Possessed by Memory: The Inward Light of Criticism

Harold Bloom

Possessed by Memory: The Inward Light of Criticism by the prolific literary critic Harold Bloom is a literary memoir threaded with a meditation on aging.

The 89-year-old Professor Bloom begins by interrogating selections from Hebrew scripture and then moves to a discussion of some of his favorite excerpts from Western literature. Included is a section on Shakespeare and an exploration of what he refers to as the concept of “self-otherseeing” in some of Shakespeare’s characters. He probes the words of Milton, the visionary company of the Romantic poets, Walt Whitman and twentieth-century American poetry, and concludes with Proust’s In Search of Lost Time. His contributions to the field of literary criticism will be felt for years to come.

Professor Bloom peppers his discussion with delightful anecdotes and illuminating conversations he shared with famous figures in literature and literary criticism, most of whom have long-since died. He mourns their deaths, paying tribute to them by keeping their memory alive through engaging with their writing. An elegiac tone permeates his discussions as he looks back on the past, reminiscing about old friends and feeling their loss.

Making frequent reference to his aging body, his lack of mobility, and his insomnia, Professor Bloom acknowledges he does not have much longer to live. He meditates on life, aging, death, and the legacy one leaves behind. Suffering from chronic insomnia, he derives comfort by reciting extensively from a vast repertoire of poems, many of which he memorized as a child. And as he recites, he articulates why certain verses or whole poems move him. Literature is his consolation and his solace.

One doesn’t have to agree with all—or even, some—of Professor Bloom’s observations about literature or the Western canon. But one cannot deny the breadth, depth, and scope of his expansive knowledge and expertise. He cites verses from poems as if they are second nature; he draws unexpected connections and comparisons with poems that are centuries apart; he breathes life into a poem as he interrogates its meaning. And he uses literature as a platform to explore existential questions about life and death. One doesn’t have to be familiar with the literature he discusses to appreciate the insights he shares.

This isn’t an easy read. It is a deeply personal journey about how literature has informed and shaped the life of a giant among literary critics—a man endowed with a capacious appetite for reading, for thinking deeply about what he reads, and for nurturing an unabashed passion for literature.

Professor Harold Bloom died on October 14, 2019. May he rest in peace.

Recommended.

Mrs. Bridge

Evan S. Connell

First published in 1959, Mrs. Bridge by Evan S. Connell is set in Kansas City in the 1930s. The central figure is India Bridge, an upper middle-class suburban housewife. Her character is revealed in a series of short vignettes, episodes, and conversations, some of which are laugh- out-loud funny. The effect is cumulative, with layer upon layer gradually piling up until a full picture emerges of Mrs. Bridge.

Married to a successful, workaholic lawyer, Mrs. Bridge is happiest when her three children are young and need her attention. When her children get older and no longer demand or want her attention, Mrs. Bridge is plagued with doubts about her self-worth. She is lonely, bored, and doesn’t know what to do with her time. She pursues various activities to occupy herself but then abandons each project. She picks up a book and leaves it unfinished. She longs to connect with her children, but they show her little respect and grudgingly converse with her. She longs to connect with her husband. He loves her but is physically and emotionally distant, stifles her thoughts and aspirations, and demonstrates his love by buying her expensive gifts she does not need or want.

The cumulative layering of vignettes and conversations unveil a poignant portrait of Mrs. Bridge. She is well-meaning and well-intentioned, but her mind is vacuous. She gets her cues on what to think and what to say from her husband. She gets her cues on etiquette, mannerisms, activities, and clothing styles from her upbringing and social circle. She is shallow, bland, and focuses on appearances. She avoids meaningful conversations, fearing she might hear something that challenges her world view. At the same time, she realizes there is something missing in her life, but she can’t—or won’t—put her finger on it. She considers seeing a therapist but abandons the idea when her husband curtly dismisses it.

Mrs. Bridge is a product of her socialization. She has internalized the patriarchal constructs that dictate the male is the head of the household and the woman’s role is to cater to his every need and subordinate herself, her aspirations, her hopes and desires, entirely to him. She is Virginia Woolf’s “Angel in the House,” reflecting her husband at twice his natural size. She engages in de-selfing by stifling any hint of independent thought and slowly suffocates herself.

Evan Connell portrays her with generosity and sympathy. One cannot help but feel compassion for a woman who flounders with trying to understand the cause of her ennui. Her socialization has thwarted her desire for self-identity. By marrying a good provider, subordinating herself to her husband, living in the right neighborhood, attending the country club, speaking in non-controversial platitudes, adhering to the rules, and behaving with decorum at all times, she has checked off all the boxes society tells her will guarantee her happiness. But she is miserable, lonely, vacuous, and she doesn’t know why.

Through his brilliant use of telling details, short vignettes, and revealing conversations, Evan Connell has indicted patriarchal socialization by poignantly portraying its impact on a sad, lonely, and bewildered Mrs. Bridge. He does it all with heart, sensitivity, and humor.

Highly recommended.

Burger's Daughter

Nadine Gordimer

A young school girl waits outside a prison in South Africa. This scene opens Burger’s Daughter by Nadine Gordimer, the 1991 Nobel Prize winner in literature. The girl clutches a hot-water bottle and an eiderdown to be delivered to her mother inside the prison. The girl’s name is Rosa Burger, the daughter of Lionel and Cathy Burger. Both her parents are white anti-apartheid activists seeking to overthrow the South African government. Rosa has grown accustomed to seeing her parents and their colleagues under constant surveillance and/or incarcerated for their political activism.

The novel follows Rosa’s life as she tries to come to terms with her parents’ legacy. We meet her at the age of 26, over a decade after the opening scene. By this time, her mother has died of illness. Her father has also died of illness while serving three years of a life sentence for treason. The novel primarily consists of Rosa’s internal monologues in which she talks to her father or her former lover, Conrad. These monologues are interrupted occasionally by the omniscient narrator.

Rosa’s monologues reveal what it was like grow up in a household bustling with anti-apartheid activism. She was called upon to contribute to the cause in various ways, but her attitude of being thrust into a political movement is ambivalent at best. She is under surveillance by the authorities, so is cautious about her activities. In spite of that, she maintains some contact with her parents’ political acquaintances although she behaves like a disengaged observer. Eventually, she is able to obtain a passport, visits her father’s first wife in France, and has an affair with a Frenchman. She goes to London and then returns to South Africa after an unpleasant encounter with a former childhood friend. The novel ends with her imprisonment.

