rather focuses on the relationship between father and son, simply by the parental relationship between the father falling into the depths of insanity and the narrator as the son. Not like “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness,” where it focused on the relationship between the relationship as the narrator or the obese father, as the father and the brain damaged child as son, with the mad father now deceased in the background. These are the only differences between the two novels. The rest is all recycled. The themes, the style itself – there are no quotation marks, and moves in a rather disjointed time line; and the relationships between the characters if slight reversed or changed, still echo the similarities. It felt like a cheap cheat of a trick.
Aghwee the Sky Monster
Written in the year nineteen-sixty four “Aghwee the Sky Monster,” is one of the first novels, that deal with Kenzaburō Ōe’s theme and his ability to concept in dealing with the birth of his first born son, who happened to be brain damaged. The character D in this story had a brain damaged child born to him. The doctor himself had said that the child itself had a brain hernia. Together with the doctor, D starves the child to death. However he later learns that what was first suspected of being a brain hernia was actually a benign tumour. What comes next is his subsequent descent into madness over his grief of what he had done to his child, and the fact that he is now haunted by “Aghwee,” a fat baby the size of kangaroo in a white cotton gown. This leads to him become a lunatic and his inability to work, and refusal to leave his home, and his entire life falling apart. Which then leads to his father to hire the narrator as a companion; kind of a caretaker and chauffer, for his now insane son.
“Alone in my room, I wear a piratical black patch over my right eye. The eye may look all right, but the truth is I have barely any sight in it...when I look at this world with both eyes I see two worlds perfectly superimposed. A vague and shadowy world on top of one that is bright and vivid. I can be walking down a paved street when a sense of peril and unbalance will stop me like a rat just scurried out of a sewer..Or I'll discover a film of unhappiness and fatigue on the face of a cheerful friend and clog the flow of easy chat with my stutter,”
This is the opening of this short little novel, and is an intriguing beginning to a good short novella, one of my favourites with “Prize Stock,” which in all brings this entire collection of four short novels to a fifty/fifty appreciation. On a personal view of opinion, as a reader, I would recommend this collection to any reader who has patience, and is interested in Japanese literature, to start here when reading Kenzaburō Ōe to become acquainted with his themes, and also just for the two novels “Prize Stock,” and “Aghwee the Sky Monster.”
While reading “Aghwee the Sky Monster,” it felt like, reading a novel that Haruki Murakami would have written. In essence it is a ghost story. A sad somewhat depressing ghost story, which deals with the relationship between father and son, and the grief a father, feels for what maybe seen as a selfish and immature action to save his son out of mercy and yet in the end he feels an immense sense of grief because his only and first born child is dead. From there something snaps in his mind. A screw came loose metaphorically and in his grief “Aghwee,” – the only word his son could say before his death; is formed, and becomes his companion. From there on out, D’s life falls apart bit by bit. His wife leaves him, and his mistress, can no longer wait around for him. D’s former life becomes a mere shadow to the present situation of the aftermath of his mental breakdown and the appearance of his invisible and imaginary friend “Aghwee.”
Yet matters become more complicated when the narrator begins to question of “Aghwee,” really exists for D, or if it is all just a ploy for his own unseen motive until it is all but too late.
