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3.51 AVERAGE
3.51 AVERAGE
Finishing Ship of Fools took me approximately an age. Porter is undeniably a talented writer, but never was a book so aptly named: every character in it was one kind of idiot or other. After 500 pages, I liked some of them even less than when I started. Maybe that’s why it took me so long to read it; if there isn’t at least one character with whom to sympathize, it’s difficult to care about what happens next. At the same time, however, I do recognize that her insights into human nature are extremely valuable: we all *are* some kind of idiot or other. The subtle (at first) hatred between Christian and Jew was eye-opening; suddenly I saw how it must have been terribly easy to fall into that trap unawares in German daily life of the 1930s. All in all, Ship of Fools is a good piece of literature, if an unlovable one.
dark
reflective
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Well written and engaging, but not my cup of tea. Read it as part of a reading challenge. If you like character novels, this one is very good.
dark
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
A novel that took her over twenty years to write, 'Ship of Fools' is a large sprawling thing with many characters (you will be grateful for the passenger manifest at the beginning) and has a grand ambition to illustrate the world in the early 1930s in the form of a group of people on an ocean liner en route to Germany from Veracruz.
All of the people on board are guilty, with the possible exception of the mostly faceless, nameless people in steerage. But even they allow themselves to be herded from one destination to another, taking down the few who would thumb their noses at authority. In first class the passengers gravitate to groups or (in the case of a lone Jewish seller of Catholic furnishings) isolation, if sometimes unwillingly. They go along, they make the motions, they shrug off unpleasantness. The passengers in first class from the whimsical American artist Jenny to the unsavory racist Herr Rieber appear almost equally, by the end of the voyage, complicit in the shape the uncertain future is taking.
Jenny, the American divorcée Mrs. Treadwell (who I see as Porter herself), and the homely, unhappy Elsa are where most of my sympathies lay while reading, but the way narrative shifted it was possible to see them as others saw them, and most importantly, Porter gave them ample time for self-criticism and doubt. Even while they acknowledge what they're doing, they get in the way of their own happiness. Porter exactly describes those strong, temporary ties experienced by a group of people who must keep each other's company for a long period.
Some characters, particularly the Spanish dance/prostitution troupe, were given no leeway for positive action. The twins Ric and Rac are the best sociopathic children I've read since 'A High Wind in Jamaica '.I don't think 'Ship of Fools' is as universal an allegory as Porter was hoping for, but the book can be very funny and shocking, has a trove of well-drawn characters and scenes, and is certainly worth the attention it demands.
All of the people on board are guilty, with the possible exception of the mostly faceless, nameless people in steerage. But even they allow themselves to be herded from one destination to another, taking down the few who would thumb their noses at authority. In first class the passengers gravitate to groups or (in the case of a lone Jewish seller of Catholic furnishings) isolation, if sometimes unwillingly. They go along, they make the motions, they shrug off unpleasantness. The passengers in first class from the whimsical American artist Jenny to the unsavory racist Herr Rieber appear almost equally, by the end of the voyage, complicit in the shape the uncertain future is taking.
Jenny, the American divorcée Mrs. Treadwell (who I see as Porter herself), and the homely, unhappy Elsa are where most of my sympathies lay while reading, but the way narrative shifted it was possible to see them as others saw them, and most importantly, Porter gave them ample time for self-criticism and doubt. Even while they acknowledge what they're doing, they get in the way of their own happiness. Porter exactly describes those strong, temporary ties experienced by a group of people who must keep each other's company for a long period.
Some characters, particularly the Spanish dance/prostitution troupe, were given no leeway for positive action. The twins Ric and Rac are the best sociopathic children I've read since 'A High Wind in Jamaica '.I don't think 'Ship of Fools' is as universal an allegory as Porter was hoping for, but the book can be very funny and shocking, has a trove of well-drawn characters and scenes, and is certainly worth the attention it demands.