Gordimer weaves references to the political upheavals in South Africa, the strikes, the Soweto uprising, as well as the activities of actual prominent anti-apartheid activists, many of whom are mentioned in Rosa’s monologues. This gives the monologues the air of authenticity. But the monologues are stylistically challenging; the stream of consciousness style confusing. Sometimes it isn’t clear whether Rosa is speaking to her deceased father, her former lover, herself, or the reader. The monologues, which can extend for a couple of pages without paragraph divisions, include a plethora of names and complex political discussions. Since the speakers are not always identified and the dialogue is reported in indirect voice, it can become somewhat tedious. The temporal shifts and flashbacks without warning contribute to the confusion.

The style may be an attempt to reflect Rosa’s confused attempts to forge a separate identity for herself within her parents’ circle of politically committed activists. Although lucid and thought-provoking passages dot the landscape, the novel generally lacks coherence and fails to generate interest in the protagonist’s fate.

Recommended with reservations.

Iceland's Bell

Halldór Laxness; translated by Philip Roughton

Iceland’s Bell by the 1955 Nobel Prize winner Halldór Laxness and translated by Philip Roughton is set in Iceland in the late 17th century when Iceland was a Danish colony. The novel, a hodge-podge of different elements, is geographically and politically broad in scope.

The three parts span a couple of decades. Part one follows the mishaps of Jón Hreggvidsson, a drunken fisherman, punished for stealing a fishing line, accused of murder, awaiting execution in jail, and escaping with the help of Snæfridur, the magistrate’s daughter, known as the Iceland’s sun for her beauty. Embroiled in the political turmoil of the times, Jón has a penchant to burst into Icelandic song whenever the mood takes him.

Part two, which takes place years later, focuses on Snæfridur’s trials and tribulations with her drunken husband Magnus. She is in love with Arnas Arnæus, a character based on the historical Arni Magnusson who collected ancient manuscripts of Icelandic sagas with a goal of recording and reviving Iceland’s glory.

Part three takes place in Copenhagen where the war for political control of Iceland is waged. Snæfridur has gone to Denmark to reverse her father’s conviction by appealing to the Danish authorities. She speaks with eloquence, passion, and pride in Iceland’s cultural heritage while decrying the injustices it has suffered. Arnæus is tempted with the governorship of Iceland by German merchants on the verge of purchasing Iceland from Denmark. The novel concludes with a brief description of the fire in Copenhagen.

Throw in the mix a host of complex civil and criminal litigations; a critique of trials and legal procedures; examples of Denmark’s colonial exploitation of Iceland, stripping it of its resources to finance the whim and exploits of the Danish king; the poverty, famine, and abysmal living conditions of the Icelandic people; references to Icelandic folklore heroes and heroines; citations from the sagas; and then pepper the narrative with an abundance of Latin phrases for good measure. If all this sounds complicated, that is because it is.

Laxness populates his canvas with aristocrats, drunkards, criminals, and hypocrites. In the tradition of Icelandic sagas, his characters have no interiority. We are not made privy to their feelings or thoughts and see them exclusively through their words and actions. Laxness portrays them without judgment. Even the most outlandish, horrific experiences and actions are described with a detached, dark humor that borders on being cartoonish. The narrative rambles; the dialogue is choppy with characters seemingly talking at each other. The pronunciation guide at the beginning and the extensive notes at the end are helpful. But the constant need to refer to the end notes to understand references and context disrupts the flow of the narrative.

This dense, somewhat unwieldy narrative provides a panoramic view of the suffering of the Icelandic people under the colonial yoke of Denmark. What emerges from this rollicking, contemporary Icelandic saga is Laxness’ love for his country and his respect for its rich cultural heritage.

Recommended with some reservations.

Bird Summons

Leila Aboulela

Inspired by Farid Ud-Din Attar’s twelfth-century Sufi poem The Conference of the Birds, Bird Summons by Leila Aboulela tells the story of three Muslim women living in Scotland. They embark on a road trip to visit the grave of Lady Evelyn Cobbold, a Scottish convert to Islam and the first British woman to perform the pilgrimage to Mecca.

The three friends are plagued with doubts about their paths in life. Salma, the self-appointed leader who organizes the trip, is a massage therapist and happily married to a Scottish convert to Islam. When she is contacted by her first love in Egypt, she becomes embroiled in a fantasy world of what might have been had she stayed in Egypt. Moni relinquished a successful banking career to devote herself to the full-time care of her five-year-old son suffering from cerebral palsy. She feuds with her husband about her exclusive focus on their son to the detriment of their marital relationship. Iman, the youngest, has been married three times. In the course of the road trip, her third husband catches up with her and announces their divorce because his parents disapprove of his marriage.

The women spend a week at a resort on the grounds of a converted monastery before heading to Lady Evelyn’s grave site. During the road trip and the week-long stay, they bicker and criticize one another. Each one is wrapped up in her own thoughts. Salma’s phone calls to her former boyfriend in Egypt consume her. Moni is plagued with worry about her son. And without an education or adequate resources, Iman tries to figure out what to do with the rest of her life.

It is at this point the novel delves into magical realism. Iman is visited by a Hoopoe who speaks to her in parables, folktales, and riddles. Moni befriends a young child who reminds her of her son. He inexplicably assumes gigantic proportions and crushes her with his weight. And Salma chases after a man she thinks is her former boyfriend. She travels back in time to Egypt and ends up in her boyfriend’s clinic where he dissects her body. The three women metamorphose into a variety of inhuman shapes and are forced to rely on each other to proceed. As a result of the Hoopoe’s guidance and their collaboration, their human shape is restored and they are able to find their way back. Each woman gains insight and strength as a result of what predictably turns out to be a journey of self-discovery.

The plunge into magical realism is a new element in Aboulela’s writing. Unfortunately, it is not entirely successful. It does not flow organically from the novel and appears contrived—as if the author is trying to bend the narrative to conform to Attar’s poem. What started off as a promising novel about three Muslim woman immigrants and their struggles with relationships and with adapting to life in a western culture veers into the territory of magical realism that is totally out of sync with the novel. In addition, the characters lack depth and nuance; the writing is perfunctory and pedantic.