The description of how the sky, is full of all the people a person looses, is one of the most beautiful and memorable moments of this novella. The story itself about human companionship, itself is a wonderful story, much like “Prize Stock,” was. Both deal with some of the continual themes and criticisms that Kenzaburō Ōe deal with. I also have to admit that these four short novels are the only ones that I have read by this author and finished. As previously admitted, his novel “Somersault,” was attempted a few years ago and failed miserably and, since then was very unsure of reading anything by this author. However, with the completion of these novels, by the author, there is a renewed interested in him and his work.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
Thursday, 10 May 2012
The Hunger Angel
Hello Gentle Reader
I never understood how reviewers and literary critics often applauded a authors use of language, as a thrilling and interesting. Obviously there are many languages in the world; however when reading a book either by a writer whose native tongue is English or whose work has been translated into English, there are rules of the language that apply, and are usually put in place. Simple sentence structures are always appropriate. Speech is often verified (though who is speaking can be vague and often deliberately obscure) comas, semicolons, explanation marks, dashes, questions marks, and periods are always used accordingly. Yet at times authors use an archaic language (like Jose Saramago did with his novel “Death with Interruptions,” when he used such words as ‘eventide,’ or ‘vespertine,’—though this often lead to more pretentious word association when more simpler and common place words would have done just fine) however upon reading many novels by Herta Müller, the concept of how language can be used in written works, outside of the simple confides of punctuation and grammar, can be seen. Peter Englund the current Permanent Secretary of the Swedish Academy, remarked on Herta Müller’s use of language. The Permanent Secretary of the Swedish Academy noted her precision of words, her experience at witnessing the corruption and misusing, as well as abusing the language and words. The most noted fact about Herta Müller’s use of language is her sentences. There are no long winding sentences, just picturesque sentences. Short and episodic, weaving and creating a larger picture. In fact there isn’t really a long continuous narrative strand, but details and anecdotes. The author (Herta Müller) is not an epicist a writer. She doesn’t write large sprawling novels; there are no thousand page novels, of painstaking long winding sentences, or a loss of confusion of characters, and events. The works are small and brief, but are incredibly intense short pieces of work, that are relentless in their depiction of life under tyrannical regimes. However this is what makes “The Hunger Angel,” by Herta Müller so much more different then her previous novels. The original German title is “Atemschaukel,” which is a compound word or neologism, which means “breathe swing,” in German; and is about a Soviet (forced) Labour Camp, and the taboo and often not talked about subject of ethnic German, Romanian’s who were sent to the Gulags in the Ukraine, to repent and pay for the crimes of Hitler, during World War II.
The novels of Herta Müller are moral, but they are not moral in the sense that they pass judgement to the reader. They do not accuse the reader of being as guilty as the guards or the dictator that happily cause misery wherever they can. Rather the opposite, the novels themselves can appear mechanical and detached from the characters or the experiences that they face. Descriptions of interrogations and daily life all become a matter of fact descriptions. There is nothing that can be done about these incidents. Descriptions of streets, houses, and shops show the inadequacy of the surroundings. A piece of tin sheet metal becomes a moveable door, to an otherwise doorless toilet outside. The grey buildings become common place, and the aspect of rats underneath the floor boards, or a one shovel of coal equals one gram of bread. The world behind the iron curtain was absurd and rough.
The novel depicts the harsh realities of life in a Soviet gulag. The first chapter itself where the famous line “Everything I possess I carry with me,” (also the title of the UK edition of this novel) and in this first chapter, titled “On Packing,” there is almost a hopeful optimism in the way Leo, thinks about the camp as perhaps being a chance to travel. Such a naïve thought, is often what we tell ourselves when faced with an obstacle that is both incredibly elusive and unavoidable. What is left is the only defensive mechanism, of trying to hope that something good can come out of it. Yet the reality always proves otherwise. Rounded up like cattle or other livestock the people from the villages who were on the list and met the requirements set down by the Stalinist government. People between the ages of seventeen and forty-five were eligible to be set to the gulags, for rebuilding and to pay for the German crimes that had taken place. But against all better judgement or lack of any judgement and morals, the Soviet Officials themselves had created crimes just as harsh as those done by the Nazi regime.
The best known account of life in a Soviet Gulag camp came from a fellow Nobel Laureate in Literature Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn who also spent time in a Soviet Labour camp for his criticism of Stalin and communism itself. Eventually the author himself found himself forced out of the former Soviet Union, and did not return until after the collapse of the red beast itself. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn himself later wrote a three volume book on the subject of the gulags between nineteen seventy three and nineteen seventy eight about the history and developments of the police state in the Soviet Union.
Sixty seven thousand, three hundred and thirty two Romanian ethnic German’s were sent as forced labour in the Gulags – that is the second highest number, besides the former Eastern territories of Germany and Poland which totals to one hundred fifty five thousand, two hundred and sixty two. When I showed a video of this novel (when the video was made of the shortlisted novels of the two thousand and nine novels for the prestigious German Book Prize) the first remark was “it looks like these people were being shipped off to a concentration camp,” – in the end that is what it was. Hundred upon thousands of people had died in the camps.
