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3.82 AVERAGE
3.82 AVERAGE
Great concepts and potential for a great story, but severely hampered by writing and execution.
I'm personally not partial to novella-length books comprised of "poetic" vignettes, though I think this has come into fashion in literature lately. But taste aside, I think my main issue was the writing was often not writing so much as explaining. Maybe that's due to the translation, but it was like reading a barrage of statements telling me how I should interpret what's happening.
Like, we have some ground psychological, social, or historical truth that Diop wants us to get at. Take the opening one, for example, that Alfa should have put humanity above duty and killed Mademba when he asked. This has all the potential to be a stunning, horrifying, and cathartic realization about everything you knew about the life you have constructed for yourself and what you thought it meant to be a good person, but it's not written like that. It's literally just told to you explicitly in the first few pages of the story while you know very little about either character: "I was not humane with Mademba, my more-than-brother, my childhood friend. I let duty make my choice... I was not human." And then this lesson is repeatedly explained over and over in the next few pages with slightly different variants.
I'm not saying that "show don't tell" is a universal facet of good writing; I think telling can be very Profound and Useful and Sometimes Better than Showing. But this was just like, All Telling, and not particularly inspired Telling at that. The first half reads like a long-winded, neurotic internal monologue, and was very difficult to get through. The environment was horrifying and graphic (the trenches, the hands) but their effect was basically anesthetized by the monologuing/explaining. If you'd asked me to rate the first 75 pages of this book we were looking at some 1-star energy.
However, story improved a lot in the second half, when it became dominated more by flashbacks. The contrast between Alfa's old life and what's left of him after the war, his beauty and where that beauty has gotten him, the loss of his mother and how that "sealed" his brain. The dreams he and Mademba had for what the war could do for them, vs. what it's actually become. The agony of French colonization renders itself in more subtle and somehow more devastating forms. It just became way more compelling, and there was a reduction in explaining.
And the reveal of Mademba's perspective at the end was impressive. But again, I don't think it was necessary to explicitly explain to the reader that we are reading from Mademba's perspective in these "out of body" sections. It's the kind of guess that the reader would make on their own anyway, and feel all the more devastating because they made that leap on their own / a little ambiguity goes a long way.
I'm personally not partial to novella-length books comprised of "poetic" vignettes, though I think this has come into fashion in literature lately. But taste aside, I think my main issue was the writing was often not writing so much as explaining. Maybe that's due to the translation, but it was like reading a barrage of statements telling me how I should interpret what's happening.
Like, we have some ground psychological, social, or historical truth that Diop wants us to get at. Take the opening one, for example, that Alfa should have put humanity above duty and killed Mademba when he asked. This has all the potential to be a stunning, horrifying, and cathartic realization about everything you knew about the life you have constructed for yourself and what you thought it meant to be a good person, but it's not written like that. It's literally just told to you explicitly in the first few pages of the story while you know very little about either character: "I was not humane with Mademba, my more-than-brother, my childhood friend. I let duty make my choice... I was not human." And then this lesson is repeatedly explained over and over in the next few pages with slightly different variants.
I'm not saying that "show don't tell" is a universal facet of good writing; I think telling can be very Profound and Useful and Sometimes Better than Showing. But this was just like, All Telling, and not particularly inspired Telling at that. The first half reads like a long-winded, neurotic internal monologue, and was very difficult to get through. The environment was horrifying and graphic (the trenches, the hands) but their effect was basically anesthetized by the monologuing/explaining. If you'd asked me to rate the first 75 pages of this book we were looking at some 1-star energy.
However, story improved a lot in the second half, when it became dominated more by flashbacks. The contrast between Alfa's old life and what's left of him after the war, his beauty and where that beauty has gotten him, the loss of his mother and how that "sealed" his brain. The dreams he and Mademba had for what the war could do for them, vs. what it's actually become. The agony of French colonization renders itself in more subtle and somehow more devastating forms. It just became way more compelling, and there was a reduction in explaining.
And the reveal of Mademba's perspective at the end was impressive. But again, I don't think it was necessary to explicitly explain to the reader that we are reading from Mademba's perspective in these "out of body" sections. It's the kind of guess that the reader would make on their own anyway, and feel all the more devastating because they made that leap on their own / a little ambiguity goes a long way.
2.5/5
i get the booker prize and all, but this just wasn’t for me
i get the booker prize and all, but this just wasn’t for me
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
A haunting depiction of grief and the horrors of the First World War. Unique in terms of exploring the experience of Senegalese infantrymen and in the writing style itself. Moves at a good pace and stays with you long after you've finished. Would recommend
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence
for once I find myself agreeing with the selected quotes from other readers on the front of a book. 145 pages which will stay with me for a very long time.
I think, without going into the story, many have below, what struck me was the rhythm of the writing, the use of repetition, in places for different characters, the telling of the story through the eyes of the main character. And also how despite this being a translation it felt like it had been written in English.
I think, without going into the story, many have below, what struck me was the rhythm of the writing, the use of repetition, in places for different characters, the telling of the story through the eyes of the main character. And also how despite this being a translation it felt like it had been written in English.
Video review https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJ9VifUiPLM
dark
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I feel like this book lends itself to being read in one or two sittings to give its decent in to madness true impact, but that does mean it’s repetitive prose begins to grate a little.
adventurous
challenging
dark
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Zanim po nią sięgnęłam usłyszałam, że to „specyficzna rzecz” i jak najbardziej się z tym zgadzam.
To pełna niepokoju i mroczna historia.
To historia o oddaniu, przyjaźni, braterstwie, rodzinie i wojnie.
O piekle jakim jest wojna. O piekle jakie pojawia się w naszej głowie po stracie kogoś najbliższego. O piekle z jakim trzeba sobie radzić.
Nie jest to łatwa i przyjemna lektura, ale zdecydowanie daje do myślenia.
To pełna niepokoju i mroczna historia.
To historia o oddaniu, przyjaźni, braterstwie, rodzinie i wojnie.
O piekle jakim jest wojna. O piekle jakie pojawia się w naszej głowie po stracie kogoś najbliższego. O piekle z jakim trzeba sobie radzić.
Nie jest to łatwa i przyjemna lektura, ale zdecydowanie daje do myślenia.