Recommended with reservations since it is not up to the quality of Aboulela’s other works in either style or content.

I'Jaam

Sinan Antoon; translated by Rebecca C. Johnson and Sinan Antoon

I’Jaam by Sinan Antoon, translated by Rebecca C. Johnson and Sinan Antoon, is a novella that packs a powerful punch well beyond its 90 pages. The title I’Jaam refers to the way in which letters in the Arabic alphabet vary depending on the location of 1-3 dots (above or below a letter) and on their position in the sentence. Readings of texts without dots can vary depending on context and syntax. The manuscript, discovered in a filing cabinet in the Ministry of Interior, is written by a young man detained by Iraqi authorities in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.

Furat is a young university student and aspiring writer. He is incarcerated by Iraqi authorities, tortured, beaten, raped, and deprived of food and water for extended periods. While in detention, he writes. His writing consists of flashbacks, memories, terrifying hallucinations, nightmares, dreams, as well as his experience with torture and rape by his guards. His manuscript is discovered by the authorities and assigned to a bureaucrat to insert the missing dots. The insertions are indicated in footnotes in which the dots are positioned on a word so it is read as praising the dominant ideology; the words minus the dots in the manuscript can be read as highly critical of the dominant ideology.

The manuscript reveals the sheer terror of living in the clutches of a totalitarian government with its echoes of George Orwell’s 1984 and Franz Kafka’s The Trial. Lies and hypocrisy permeate every aspect of governance. Furat describes a society in which activity is monitored, freedom of expression severely curtailed, and government spies infiltrate all levels of society. Something as innocuous as failure to clap during a government-sponsored demonstration can cause one to disappear. Unquestionable loyalty and support are demanded for the “Father-Leader” and strictly and brutally enforced by his police.

Furat’s writing shifts from lucid descriptions of life before detention, his interactions with his grandmother, his budding love affair with his girl-friend, to the horror and brutality of his incarceration in a filthy, rat-infested cell. The shifts are abrupt, reflecting the temporal blur he experiences as a result of his humiliating and dehumanizing treatment during detention. His faculties break down so he/we no long know what is real and what is imaginary. The narrative is haunting and ends abruptly. We don’t know what happens to Furat. All that remains is the manuscript he left behind.

A chilling novella, highly recommended for its evocation of life under a totalitarian government.

The Poisonwood Bible

Barbara Kingsolver

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver is an epic story of a missionary family in the Belgian Congo in 1959. Nathan Price is an evangelical Baptist minister obsessed with converting the indigenous population in the small village of Kilanga. The story unfolds in the first-person voices of his wife, Orleanna; and their four daughters, Rachel, Leah, Adah, and Ruth May. The story takes place against the backdrop of political upheaval as the Congo briefly transitions to independence followed by decades of Mobutu’s tyranny.

The novel opens with Orleanna back in Georgia, years after her departure from the Congo. She grapples to understand their experience and the tragedy that precipitated her exit from the Congo. The novel then shifts back in time to 1959 and the family’s arrival at Kilanga. It moves forward through the next three decades through the alternating perspectives of the four daughters with intermittent reflections by Orleanna.

Divided into seven books, the first two-thirds of the novel describe the family’s experience in Kilanga. The girls initially experience culture shock. They ridicule the clothing, smells, food, morals, and habits of the indigenous population. But gradually, Leah and Adah open up to the culture, develop an appreciation for its positive elements, and begin to adapt. Rachel, the eldest, is self-absorbed, materialistic, and remains consistently aloof and disparaging of the Congolese; Ruth May is too young to form an opinion.

Nathan Price is seen through the eyes of his family. He is a physically and mentally abusive toward his wife and daughters; he is intransigent and close-minded toward the villagers. He refuses to understand their culture or to see anything positive in it. His insistence they embrace his religion and adopt his way of thinking only serve to alienate him. Propelled by his missionary zeal, Nathan emerges as arrogant, bigoted, and a foolish promoter of cultural imperialism.

The novel’s strength lies in a number of factors. Kingsolver’s imagery transports the reader to Kilanga through her detailed, atmospheric description of the local culture and life in the village with its challenges, losses, and rewards. We see the vibrant colors, feel the textures, smell the smells, taste the food, and hear the sounds of the jungle and its inhabitants. Kingsolver’s descriptions are immersive, powerful, and evocative. Her novel’s strength also lies in character portrayal. Each of her characters speaks in a unique, identifiable voice, is well-developed and realistically portrayed.

But the novel loses some of its strength in the last 150 or so pages when Kingsolver traces the lives of Orleanna and her daughters decades later. The passion and energy of the earlier part of the novel is diluted due to a perfunctory description of what happens to each character. Also, although Kingsolver’s scathing critique of western imperialism and Christian missionary zeal with its devastating impact on the Congo has been established earlier, she continues to hammer the point home. Her political advocacy overshadows the rest of the novel to its detriment. In spite of these flaws, however, the novel is a remarkable achievement and well-deserving of the numerous accolades it has received.

Highly recommended.

Painter to the King

Amy Sackville

Painter to the King by Amy Sackville offers a historical panorama of the court of King Philip IV of Spain by focusing on the artist Diego Velázquez and his portraits of Philip and his family.

The novel unfolds through a unique combination of different styles. Dashes and ellipses abound; as do partial sentences; sentences that start and stop and start up, again—all of which constitute a stream of consciousness technique. The technique also replicates the painter’s brush strokes as his hand moves across the canvas, hesitates, and continues.

The nearly four-decade relationship between Velázquez and Philip is told chronologically with intermittent interruptions in which the narrator inserts herself as she walks through the dusty streets of Madrid and Seville, retracing Velázquez’s footsteps and frequenting his former haunts. She dips in and out of Velázquez’s mind, stands behind him as he paints, evokes his struggle to capture the right amount of light and shade in an image, speaks to him directly, and invites him to answer questions about his life and his art. She occasionally walks readers through a painting, directing our eyes to certain details as if seeing them from inside the canvas.