Based on the experiences of both her mother and a friend Oskar Pastior (who passed away in two thousand and six), who were both sent to labour camps while they were still relatively young, Herta Müller has depicted the snowy landscape and the harsh conditions of the disposed. The late Oskar Pastior and Herta Müller wished to write the novel together, but Herta Müller was forced to write it, herself, when her friend had died. Which then lead to a startling revelation, for Herta Müller, Oskar Pastior was an informant for the secret police. But Müller was reluctant and unable to criticise the late poet. He had already suffered in the gulags at the age of seventeen, he was a homosexual who could have been killed for it, and at such a stage in his life he just wanted to live, and was unfortunately open to the price, that it would cost him, to do just that. However she has been less lenient towards fellow Nobel Laureate in Literature, for his controversial poem about Israel and Iran. Herta Müller has said that Gunter Grass has lost all his moral credibility when he hid his affiliation with the Nazi SS (Grass was part of the Waffen SS at the end of World War II) while Herta Müller herself has always been honest about the amoral past that of her own people. Her father was part of the Waffen SS and supported many of the views of Nazi’s political standings until his death – he never officially distanced himself from it. Yet Müller herself had been rather critical of all ideologies, including Fascism which had claimed her father’s life and Communism which had claimed both her mother’s life and her own, and countless friends. Which is why Herta Müller’s novels are the way they are – both political but distanced itself from all ideologies, because all ideologies are full of lies.
With “The Hunger Angel,” Herta Müller shines light on the subject and the fate of the forced labour of ethnic Germans, from nineteen-forty five onwards (our main character Leo stayed in the camp for five years) all of which paid for the crimes of people who may or may not have supported Hitler:
“None of us were part any war, but because were Germans, the Russians considered us guilty of Hitler’s crimes.” – with an almost ironic revelation that David Lommer a character in the camp was Jewish.
Throughout the novel, the concept of hunger is examined continuously. A spectre that represents the hunger that starves all the camp prisoners equally is called the Hunger Angel, which is described as a protean spectre that appears as a white hare in the wasted-away cheeks of anyone on the verge of starving to death. Which further shows the poetic imagery that Herta Müller uses in this novel, as well as the Kafkaesque metaphors that the camp comes to produce.
The suffering of the characters and the people in this novel are at the forefront. When Leo finds 10 rubles in a puddle of mud, when someone throws his gaiters, at the market, he quickly goes on a spending spree, and eventually buys so much food and eats it all he quickly ends up vomiting it up once again. This greedy gluttonous action is all that he can do when given so a chance to devour food after being starved for so long.
Memories serve as both a savour, and a painful reminder of what has been lost, and the horrible situation that has become the life of the residents of the camp itself:
“Deep in the fruit garden, at our summerhouse in the Wench, stood a wooden bench without a back. We called it Uncle Hermann. We called it that because we didn’t know anybody by that name.” – even the past becomes as surreal as the present.
