Um, yes, well. To put it in a nutshell, I am an idiot and forgot what day it was. I will make every effort to get it posted this weekend. I'm sorry.
Off to sit in the naughty corner.
If anyone has a discussion they want to lead or a book suggestion email me.
20 November 2009
23 October 2009
Everything is Illuminated
Did you like the book? I loved it. It pretends to be about a young man's search for the Ukrainian woman who saved his grandfather from the Nazis but is really about pretty much everything else: love, history, memory, narrative, and death.
Everything Is Illuminated has two completely different narrators, and two elaborately intertwined stories. The first one is told by Jonathan who in a series of magical-realist vignettes beginning in 1791 retells the history of his grandfather's town, the Galician shtetl of Trachimbrod. Interspersed with the chapters on Trachimbrod are narrated by Alex episodes from Jonathan's search for the mysterious Augustine, his grandfather's alleged savior. They are accompanied by Alex's strangely moody grandfather serving as Jonathan's guide.
At the quite devastating climax of the book, you realize how the two tales are related, a connection that forever sunders Alex from Jonathan. What did you make of this narrative? I personally found it quite compelling. (Incidentally, it seems to be a great way of dealing with a an issue of considerable urgency in Holocaust literature: the seemingly hopeless split between history and narrative, between what happened and what can be told...)
Throughout the novel, fantasy and reality are convoluted and conflated. In the non-Alex stretches of the book, scenes from the lives of Ukrainian ancestors are recreated: their courtships, marriages, an accident and, eventually, salvation. These sections contain some glittering observations in the style of magical realism, as when the writer imagines a bad smell "entering the mouths of the sleeping for long enough to misdirect their dreams before exiting with the next snore". Also demonstrating that the writer can target hearts as well as heads is the detail, when the characters reach Trachinbrod, of wedding rings, money and pictures buried in the earth, all these "Jewish things" interred as the Nazis advance. Do you think that Foer portrays fantasy in a positive or negative light?
Okay, these are my thoughts about the book. Some of them, anyway. I need cut it here: I've got the plane to catch. But I hope this little intro will start some discussion.
The one questions I'm still struggling with when it comes to this book is why do so many of the characters in the novel, including Jonathan, fail to find the things for which they are searching. What do you think?
Everything Is Illuminated has two completely different narrators, and two elaborately intertwined stories. The first one is told by Jonathan who in a series of magical-realist vignettes beginning in 1791 retells the history of his grandfather's town, the Galician shtetl of Trachimbrod. Interspersed with the chapters on Trachimbrod are narrated by Alex episodes from Jonathan's search for the mysterious Augustine, his grandfather's alleged savior. They are accompanied by Alex's strangely moody grandfather serving as Jonathan's guide.
At the quite devastating climax of the book, you realize how the two tales are related, a connection that forever sunders Alex from Jonathan. What did you make of this narrative? I personally found it quite compelling. (Incidentally, it seems to be a great way of dealing with a an issue of considerable urgency in Holocaust literature: the seemingly hopeless split between history and narrative, between what happened and what can be told...)
Throughout the novel, fantasy and reality are convoluted and conflated. In the non-Alex stretches of the book, scenes from the lives of Ukrainian ancestors are recreated: their courtships, marriages, an accident and, eventually, salvation. These sections contain some glittering observations in the style of magical realism, as when the writer imagines a bad smell "entering the mouths of the sleeping for long enough to misdirect their dreams before exiting with the next snore". Also demonstrating that the writer can target hearts as well as heads is the detail, when the characters reach Trachinbrod, of wedding rings, money and pictures buried in the earth, all these "Jewish things" interred as the Nazis advance. Do you think that Foer portrays fantasy in a positive or negative light?
Okay, these are my thoughts about the book. Some of them, anyway. I need cut it here: I've got the plane to catch. But I hope this little intro will start some discussion.
The one questions I'm still struggling with when it comes to this book is why do so many of the characters in the novel, including Jonathan, fail to find the things for which they are searching. What do you think?
14 October 2009
Everything will be Illuminated on Friday 23rd October
Okay, the discussions on JS Foer's Everything Is Illuminated are being officially postponed till next week. I hope that's good with everyone.
(And as I'm off to Cambodia on Saturday 24th, I'll do the opening post and then disappear!)
12 October 2009
Just checking...