Sackville’s attention to detail is immersive and atmospheric. She plunges the reader into chaotic scenes depicting the frenzied activities and celebrations in Philip’s court. Her impressive use of visual imagery conjures a scene or a painting before our eyes. Her sentences pile on the details and can extend for several lines, giving the text an almost breathless quality. The style is remarkable; the historical research extensive.

In terms of style, this is a remarkable work. However, it may be too much of a good thing. The novel is weighed down by an excess of style and too little substance. The dashes, ellipses, stops and starts, shifts in perspective, the chaotic atmosphere, lengthy sentences, and the breathless quality, while effective in generating an atmosphere, can be quite exhausting and tedious to read. The fragmentary style leaves little room for character development. Neither the king nor Velázquez emerge as fully fleshed-out characters that engage reader attention.

Perhaps Sackville was aiming for something different. Perhaps her intention was to translate Velázquez’s breathtaking portraits into words that emulate his pauses and deliberations during composition; the sweep of his brush strokes; his play with light and dark; his manner of suspending gestures; his attention to detail; his intense scrutiny; and his angle of vision—all of which characterize his masterpieces. If that were her intention, then she has succeeded admirably.

Recommended.

The Whispering Muse

Sjón; translated by Victoria Cribb

The Whispering Muse by Sjón, translated from the Icelandic by Victoria Cribb, blends fiction with mythology. The narrative unfolds through the first-person voice of Valdimar Haraldsson, a somewhat pompous elderly gentleman with an inflated ego. He is the author of a 17-volume journal devoted to demonstrating the supposedly mental and physical superiority of the Nordic race which he attributes to its consumption of fish. He has written articles and given lectures on the subject. Haraldsson is at a cross roads in his life when he is invited by the son of a deceased friend to join a Danish merchant ship on its way to Turkey. He embraces the opportunity. The year is 1949.

Once situated on the ship, Haraldsson meets the senior members of the crew. Among them is Caeneus, the second mate. Caeneus regales the guests at dinner time with tales of Jason and the Argonauts on their adventures to retrieve the Golden Fleece. He claims to have sailed with Jason, his muse being a broken fragment of the Argo’s hull which whispers in his ear. He serves as the muse’s mouthpiece. His tales include the stay at Lemnos whose exclusive inhabitants are females eager to entertain their male guests; his rape as a female and subsequent transformation into a male; his stint as a bird, as well as many other fantastical elements. He weaves Nordic mythology with Greek myths from Apollonius, the plays of Euripides, and the poetry of Ovid. He garners the rapt attention of the dinner guests, much to Haraldsson’s chagrin since he had hoped to entertain them with his theory on the benefits of eating fish.

Caeneus’ playful, fantastic tales contrast sharply with Haraldsson’s dry, controlled speech. His mythic retellings intersect with events on the ship. For example, during Easter when the ship is delayed at port, Caeneus tells the story of the Argo’s extended stay at Lemnos. He also echoes Easter when he launches into an improbable tale of being nailed to a cross to heal his broken bones.

Haraldsson barely contains his boredom as he listens to the Caeneus’ tales. He cannot fathom the audiences’ fascination with the stories and is frustrated by the lack of seafood on the ship’s menu. When he finally delivers his lecture on “Fish and Culture,” the audience listens in polite silence. He is dull, insufferable, and bereft of imagination. He refuses to be transported by Caeneus’ narrative. His perceptions are out of joint with the other guests and he is totally clueless on the impact he has on those around him. Upon his return home, he starts a romance with his elderly neighbor. The novel ends with Haraldsson stroking the “whispering muse” he smuggled off the ship.

This is an unusual, light-hearted mingling of mythic elements, storytelling, and sea-faring yarns, all told through the voice of a self-absorbed, pedantic egoist. The translation flows smoothly and is very readable. The narrative is entertaining, but it lacks the gravitas and intensity of Sjón’s The Blue Fox.

Recommended.

Freedom Hospital: A Syrian Story

Hamid Sulaiman; translated by Francesca Barrie

Freedom Hospital: A Syrian Story by Hamid Sulaiman, translated by Francesca Barrie, is a graphic novel about the civil war raging in Syria. Inspired by his own experiences, Sulaiman blends fact with fiction to depict the bloody carnage and devastation caused by the conflict.

The novel opens with a brief biography of each of the characters. It is March 2012. Yasmin, a young Syrian, and her childhood friend, Sophie, a journalist of Syrian origin, are smuggled back to Syria. Yasmin has established Freedom Hospital, an underground Syrian hospital in the fictitious town of Houria in Northern Syria. Sophie is there to film a documentary about Freedom Hospital and its occupants.

Revealed periodically are back stories of each of the characters and how they came to be involved with the hospital. We witness their desperate struggle to save lives with the meager resources available. Meanwhile, the bombing continues unabated. The mounting death toll is disclosed every few days and printed at the top of the page as a recurring drum beat in the background. Also identified is the type of type of weapon used, whether gun, bomb, plane, or tank, as well as where it was manufactured. Sulaiman acknowledges he inserts footage from YouTube videos, photographs of demonstrations, excerpts from speeches, and propaganda slogans to pepper the text. And in the midst of the carnage, romance blossoms between a few of the characters.

The illustrations are rendered starkly in black and white. They resemble dark blotches and have a sketchy, hurried quality, perhaps to reinforce the dark, haphazard condition of the hospital, located in a dark place at a dark time. Some of the characters are drawn with only partial outlines, suggesting a corresponding loss of life and limb.

In his Postscript, Sulaiman admits he cobbled together bits and pieces of his own experiences and the experiences of people he knew. Unfortunately, this patchwork quality is evident. The characters are flat and never come alive. They function as mouth pieces, spouting slogans from one faction or the other. The dialogue is stilted and unrealistic. The narrative contains gaps and jumps around, disrupting the flow.

Sulaiman’s intent is to familiarize people with the complex, political situation in Syria; to render the diversity of characters involved in the civil war; and to show how extremists attempted to co-opt opposition to the Syrian government. He is to be applauded for wanting to shed light on a very tragic situation. But his execution, no doubt heartfelt and well-intentioned, is somewhat scanty and sporadic, qualities that may be attributed to the nature of the medium more than to anything else.

Recommended with reservations.