In the end it’s a great book, in my opinion. Poetic and disturbing, but not for everyone’s liking. The brief vignettes make up the chapters and the constant discussion of hunger, can often put people off or annoy them, but hunger is all that is left in the camp and its forced residents. It is in the end what reminds them that they are human. It was critically acclaimed by Peter Englund of the Swedish Academy, and the German Book Prize, was supposed to predict the wining of this book as it was the critics favourites, however it lost to Kathrin Schmidt and her novel “Du stirbst nicht,” or “You’re not going to die,” – which by the way I am still waiting to see a English translation. However in the end it was a great book, one that did not sugar coat the facts of the reality but it did use beautiful language to create a harrowing picture of deprivation, hunger, inhumane treatment, and the lack of human dignity as well as injustice, in order to leave a lasting impression the reader.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
I never understood how reviewers and literary critics often applauded a authors use of language, as a thrilling and interesting. Obviously there are many languages in the world; however when reading a book either by a writer whose native tongue is English or whose work has been translated into English, there are rules of the language that apply, and are usually put in place. Simple sentence structures are always appropriate. Speech is often verified (though who is speaking can be vague and often deliberately obscure) comas, semicolons, explanation marks, dashes, questions marks, and periods are always used accordingly. Yet at times authors use an archaic language (like Jose Saramago did with his novel “Death with Interruptions,” when he used such words as ‘eventide,’ or ‘vespertine,’—though this often lead to more pretentious word association when more simpler and common place words would have done just fine) however upon reading many novels by Herta Müller, the concept of how language can be used in written works, outside of the simple confides of punctuation and grammar, can be seen. Peter Englund the current Permanent Secretary of the Swedish Academy, remarked on Herta Müller’s use of language. The Permanent Secretary of the Swedish Academy noted her precision of words, her experience at witnessing the corruption and misusing, as well as abusing the language and words. The most noted fact about Herta Müller’s use of language is her sentences. There are no long winding sentences, just picturesque sentences. Short and episodic, weaving and creating a larger picture. In fact there isn’t really a long continuous narrative strand, but details and anecdotes. The author (Herta Müller) is not an epicist a writer. She doesn’t write large sprawling novels; there are no thousand page novels, of painstaking long winding sentences, or a loss of confusion of characters, and events. The works are small and brief, but are incredibly intense short pieces of work, that are relentless in their depiction of life under tyrannical regimes. However this is what makes “The Hunger Angel,” by Herta Müller so much more different then her previous novels. The original German title is “Atemschaukel,” which is a compound word or neologism, which means “breathe swing,” in German; and is about a Soviet (forced) Labour Camp, and the taboo and often not talked about subject of ethnic German, Romanian’s who were sent to the Gulags in the Ukraine, to repent and pay for the crimes of Hitler, during World War II.
The novels of Herta Müller are moral, but they are not moral in the sense that they pass judgement to the reader. They do not accuse the reader of being as guilty as the guards or the dictator that happily cause misery wherever they can. Rather the opposite, the novels themselves can appear mechanical and detached from the characters or the experiences that they face. Descriptions of interrogations and daily life all become a matter of fact descriptions. There is nothing that can be done about these incidents. Descriptions of streets, houses, and shops show the inadequacy of the surroundings. A piece of tin sheet metal becomes a moveable door, to an otherwise doorless toilet outside. The grey buildings become common place, and the aspect of rats underneath the floor boards, or a one shovel of coal equals one gram of bread. The world behind the iron curtain was absurd and rough.
The novel depicts the harsh realities of life in a Soviet gulag. The first chapter itself where the famous line “Everything I possess I carry with me,” (also the title of the UK edition of this novel) and in this first chapter, titled “On Packing,” there is almost a hopeful optimism in the way Leo, thinks about the camp as perhaps being a chance to travel. Such a naïve thought, is often what we tell ourselves when faced with an obstacle that is both incredibly elusive and unavoidable. What is left is the only defensive mechanism, of trying to hope that something good can come out of it. Yet the reality always proves otherwise. Rounded up like cattle or other livestock the people from the villages who were on the list and met the requirements set down by the Stalinist government. People between the ages of seventeen and forty-five were eligible to be set to the gulags, for rebuilding and to pay for the German crimes that had taken place. But against all better judgement or lack of any judgement and morals, the Soviet Officials themselves had created crimes just as harsh as those done by the Nazi regime.
The best known account of life in a Soviet Gulag camp came from a fellow Nobel Laureate in Literature Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn who also spent time in a Soviet Labour camp for his criticism of Stalin and communism itself. Eventually the author himself found himself forced out of the former Soviet Union, and did not return until after the collapse of the red beast itself. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn himself later wrote a three volume book on the subject of the gulags between nineteen seventy three and nineteen seventy eight about the history and developments of the police state in the Soviet Union.