Hi everone, just though I'd check if anyone's read Everything's Illuminated? I've started writing a (short) intro post, but I'm more than happy to wait with publishing it till next week. What do you think?
02 October 2009
Dreaming in Hindi
Dreaming in Hindi is the story of the author, Katherine Russell Rich, while living in India and learning Hindi for a year. But not really. It's mainly a collection of theories, ideas, and reflections on learning a second language. For me, this was the most interesting thing about the book, and at the same time, the biggest problem with it.
Simply, I don't think the author found a good balance between telling her story and the second language learning theories. Much of the author's reflections refer to how learning a language changes you, and your vision of the world. In that respect, I think she was intending for this to be a personal memoir, and a record of how learning the language and living in such a different culture had changed her. However, I felt the personal side of the story was underdeveloped, facts and memories got lost in between all the talk about learning languages, and the writing was very scattered. She tried to adapt her experience to the theories she discusses in each chapter, which results in jumps and omissions that can confuse the reader.
Worse still, we never really get to know her or the rest of the characters well enough to care about them personally. To me, it felt, as if she was holding back, not really wanting to reveal the personal side of her story, and omitting important details. We don't even get to know much about her work in the school with deaf children, her relation with the students or her work with them.
However, she does a very good job of presenting and explaining theories and ideas about learning a language in a very simple way, and this provides for fascinating reading. She is mainly concerned about the difference between learning a first language and a second one (or a third or fourth), the effect that learning a language has on the brain (In navigating another language, then, you're not using precisely the same brain you do when employing your first), and the effect in has on your personality (With each new language you acquire a new soul, she mentions a Slovak proverb), and your vision of the world (The way that words, with only the tensile strength of breath, can tug you out of one world and land you in the center of another).
Next to neurolinguistic theories, there are reflections on studies with bilingual people and interesting observations about the differences between languages (I was fascinated to learn that in India, time is circular, and in Mandarin, it's vertical, in contrast to the linear concept of time of the Western world). There are also observations about India, the culture and the way that language is used as another weapon in the Hindi-Muslim divide. However, here again, I felt she didn't go deep enough, and worse, she never let go of her Western ways, and much of what we learn about India is through her Western eyes, to the point that it's judgemental.
The result is that while other people's words and ideas come alive in the book, she never fully does. Her reflections do not add much, and she doesn't share enough for us to care about her. She clearly considers learning a language the entry into another world and hence, the beginning of another life. She started studying Hindi after losing her job and having been ill for a while so for her it's a healing process. You embrace pursuits like this as an adult, I think, as a transfer of focus when your life has shifted you into another place, when you've had to begin again in some way. It's a very personal process, but her personality is absent from the book.
As someone who lives and uses a language other than her mother tongue in a daily basis, I had experienced that feeling of being someone else, of being different whenever I switch from one language to another. But it was only because of my experience that I could understand what she was going through and I don't know if anyone without the personal experience could appreciate what it's like from this book.
What do you think?
Does the combination of her personal story with the essay-like parts on the effects of learning a language work together in the book? Which one did you find more interesting?
Did you get engaged with her personal story of living in another culture and struggling to learn the language?
If you speak a second language, did you experience many of the stages that the author went through? Did you feel, for instance, that you were losing your mother tongue? I missed full language of any kind. During these months I existed in half language.
If you don't speak a second language, do you feel you understand what it's like after reading the book?
Do you feel she provides a full picture of life in India?
Do you agree with her main proposition, that learning a language makes you different, and gives you a different view of the world? A language is a whole map of reality.
Do you think that learning a new language can help you start afresh after a difficult time in your life? Forcing yourself back to the start, finding names again for everything requires you to look at everything afresh.
What's your experience of learning a second language or living in a different culture?
Simply, I don't think the author found a good balance between telling her story and the second language learning theories. Much of the author's reflections refer to how learning a language changes you, and your vision of the world. In that respect, I think she was intending for this to be a personal memoir, and a record of how learning the language and living in such a different culture had changed her. However, I felt the personal side of the story was underdeveloped, facts and memories got lost in between all the talk about learning languages, and the writing was very scattered. She tried to adapt her experience to the theories she discusses in each chapter, which results in jumps and omissions that can confuse the reader.
Worse still, we never really get to know her or the rest of the characters well enough to care about them personally. To me, it felt, as if she was holding back, not really wanting to reveal the personal side of her story, and omitting important details. We don't even get to know much about her work in the school with deaf children, her relation with the students or her work with them.