The Grass is Singing

Doris Lessing

The Grass is Singing by the 2007 Nobel Prize winner, Doris Lessing, is a scathing indictment of South Africa apartheid as revealed through the tragic lives of Mary and Dick Turner and Moses, their “house boy.” The novel opens with the newspaper announcement of Mary’s murder and Moses’ arrest. The novel then shifts back in time to reveal the events leading up to the murder.

Eager to escape her drunken father and embittered mother, Mary moves to the city where she leads a contented, financially independent life as a secretary. She is happy being a reliable, “sisterly” friend without romantic attachments or desires until she hits the age of thirty when she becomes focused on finding a husband. She marries the first man who asks her—Dick Turner, a farmer. She is shocked to discover the meager condition of his home and farm. Her restlessness transforms to anger when she learns of her husband’s incompetence in managing his affairs and his total inability to eke out a decent living. Anger soon transforms to disengagement and apathy. Her disappointment in life and abject loneliness coupled with an attraction and repulsion she feels toward Moses eventually leads to her total breakdown. The final chapter skillfully conveys her muddled mind as she struggles to discern what is real and what is imaginary.

Lessing sustains a relentless tone of impending doom throughout the novel. Every detail spells misery--from the intolerable heat; to the blinding sun; to the parched, unforgiving earth; to the incessant chirping of the cicadas; to Dick Turner’s yet another in a series of failed new ventures. The main focus, however, is on Mary. Plagued with unmitigated boredom, embarrassment at their poverty, loneliness, isolation, increasing estrangement from her husband, and the gradual erosion of her hope for a better future all contribute to the gradual deterioration of her mind.

Mary is far from being a sympathetic character. Her treatment of the black “house boys” and farm workers is despicable and arises from her gendered and racist socialization. She struggles to navigate an appropriate relationship between master and hired hand when Moses enters her life as her house boy, the same Moses she had whipped when he defied her in front of the other farm hands. Tormented by her action, Mary finds herself both attracted and repulsed by him. She dies without understanding the expectations placed on her as a white female and wife in a South Africa riddled with the racial tensions and injustices of apartheid.

Lessing casts an unflinching lens on the impact of apartheid on white and black races. She allows us access to Dick Turner’s mind and draws him with some sympathy. But she never allows entrance into the mind of Moses who remains a mystery. This may be an intentional strategy to capture the truism that whereas the survival of the slave/servant depends on his ability to know the mind of the master, the master can cultivate a willful indifference to the thoughts and feelings of those he has subordinated. We never learn Moses’ attitude toward Mary although he is shown to be solicitous toward her on occasion. Does he murder her because she represents a system that strips him of his humanity? To avenge himself for her cruelty? Because the balance of power has shifted and he now feels he has the upper hand? Or does he murder her because he witnesses her mental breakdown and wants to put her out of her misery? His motivation is never made clear. What we do know is Moses calmly surrenders to white authorities and seems to accept his fate with equanimity.

A very powerful, well-crafted novel that demonstrates Doris Lessing’s consummate skill as a writer. Her unflinching lens and immersive details expose the tragic, dehumanizing impact on oppressor and victim in a virulently unjust, brutal, exploitative, and racially segregated society. This is what happens, Lessing tells us, when you dehumanize another.

Highly recommended.

Beowulf

Translated by Maria Dahvana Headley

Maria Dahvana Headley’s opening salvo in her translation of Beowulf is the word “Bro!” This sets the stage for an irreverent, rollicking, electrifying, and astonishing translation unlike any we have seen before.

Headley has studied the poem extensively. Her goal was to render the poem as close to the spirit of its original form as possible. As she says in her extensive introduction, “The original reads, at least in some places, like Old English freestyle, and in others like a wedding toast of a drunk uncle who’s suddenly remembered a poem he memorized at boarding school.” She captures the rollicking spirit of the poem admirably, generating a work that is not so much a translation but a re-creation. Her goal was to create “a text that is as bubbly and juicy as I think it ought to feel.”

Headley smashes the sedate lines of previous translations with flashes of lightning. As she explains in her introduction, some of the Old English words are difficult to pin down in modern English. Just as previous translators have had to interpret and take liberties with the wording, Headley has had to do the same. Whenever possible, she opts for wording that conforms with the original temperament of the poem. For example, the word “hwaet,” which has been variously translated as “Listen,” “Hark,” “Lo,” she translates as “Bro!” She conceives it as the poet’s attempt to capture audience attention and as a form of masculinist coded language. She punctuates traditional, stately passages of sublime poetry with the occasional four-letter word and phrases currently inhabiting social media. For example, Wealhtheow admires Beowulf’s “brass balls.” Treasure is now “bling.” The watchman in Denmark initially confronts Beowulf with, “There’s a dress code! You’re denied.”

Headley perceives the narrator as “an old-timer at the end of the bar, periodically pounding his glass and demanding another.” He shouts to be heard in a mead hall of rowdy men falling over each other in a drunken stupor. He interrupts himself, comments on the action, engages in foreshadowing, and addresses the audience directly to retain attention. She argues his language is laced with satire as he interrogates definitions of masculinity with its concomitant heroic boasts and chest-thumping.

One of the more interesting aspects of Headley’s translation lies in her treatment of Grendel’s mother. She allows her the simultaneous qualities of a monster while retaining her human qualities as a mother experiencing overwhelming grief at the loss of her only child.

With its raucous rhymes, refreshing language pulsating with contemporary idioms, Headley successfully reclaims a thousand-year-old manuscript for today’s audience. She comes out swinging. This is definitely not your father’s Beowulf.

Very highly recommended for its originality, riotous fun, effusive temperament, and sheer audacity.

Apeirogon

Colum McCann

Apeirogon by Colum McCann is a mosaic of vignettes focusing on the Palestine-Israel conflict. The 1001 vignettes or chapters vary in length from one sentence to several pages. They tell the true story of the tragic deaths of two girls and how their real-life fathers crossed paths to forge an unlikely friendship. Their common grief acts as the transformative catalyst. They become vocal advocates for an end to the occupation through dialogue as the means to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

In 1997, Smadar, a thirteen-year-old Israeli girl, is killed when three suicide bombers blow themselves up in Jerusalem. Rami Elhanan, her father, is an Israeli Jew. About ten years later, Abir, a ten-year-old Palestinian girl, is shot dead with a rubber bullet by an Israeli border guard in East Jerusalem. She had crossed the street from school to buy some candy. Bassam Aramin, her father, is a Palestinian Muslim.