Sixty seven thousand, three hundred and thirty two Romanian ethnic German’s were sent as forced labour in the Gulags – that is the second highest number, besides the former Eastern territories of Germany and Poland which totals to one hundred fifty five thousand, two hundred and sixty two. When I showed a video of this novel (when the video was made of the shortlisted novels of the two thousand and nine novels for the prestigious German Book Prize) the first remark was “it looks like these people were being shipped off to a concentration camp,” – in the end that is what it was. Hundred upon thousands of people had died in the camps.
Based on the experiences of both her mother and a friend Oskar Pastior (who passed away in two thousand and six), who were both sent to labour camps while they were still relatively young, Herta Müller has depicted the snowy landscape and the harsh conditions of the disposed. The late Oskar Pastior and Herta Müller wished to write the novel together, but Herta Müller was forced to write it, herself, when her friend had died. Which then lead to a startling revelation, for Herta Müller, Oskar Pastior was an informant for the secret police. But Müller was reluctant and unable to criticise the late poet. He had already suffered in the gulags at the age of seventeen, he was a homosexual who could have been killed for it, and at such a stage in his life he just wanted to live, and was unfortunately open to the price, that it would cost him, to do just that. However she has been less lenient towards fellow Nobel Laureate in Literature, for his controversial poem about Israel and Iran. Herta Müller has said that Gunter Grass has lost all his moral credibility when he hid his affiliation with the Nazi SS (Grass was part of the Waffen SS at the end of World War II) while Herta Müller herself has always been honest about the amoral past that of her own people. Her father was part of the Waffen SS and supported many of the views of Nazi’s political standings until his death – he never officially distanced himself from it. Yet Müller herself had been rather critical of all ideologies, including Fascism which had claimed her father’s life and Communism which had claimed both her mother’s life and her own, and countless friends. Which is why Herta Müller’s novels are the way they are – both political but distanced itself from all ideologies, because all ideologies are full of lies.
With “The Hunger Angel,” Herta Müller shines light on the subject and the fate of the forced labour of ethnic Germans, from nineteen-forty five onwards (our main character Leo stayed in the camp for five years) all of which paid for the crimes of people who may or may not have supported Hitler:
“None of us were part any war, but because were Germans, the Russians considered us guilty of Hitler’s crimes.” – with an almost ironic revelation that David Lommer a character in the camp was Jewish.
Throughout the novel, the concept of hunger is examined continuously. A spectre that represents the hunger that starves all the camp prisoners equally is called the Hunger Angel, which is described as a protean spectre that appears as a white hare in the wasted-away cheeks of anyone on the verge of starving to death. Which further shows the poetic imagery that Herta Müller uses in this novel, as well as the Kafkaesque metaphors that the camp comes to produce.
The suffering of the characters and the people in this novel are at the forefront. When Leo finds 10 rubles in a puddle of mud, when someone throws his gaiters, at the market, he quickly goes on a spending spree, and eventually buys so much food and eats it all he quickly ends up vomiting it up once again. This greedy gluttonous action is all that he can do when given so a chance to devour food after being starved for so long.
Memories serve as both a savour, and a painful reminder of what has been lost, and the horrible situation that has become the life of the residents of the camp itself:
“Deep in the fruit garden, at our summerhouse in the Wench, stood a wooden bench without a back. We called it Uncle Hermann. We called it that because we didn’t know anybody by that name.” – even the past becomes as surreal as the present.
In the end it’s a great book, in my opinion. Poetic and disturbing, but not for everyone’s liking. The brief vignettes make up the chapters and the constant discussion of hunger, can often put people off or annoy them, but hunger is all that is left in the camp and its forced residents. It is in the end what reminds them that they are human. It was critically acclaimed by Peter Englund of the Swedish Academy, and the German Book Prize, was supposed to predict the wining of this book as it was the critics favourites, however it lost to Kathrin Schmidt and her novel “Du stirbst nicht,” or “You’re not going to die,” – which by the way I am still waiting to see a English translation. However in the end it was a great book, one that did not sugar coat the facts of the reality but it did use beautiful language to create a harrowing picture of deprivation, hunger, inhumane treatment, and the lack of human dignity as well as injustice, in order to leave a lasting impression the reader.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
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