However, she does a very good job of presenting and explaining theories and ideas about learning a language in a very simple way, and this provides for fascinating reading. She is mainly concerned about the difference between learning a first language and a second one (or a third or fourth), the effect that learning a language has on the brain (In navigating another language, then, you're not using precisely the same brain you do when employing your first), and the effect in has on your personality (With each new language you acquire a new soul, she mentions a Slovak proverb), and your vision of the world (The way that words, with only the tensile strength of breath, can tug you out of one world and land you in the center of another).
Next to neurolinguistic theories, there are reflections on studies with bilingual people and interesting observations about the differences between languages (I was fascinated to learn that in India, time is circular, and in Mandarin, it's vertical, in contrast to the linear concept of time of the Western world). There are also observations about India, the culture and the way that language is used as another weapon in the Hindi-Muslim divide. However, here again, I felt she didn't go deep enough, and worse, she never let go of her Western ways, and much of what we learn about India is through her Western eyes, to the point that it's judgemental.
The result is that while other people's words and ideas come alive in the book, she never fully does. Her reflections do not add much, and she doesn't share enough for us to care about her. She clearly considers learning a language the entry into another world and hence, the beginning of another life. She started studying Hindi after losing her job and having been ill for a while so for her it's a healing process. You embrace pursuits like this as an adult, I think, as a transfer of focus when your life has shifted you into another place, when you've had to begin again in some way. It's a very personal process, but her personality is absent from the book.
As someone who lives and uses a language other than her mother tongue in a daily basis, I had experienced that feeling of being someone else, of being different whenever I switch from one language to another. But it was only because of my experience that I could understand what she was going through and I don't know if anyone without the personal experience could appreciate what it's like from this book.
What do you think?
Does the combination of her personal story with the essay-like parts on the effects of learning a language work together in the book? Which one did you find more interesting?
Did you get engaged with her personal story of living in another culture and struggling to learn the language?
If you speak a second language, did you experience many of the stages that the author went through? Did you feel, for instance, that you were losing your mother tongue? I missed full language of any kind. During these months I existed in half language.
If you don't speak a second language, do you feel you understand what it's like after reading the book?
Do you feel she provides a full picture of life in India?
Do you agree with her main proposition, that learning a language makes you different, and gives you a different view of the world? A language is a whole map of reality.
Do you think that learning a new language can help you start afresh after a difficult time in your life? Forcing yourself back to the start, finding names again for everything requires you to look at everything afresh.
What's your experience of learning a second language or living in a different culture?
04 September 2009
Vernon God Little
by DBC Pierre (Peter Finlay)
In Vernon Gregory Little, the reader encounters a self-indulgent, yet endearing character, who tells, brags, jokes, swears, and reveals everything and nothing directly to the reader. "You didn't need to know this, but when I was a kid I used to be kind of unpredictable, for 'Number Twos' anyway," (p. 7) Vernon tells us, aptly summarizing what is to follow: shifting paradigms, utter unpredictability, and lots of feces and talk of it, eventually on the cover of Times and the morning paper. Vernon lets the reader in on some deep dark secrets festering in the small town of Martirio (Spanish. Denotes martyrdom, torment, torture.), while simultaneously filtering everything through his own, very special, view of the world. The reader can never be sure, to which degree Vernon's description of the world parallels the 'truth', ultimately forcing the reader to constantly renegotiate his or her understanding of it.
As Vernon's "truth's still out there, virginal and waiting" (p. 248) is juxtaposed with the "tragedy routine" (p. 27) of the town, and the truth of its "news" (p. 21) a tale of constantly changing and hidden connections and alliances, lies, and faltering beliefs emerges from a place that would give anything to be perceived as the small town with hayrides and community spirit that "one of the networks might even put ... national today" (p. 87) because "the deadly web of cause and effect ... has brought the once peaceful town to its knees" (p. 55). For Vernon, as for the inhabitants of the town and for the town as a 'community', the borders between reality and fiction, and reality and entertainment, are blurred. However, while Vernon firmly believes that "whoever points a finger at me, just for being a guy's friend, has some deep remorse coming. Tears of fucken regret, when the truth comes marching in. And it always comes, you know it. Watch any fucken movie." (p. 36) he also understands that he is not (and even admonishes himself for not being) Jean Claude van Damme, an action-movie hero. Thus the reader is constantly left wondering, how much of what Vernon says is to reassure himself, or to brag, or to lie, and how much is 'true'.