The story of Smadar and Abir, and of Rami and Bassam unfolds intermittently in a non-linear sequence of fragments. The gruesome details of the deaths of the young girls, their back stories, and the back stories of their families are revealed gradually and sandwiched between elements of fiction, quotations, anecdotes, insights, commentary, historical and religious explorations, information on bird migration, the Irish conflict, and various other miscellany. The novel is replete with symbolism that reverberates throughout the sections. The different threads, some of which initially appear as only tangentially connected to the main narrative, are stitched together, dropped, only to be picked up later.

The sections are numbered from 1 to 500, a middle section numbered 1001, followed by sections that reverse the numbering by beginning with 500 and concluding with section 1. The motion is circular and ends where it began with the wording of the final sentence varying slightly from the very first sentence. We are brought full circle. This circular structure reflects the activity of both fathers as are they are repeatedly called upon to tell and re-tell the story of their daughters. They dip in and out of the story, never willing or able to put it behind them. The fragmentary nature of the narrative also effectively replicates the trauma of losing a child since the pain of loss imposes itself on one’s consciousness, unbidden, interrupting the flow of thought at any time of the day or night.

This is not an easy novel to read. It contains graphic descriptions of torture, violence, and dismembered bodies. The heart-wrenching content, especially that which details the youth, innocence, and lost potential of the young girls, coupled with the fragmentary nature of the format make it a challenging read. Through its hybrid form and content, McCann has produced a multi-faceted perspective, an apeirogon with a countable infinite number of sides, which explores the issues surrounding one of the world’s most complex political conflicts. As Rami and Bassam demonstrate, although dialogue alone is insufficient in resolving the conflict, it is an essential first step in eradicating the de-humanization of the other, in generating empathy, and in dismantling the structural barriers which fuel the conflict.

A compelling novel that defies easy categorization but which leaves a lasting and profound impact. Very highly recommended.

Homeland Elegies

Ayad Akhtar

Homeland Elegies by Ayad Akhtar, the Pulitzer Prize winning author for drama, seamlessly blends memoir and fiction. Akhtar uses experiences from his life as the skeletal framework which he fleshes out with fact and fiction. Where the memoir ends and the fiction begins is impossible to discern. Ultimately, it makes no difference. What emerges from this brilliant hybrid of a novel is a raw, convincing, and gripping portrait of America and of life post 9/11 for an American born Muslim son of immigrants.

Unfolding in the first-person point of view, the narrator and author of the novel have much in common. Both are born in the U.S., are the sons of Pakistani immigrants, and are successful authors awarded the Pulitzer Prize for drama. But that is as far as we can go with the comparisons. We don’t know with any certainty when we slip from memoir to fiction or vice versa.

The novel reads like a memoir interspersed with a series of essays in which the narrator critiques American capitalism and its obsessive focus on materialism to the detriment of the health and well-being of society as a whole. Akhtar weaves history, political events, and real characters in his narrative to add to the confusing blend of reality versus fiction. His parents are successful doctors. His father embraces all things America, initially lending his whole-hearted support for Donald Trump. The narrator shares with his mother a more critical and nuanced perspective on all things America.

Although he was born in America and has lived all his life in America, the narrator experiences “othering” and bigotry as a Muslim person of color in a post 9/11 America. Those experiences, described in vivid and immersive detail, are chilling. His critique extends to fellow Muslims. He argues they have lost focus by adhering to rigid, fundamentalist thinking and by reacting to what others have said about their religion. He suggests they should deconstruct their own behaviors and attitudes and accept some measure of culpability for their failures instead of seeking to blame others.

The narrator’s voice is engaging, brutally honest, genuine, not always likable, and carries with it the appeal of self-disclosure. He struggles with identity. He experiences contradictions as an American born of immigrant parents. He interrogates the culture that victimizes him with its racism and bigotry. He feels the push and pull toward Islam and Muslims. He undergoes a temporary change in attitude when he experiences a moneyed lifestyle. He excoriates an America fragmented by race and class; the diminishing of its middle class; the lifetime of student debt; the unbridled greed of the health care industry; and the decline of critical thinking in education.

This combination of memoir and fiction delves deep and covers wide. It is unique, riveting, challenging, and compelling.

Highly recommended for its intensity, provocative thinking, originality of form, and sheer brilliance.

The Still Point

Amy Sackville

The Still Point by Amy Sackville is a powerful debut novel which skillfully weaves together two threads one hundred years apart but linked together by the same family.

One thread involves the escapades of a newly-married Edward Mackley who sets off to reach the North Pole. He never makes it there. He dies on the frozen tundra where his body is discovered sixty years later. Meanwhile, his young wife Emily puts her life on hold, waiting for his return. She waits and waits for Edward to come home.

The second thread involves Julia, Edward’s descendent. One hundred years after Edward’s disappearance, Julia inherits the family home. She is tasked with archiving the belongings of her illustrious ancestors. Julia lives in a fantasy world. She reads Edward’s diary discovered with his body. She reads Emily’s letters to Edward which were never sent. And she spins a vibrant fantasy about their love for each other. Julia goes through the motions of living in the present. But her fantasy constantly intrudes and she finds herself trekking with Edward through blizzards and ice or with Emily living in her brother-in-law’s home while waiting for a husband who never returns. While indulging her fantasies, Julia neglects her husband and her marriage because neither is able to live up to her romantic illusions. When a revelation about Emily punctures her fantasy, Julia finally adopts a realistic attitude toward love and marriage. The novel ends on a hopeful note of reconciliation in her marriage to Simon.

The two interlocking threads are skillfully woven together punctuated with the occasional dream narrative. Sackville dips in and out of each thread and time frame in prose that is lyrical, elegant, and soars like poetry. Her diction and detailed description evoke striking images of the polar landscape, of frost-bitten bodies, and of a house pregnant with relics from the past. Her characters are well-developed and portrayed sympathetically, their complexity revealed through their interactions and thoughts. The narrative shifts from past tense to present tense coupled with an occasional direct address to the reader create a sense of intimacy as she invites us to join her in observing her characters and exploring their surroundings.

