Scan barcode
kingeditor's review
5.0
If The Kingdom of This World were even a little bit longer, it would be unbearable. The misery of the plot and the sumptuousness of the prose would drive any reader either to despair or exhaustion. As it is, The Kingdom of This World is brimming but not overstuffed with some of the most baroque language, passionate struggles, and inhuman cruelty to ever fill a novel of such short length.
The title’s meaning is stated outright at the very end, but I feel that a reader could discern it from the opening pages, in which the decadence of the colonial ruling class is put on extravagant display. Decadence—material, cultural, and sexual—is what separates Earth from Heaven and is Alejo Carpentier’s obsession, along with musicology. Both are intertwined through the cycle of revolutions, as the classical European music of the oppressors gives way to the primal drum rhythms of the Haitian people who continuously overthrow them.
This motif of eternal recurrence, by which a new class (and skin color) of enslavers replaces the old, lends the novel a tone of overwhelming pessimism all the way until its last gasp. I won’t spoil it, but the main character, Ti Noel, has an epiphany about the prospects for mankind in the torturous injustice that is life on Earth. That this provides some semblance of catharsis for the reader yet not a corrective to the events they have just witnessed is not a discredit to Carpentier’s skill as a writer, only a testament to the colossal tragedy of Caribbean history.
The title’s meaning is stated outright at the very end, but I feel that a reader could discern it from the opening pages, in which the decadence of the colonial ruling class is put on extravagant display. Decadence—material, cultural, and sexual—is what separates Earth from Heaven and is Alejo Carpentier’s obsession, along with musicology. Both are intertwined through the cycle of revolutions, as the classical European music of the oppressors gives way to the primal drum rhythms of the Haitian people who continuously overthrow them.
This motif of eternal recurrence, by which a new class (and skin color) of enslavers replaces the old, lends the novel a tone of overwhelming pessimism all the way until its last gasp. I won’t spoil it, but the main character, Ti Noel, has an epiphany about the prospects for mankind in the torturous injustice that is life on Earth. That this provides some semblance of catharsis for the reader yet not a corrective to the events they have just witnessed is not a discredit to Carpentier’s skill as a writer, only a testament to the colossal tragedy of Caribbean history.
kbuchanan's review against another edition
4.0
This electric little book deals with the slave uprisings in Haiti at the beginning of the 19th century and the rise and fall of Henri Christophe, the country's first black king. The novel itself is an early and influential example of magical realism in its first form, and writers from Gabriel Garcia Márquez to Isabel Allende express indebtedness to it. Carpentier's writing is a firestorm: rich, bloody, and insistently poetic. This world is brutal and complex, showing us both the oppressive French colonial regime and its aftermath of a society run by the often cruel Henri Christophe. Given the novel's extremely short length, Carpentier gives us an impressive epic on a scale far grander than its brevity would suggest. From the early stirrings of revolution under the leadership of Mackandal to the downfall and looting of Sans-Souci palace, this novel opens up a whole world to explore, and one that was new to me. I was somewhat surprised, given the level of importance afforded this work, that I had never heard of this writer or this novel, originally published in 1949. It left me feeling the gaps in established literary canon acutely.
gettyhesse's review against another edition
4.0
One of the ur-texts of Latin American magical realism. Very dense, and hard to describe. I think I will have to re-read it to more fully grasp its meanings, its implications, its affects.
santiagokuc's review against another edition
5.0
“Padece, espera y trabaja para gentes que nunca conocerá, y a su vez padecerán, esperarán y trabajarán para otros que tampoco serán felices”
Excelente retrato de la primer colonia en independizarse, y cómo está fue siendo colonizada varias veces más hasta ser lo que es hoy. Haiti.
Excelente retrato de la primer colonia en independizarse, y cómo está fue siendo colonizada varias veces más hasta ser lo que es hoy. Haiti.
diznypixie's review
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.0
yanina's review against another edition
5.0
Recuerdo que cuando lo empecé a leer no me convencía, pero me alegro de haber insistido. Simplemente, me encantó.
pierreikonnikov's review against another edition
4.0
A good book, a noble book, but not a great book. The author posits hierarchies are the way of nature, and revolutions are just that: they revolve, the low become high and back again to low, power is defeated by power, and even the geese have social strata. The problem with the book is it is conceit without story, and there is no driving narrative that resolves. As such it is more a series of tableaux, not dissimilar to Candide, but the subtitle here would be the opposite to Voltaire's. The author presents a world in which man is doomed to continue struggling against power forever, and history bears this hypothesis out. Trouble is, he also forgot to include a decent story in there too.
bettinathenomad's review against another edition
3.0
Enjoyable, but a bit short to really dive into the characters. Read the full review on my blog: http://wp.me/p1gPfH-6e