As the novel satirizes private enterprise through images of a sponsored SWAT team and prison, the media through a death row reality show and the main man falling victim to his own greed for a juicy story, and everyone who believes in either of the concepts, words from Vernon's nemesis echo the bottom line of why what happens to Vernon happens to him: "Facts may seem black and white by the time they hit your TV screen, but professional teams sift through mountains of grey to get them there. You need positioning, like a product in the market - the jails are full or people who didn't manage their positions." (p. 34) In this sentiment, also the reader is lured into believing that he or she has understood and nailed down the bottom line of this novel, its ultimate message, its pull, only to be thrown completely off by the ending. A happy one. Where the boy gets the girl, the mother gets the fridge, the evil ones get what they deserve, and "Everybody's gone ... Everything's back to normal." as Vernon God Little delivers rewards and punishment.
Like a TV movie.
But all that's just my opinion, what do you think?
1. What did you make of Vernon's changing name? (personally, probably my favorite tool in the whole novel)
2. What did you make of the mother-son relationship? Since it is only depicted through Vernon's eyes and that knife turns out to be a run-of-the-mill conscience...
3. It can be argued that about halfway through Pierre loses control and the plot spins out of control. Thoughts on this?
4. What do you make of the pop culture references. (Me, I'll be reading this again, to get to the bottom of them all)
Time to discuss!
In Vernon Gregory Little, the reader encounters a self-indulgent, yet endearing character, who tells, brags, jokes, swears, and reveals everything and nothing directly to the reader. "You didn't need to know this, but when I was a kid I used to be kind of unpredictable, for 'Number Twos' anyway," (p. 7) Vernon tells us, aptly summarizing what is to follow: shifting paradigms, utter unpredictability, and lots of feces and talk of it, eventually on the cover of Times and the morning paper. Vernon lets the reader in on some deep dark secrets festering in the small town of Martirio (Spanish. Denotes martyrdom, torment, torture.), while simultaneously filtering everything through his own, very special, view of the world. The reader can never be sure, to which degree Vernon's description of the world parallels the 'truth', ultimately forcing the reader to constantly renegotiate his or her understanding of it.
As Vernon's "truth's still out there, virginal and waiting" (p. 248) is juxtaposed with the "tragedy routine" (p. 27) of the town, and the truth of its "news" (p. 21) a tale of constantly changing and hidden connections and alliances, lies, and faltering beliefs emerges from a place that would give anything to be perceived as the small town with hayrides and community spirit that "one of the networks might even put ... national today" (p. 87) because "the deadly web of cause and effect ... has brought the once peaceful town to its knees" (p. 55). For Vernon, as for the inhabitants of the town and for the town as a 'community', the borders between reality and fiction, and reality and entertainment, are blurred. However, while Vernon firmly believes that "whoever points a finger at me, just for being a guy's friend, has some deep remorse coming. Tears of fucken regret, when the truth comes marching in. And it always comes, you know it. Watch any fucken movie." (p. 36) he also understands that he is not (and even admonishes himself for not being) Jean Claude van Damme, an action-movie hero. Thus the reader is constantly left wondering, how much of what Vernon says is to reassure himself, or to brag, or to lie, and how much is 'true'.
As the novel satirizes private enterprise through images of a sponsored SWAT team and prison, the media through a death row reality show and the main man falling victim to his own greed for a juicy story, and everyone who believes in either of the concepts, words from Vernon's nemesis echo the bottom line of why what happens to Vernon happens to him: "Facts may seem black and white by the time they hit your TV screen, but professional teams sift through mountains of grey to get them there. You need positioning, like a product in the market - the jails are full or people who didn't manage their positions." (p. 34) In this sentiment, also the reader is lured into believing that he or she has understood and nailed down the bottom line of this novel, its ultimate message, its pull, only to be thrown completely off by the ending. A happy one. Where the boy gets the girl, the mother gets the fridge, the evil ones get what they deserve, and "Everybody's gone ... Everything's back to normal." as Vernon God Little delivers rewards and punishment.
Like a TV movie.
But all that's just my opinion, what do you think?
1. What did you make of Vernon's changing name? (personally, probably my favorite tool in the whole novel)
2. What did you make of the mother-son relationship? Since it is only depicted through Vernon's eyes and that knife turns out to be a run-of-the-mill conscience...