The title of the novel, taken from T.S. Eliot’s poem Burnt Norton, conveys layers of meaning. It is the intersection of time where past and current generations meet. It is a house frozen in time, laden with artifacts, relics, documents, and paraphernalia of the past. It is the still point in time for Edward and his men as they trudge across a snow-covered landscape stretching as far as the eye can see, day after day, until time, itself, freezes. It is the still point for Emily who suspends the rest of her life waiting for Edward’s return. And it is the still point for Julia who puts life and marriage in abeyance while she relives the fantasy of Edward and Emily.

The strength of this novel lies in the stunning beauty of the narrative voice. Amy Sackville’s use of immersive detail, the poetry of her diction, her skillful shifts in narrative threads, and her ability to invite the reader to pause with her on a scene is masterful. While the narrative threads in and of themselves are compelling, it is in the telling of the story that Amy Sackville demonstrates her truly exceptional talent.

Very highly recommended.

The Wind That Lays Waste

Selva Almada; translated by Chris Andrews

The Wind That Lays Waste by Selva Almada, translated from the Spanish by Chris Andrews, is a short novel with a deceptively simple plot where it seems as if very little happens. The narrative describes the events of a single day.

Reverend Pearson, an evangelical preacher, is traveling across rural Argentina preaching the word of God to whoever is willing to listen. He travels with his daughter, Leni. After their car breaks down on a deserted highway, they are towed to the workshop of Gringo Brauer, a mechanic. Gringo lives with his assistant, a young boy named Tapioca.

While Gringo struggles to fix the reverend’s car, the characters interact with each other, gradually revealing intimate details about their lives and vulnerabilities. The two teenagers are both motherless. Leni has vague memories of her father abandoning her mother on the side of a road. Tapioca can barely remember his mother. She abandoned him with Gringo, claiming that he is the boy’s father. The reverend is fixated on saving souls and sets his eye on Tapioca as a suitable candidate for salvation. Gringo dismisses organized religion, believing nature is the best teacher and that a person’s action is all that matters. The tension gradually and imperceptibly builds between the two adults, culminating in a climax that coincides with a fierce thunder storm and torrential rain.

Almada has crafted a very tightly structured, taut novel where every word tells. Her prose is simple, direct, and lucid. She conveys the complexity of her characters, the dynamics of their relationships, their inner conflicts and flashbacks, and she does it all in language that is sparse but effective. Her images evoke a strong atmosphere—from the graveyard of broken cars and jagged metal paraphernalia, the sweat-stained clothes and sticky bodies, the stunted trees and thirsty soil, Gringo’s bouts of convulsive coughing, and Leni silently watching the two men fight as tears roll down her face.

This is a wonderful story, skillfully executed in vivid imagery and concise diction. The narrative is deceptively simple but it packs a powerful punch.

Highly recommended.

Broken Glass Park

Alina Bronsky; translated by Tim Mohr

Broken Glass Park by Alina Bronsky, translated from the German by Tim Mohr, unfolds in the first-person voice of Sascha Naimann, a seventeen-year-old Russian immigrant living in Germany. The tragic circumstances of her young life are gradually revealed. Her mother and mother’s boyfriend were murdered by Vadim, her mother’s former husband, leaving Sascha and her young step-siblings as orphans. Her step-father’s cousin, Maria, moves to Germany to take care of the children.

Sascha is forced to grow up quickly. She assumes responsibility for her siblings and acts as translator for Maria who cannot speak German. Her narrative is dotted with frequent flashbacks to her mother and Vadim—a despicable human being tormenting the family with physical, mental, and sexual abuse, culminating in his act of double murder. Sascha tries to make sense of why her mother tolerated him for as long as she did. She heaps piles of abuse on Vadim and conjures elaborate plans for murdering him when he is released from prison. Her plans are thwarted when she learns Vadim has committed suicide in his prison cell. The news causes Sascha to snap temporarily.

The narrative voice is initially strong. Sascha is intelligent, street-smart, tough, resilient, observant, and determined. She can also be funny, vulnerable, tender, compassionate, and fiercely protective of her younger siblings. But, above all, she is consumed with anger and rage. Her voice is engaging and convincing. But it begins to fall flat when she seems to fall in love with an older man and, for no apparent reason, sleeps with his son. She later sleeps with a complete stranger because he happens to share the same name as the man she ostensibly loves. Her romantic entanglements are confusing and aimless. As a consequence, her voice loses much of its strength and focus. Her story drifts into that of a lovelorn teenager. The plot becomes haphazard, lacking purpose, direction, and the urgency that characterized its opening pages.

This is Alina Bronsky’s debut novel. The writing is fast-paced, vigorous, and engaging. Bronsky’s talent lies in writing first-person narratives. She has an ability to create interesting, complex, and believable characters that generate sympathy. Although she is able to do so to some degree with Sascha, her skill is more finely honed in her subsequent novels where she is more successful in capturing voice and motivation and in tightening narrative structure and focus.

Recommended.

The Lambs of London

Peter Ackroyd

The Lambs of London by Peter Ackroyd is a fictional glimpse into the lives of Mary and Charles Lamb and their erstwhile friend, William Ireland. The setting is late 18th century, early 19th century London.

We meet the Lambs as adults. Charles spends his days at the office and his nights drinking at local pubs. Mary leads a cloistered life at home, relying on her brother for intellectual engagement and discussion. The novel’s beginning is promising in that it focuses on the Lambs. But then it veers toward William Ireland and his ostensible discovery of new works by Shakespeare. The shift to William Ireland, his fraught relationship with his father, his Shakespearean “discoveries,” and the quest for their authentication becomes the primary focus of the narrative, relegating Charles and Mary Lamb to the margins.

The novel is a quick and easy read and, as a work of fiction, its deviations from historical facts about the Lambs are irrelevant. The story line had potential. The relationship between Charles and Mary would have been fertile ground for exploration. Unfortunately, it is never fully developed. The characters, as a whole, are not fully realized. Mary is the most interesting character in the narrative. She is an intelligent, articulate woman suffocating under the social conventions of the time. Her predictable attachment to William in the narrative is subordinated in importance to his obsession with promoting his discoveries as the genuine works of Shakespeare. Why she descends into madness and murders her own mother is hinted at but, again, never fully explored. This, too, would have been fertile ground for greater development. Although William Ireland’s ostensible motivation to commit fraud is to earn his father’s approval, the extreme measures he takes to gain that approval are unconvincing. Even the title of the book is misleading as the focus is not so much on the Lambs as it is on William Ireland and the reception he receives for his ostensible discoveries.

The strength of the novel lies in its ability to evoke London at the turn of the century. The details are immersive. The muddy Thames, London’s bustling streets, its colorful street characters, and its pungent smells are captured in all their squalor and glory. The few glimpses of the Lambs and their excursions into literature are a delight. The novel held out promise, but its shift in focus from the Lambs to William Ireland diluted its potential.

Recommended with reservations.

Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States

James C. Scott

It has been generally believed that state formation was a consequence of the domestication of animals and plants. The theory was that when humans no longer had to hunt and gather food, they settled down in agricultural communities which eventually evolved into the modern state. In Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States, James C. Scott argues this is a false narrative. He proposes an alternative narrative for state formation based on more recent archaeological and historical evidence.

Focusing his analysis primarily in ancient Mesopotamia as the birthplace of the earliest state, Scott cites evidence showing sedentism and animal and plant domestication existed at least 4,000 years before the appearance of agricultural villages. The one did not give rise to the other. Instead, states materialized with the gradual emergence specifically of domesticated grain crops that required labor for planting and harvesting. Unlike other crops which grow underground, grain is visible, portable, storable, ripens at the same time, and, more significantly, is measurable for tax purposes. And with that comes the need for a large pool of laborers; hierarchically structured societies; tax collectors; city walls to prevent grain-theft by non-state dwellers (stigmatized as “barbarians),” and as a deterrence for a mass exodus of laborers.

Movement between sedentary and non-sedentary populations was fluid in either direction. Scott argues the shift to sedentary communities was not necessarily advantageous. Non-sedentary populations were mobile when they needed to be, ate a more diverse diet, and the dispersed nature of their communities impeded the rapid spread of disease. The more densely populated areas, especially those sharing living space with animals, were subject to the rapid spread of epidemics, viruses, and parasites; ate a diet poor in proteins consisting primarily of cereal grains. They were taxed, their movements restricted; and their labor exploited to serve the elite.

The study is full of fascinating insights, for example, while we domesticated animals and crops, they domesticated us as evidenced by the development of our husbandry skills; the “collapse” of states may simply mean population dispersion, not disappearance; the “barbarians” living outside of state control were healthier and happier than their sedentary counterparts; the birth rate of sedentary populations outstripped the nomadic birth rates in spite of their higher mortality rate; writing was invented to tabulate crop production and allocation; state formation was about intentional control over reproduction of crops, animals, and people; slave labor was essential to state formation; states were fragile entities vulnerable to crop devastation and the spread of disease among people and animals; states grew in size by absorbing more of the surrounding resources, displacing the neighboring population who either had to move further afield or be absorbed into the state.

This is a fascinating study articulating an alternative narrative for the shift from non-sedentary to sedentary populations and the consequences of the shift. Although a lay audience may require a dictionary for some of the technical terms, the effort is well worth it.

Highly recommended for those interested in the study of early populations and state formation.

Burnt Shadows

Kamila Shamsie

It is a saga of two families whose lives are inextricably intertwined. It is an epic tale sweeping across continents over a sixty-year period. Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie begins in Nagasaki on August 9, 1945; goes to India just before partition in 1947; to Pakistan in 1982-1983; and concludes in New York and Afghanistan in 2001-2002.

The central figure is Hiroko Tanaka, a Nagasaki resident. The novel opens with her as a twenty-one-year-old and engaged to a man of English and German descent. When the atomic bomb is dropped on Nagasaki, Hiroko loses her fiancé and her father. In addition to her emotional and psychological scars, Hiroko carries disfiguring burn scars on her back. Having lost everything in Nagasaki, she decides to make a clean break. She visits her fiancé’s half-sister, Elizabeth Weiss, who lives in India with her husband, James Burton. There she meets and marries Sajjad Ashraf, a Muslim employed by the Burtons. The partition in India forces the newly-weds to relocate temporarily to Istanbul then to Pakistan which they call home for nearly twenty years until Sajjad’s untimely death. Hiroko then relocates to New York to live with Elizabeth. The ties connecting the Tanakas, the Ashrafs, and the Burtons extend to their respective children, Henry Burton and Raza Ashraf, and to Henry’s daughter, Kim Burton.

Shamsie skillfully infuses the different time frames and locations with historical and political events. Through Hiroko’s eyes, we see Nagasaki in the aftermath of the atomic bomb. We see the escalating tensions in India between British colonists, Hindus, and Muslims. From neighboring Pakistan, we see Afghanistan’s armed struggle against Russian occupation. And in New York, we see the aftermath of 9/11.

Set against the backdrop of global conflicts over a period of nearly sixty years, this family saga wrestles with a number of complex issues. Scenes throughout reveal cross-cultural conflicts, racism, cultural understanding, cultural arrogance, ethnocentrism, loyalty, sacrifice, family, othering, betrayal, and the displacement of a civilian population. The four sections are seamlessly woven together with transitional passages to explain the leaps in time and location. The characters are unique, believable, and speak in authentic voices.

Shamsie’s portrayal of Hiroko is particularly effective. She emerges as independent, loving, strong, tender, adaptable, and the anchor which binds the narrative and families together. Her fluency in several languages illustrates how language facilitates understanding and appreciation of a culture. But fluency in languages and dialects can also have catastrophic consequences, as evidenced by Raza. Having inherited his mother’s language skills, Raza sets in motion a series of events which end tragically. Hiroko’s character also contrasts racism with acceptance of the other. When Kim Burton seeks understanding for reporting an Afghan Muslim to authorities solely on the basis of a shared religion with the 9/11 terrorists, Hiroko responds with, “Should I look at you and see Harry Truman?” Enough said.

A very powerful and compelling novel showing the impact of global conflicts on the lives of individuals. Told with compassion and sensitivity in immersive, riveting language.

Very highly recommended.