3. It can be argued that about halfway through Pierre loses control and the plot spins out of control. Thoughts on this?
4. What do you make of the pop culture references. (Me, I'll be reading this again, to get to the bottom of them all)
Time to discuss!
21 August 2009
The Poisonwood Bible
I am fascinated by history, or more succinctly, by the history that we are told, and the history that we know. I think that this fascination began when a teacher once remarked that if you wanted to understand how history was nothing more than a fluid understanding of our immediate world, all you needed to do was to look at a map. Prior to this, I had always thought of maps as "the truth" that the mapmakers got as close to it as they could, changing a three dimensional sphere into a two dimensional projection. But as I moved through life I came to realize that maps and history as we are told are not "THE truth," but just one version of it. And that the writers of history and the map makers are always put to their task with an agenda. Not only the agenda of society, but also their own. And they are earnest in their task because their understanding of history can only be told from their perspective, not those of people they have never met.
I think this is why "The Poisonwood Bible" captured me the very first time I read it. This is the third time I have read the book, and I only grow more fond of it each time, probably because I try and read it from a different perspective each time. Though I most readily identify with Leah's character and despise Rachel's character, when I make a concerted effort to read the book from Rachel's, Adah's, Ruth May's, Orleanna's, or even Nathan's perspective, I find that I understand the underlying history of their stories a little differently each time. Much like every single person on the planet understands their own and their fellow human's history and life story from the filter of their own life experiences. We are nothing if not our life experiences, our childhood environment, and our place in the world.
The scene that stands out the most for me is when Nathan Price arrives in Kilanga and proceeds to plant his garden with his imported "wonder beans." At first, I scoffed at him and judged his ignorance. I put him down in my mind's eye, thinking that Africa was about to teach him a lesson (which it did.) But then I realized that he was only doing what he knew. And I was being just as rigid in my thinking as he was. Instead of gently and then forcefully trying to show him the error of his ways, like Mama Tataba, I dismissed his ignorance and moved on, never giving him a second thought. I wanted him to bend to the will of Africa, even though I was unwilling to bend my own thinking on the subject because of what I thought I knew. What is the moral of this little story? Though I thought I was being open minded, I wasn't. It takes conscious effort to be open minded, I discovered, something that the whole western world has forgotten to do, at least in terms of Africa.
I could go on and on, but instead, I will leave you with a few other questions to ponder and discuss on the subject, gleaned from a reading guide at Goodreads.com.
I think this is why "The Poisonwood Bible" captured me the very first time I read it. This is the third time I have read the book, and I only grow more fond of it each time, probably because I try and read it from a different perspective each time. Though I most readily identify with Leah's character and despise Rachel's character, when I make a concerted effort to read the book from Rachel's, Adah's, Ruth May's, Orleanna's, or even Nathan's perspective, I find that I understand the underlying history of their stories a little differently each time. Much like every single person on the planet understands their own and their fellow human's history and life story from the filter of their own life experiences. We are nothing if not our life experiences, our childhood environment, and our place in the world.
The scene that stands out the most for me is when Nathan Price arrives in Kilanga and proceeds to plant his garden with his imported "wonder beans." At first, I scoffed at him and judged his ignorance. I put him down in my mind's eye, thinking that Africa was about to teach him a lesson (which it did.) But then I realized that he was only doing what he knew. And I was being just as rigid in my thinking as he was. Instead of gently and then forcefully trying to show him the error of his ways, like Mama Tataba, I dismissed his ignorance and moved on, never giving him a second thought. I wanted him to bend to the will of Africa, even though I was unwilling to bend my own thinking on the subject because of what I thought I knew. What is the moral of this little story? Though I thought I was being open minded, I wasn't. It takes conscious effort to be open minded, I discovered, something that the whole western world has forgotten to do, at least in terms of Africa.
I could go on and on, but instead, I will leave you with a few other questions to ponder and discuss on the subject, gleaned from a reading guide at Goodreads.com.
- At the novel's end, the carved-animal woman in the African market is sure that "There has never been any village on the road past Bulungu," that "There is no such village" as Kilanga. What do you make of this?
How do the "voices" (and therefore perspectives and stories) of the sisters differ? Do they all tell the same story? Why or why not?
Think about Nathan Price's relationship with his family, Tata Ndu's relationship with his people, and the Belgian and American authorities' relationship with the Congo. What similarities are there? What differences? Why?
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