It's a long book, and some of the philosophical bits are a bit tedious to get through, but I still liked it, for what it was.
There were a lot of characters to keep track of throughout, but it did feel like you were in each of their heads as the perspective switched. The writing would shift so well, portraying each person's thoughts and feelings, so I felt like their true character came through.
I did feel like the story petered out a little, especially towards the end, with regards to the gala, but it also felt true to what such a long voyage would be like.
There were a lot of characters to keep track of throughout, but it did feel like you were in each of their heads as the perspective switched. The writing would shift so well, portraying each person's thoughts and feelings, so I felt like their true character came through.
I did feel like the story petered out a little, especially towards the end, with regards to the gala, but it also felt true to what such a long voyage would be like.
The year is 1931, and the action of the book takes place on or within sight of the Vera, a ship departing from Veracruz, Mexico for Europe, with its ultimate destination being Bremerhaven, Germany. The majority of the upper-deck passengers are German, as is the crew, and we follow along with quite a number of the people aboard. Among the Germans, we have an alcoholic professor and his long-suffering wife, a timid woman recently widowed (she is returning to Germany with her husband's body, in fact), a hunchback, a Jew, and an old dying man who is being angrily cared for by his nephew. Of other nationalities, there are Cuban students, a Spanish company of dancers, a disgraced Spanish Contessa who is being transported as a prisoner, an uncouth American man, an 18-year-old Swiss girl made miserable by her parents, and a couple of Americans who have been living together in Mexico and spend most the voyage arguing over where they should go next. At first, the array of characters is a little dizzying, and there is a useful list of everyone at the front of the book, including who they are cabin-mates with. Eventually though, you get to know them and their personalities.
Wikipedia says, "The ship of fools is an allegory that has long been a fixture in Western literature and art. The allegory depicts a vessel populated by human inhabitants who are deranged, frivolous, or oblivious passengers aboard a ship without a pilot, and seemingly ignorant of their own direction." And indeed, deranged, frivolous and oblivious are apt descriptors for the passengers of the Vera. A passage where a character thinks, "You might learn something about one or two persons, if you took the time and trouble, but there was not time enough and it was not worth the trouble..." clearly extends beyond the confines of the ship to castigate the world at large for its indifference. As humans, we are often careless with each other and too self-involved to see the consequences our actions (or more often inactions) are likely to have, and the undercurrents that shaped World War II are apparent in passengers' attitudes and in events on board. Generalizations and assumptions based on nationality and appearances run rampant; few are challenged or corrected through the course of the book.
I'm not usually a big fan of allegory, as I often find it heavy-handed, and this book is no exception. I was interested in a number of the characters and quite liked the close quarters as a means for forcing confrontation, but I found the overall effect to be ponderous as your choices in reading didactically are between a story that doesn't really go anywhere (even though the ship does) and being preached to.
Recommended for: fans of Orwell's Animal Farm, people who believe Lord of the Flies tells the truth about human nature, non-claustrophobes, anyone who thinks "hell is other people."
Quote: "We will go on for a while, and it will be worse and worse, and we will say and do more and more outrageous things to each other, and one day we will strike the final death-giving blows. There is nowhere to go back and begin again with this...there is no place to go. The past is never where you think you left it: you are not the same person you were yesterday -- oh where did David go, I wonder? The place you are going towards doesn't exist yet, you must build it when you come to the right spot."
Wikipedia says, "The ship of fools is an allegory that has long been a fixture in Western literature and art. The allegory depicts a vessel populated by human inhabitants who are deranged, frivolous, or oblivious passengers aboard a ship without a pilot, and seemingly ignorant of their own direction." And indeed, deranged, frivolous and oblivious are apt descriptors for the passengers of the Vera. A passage where a character thinks, "You might learn something about one or two persons, if you took the time and trouble, but there was not time enough and it was not worth the trouble..." clearly extends beyond the confines of the ship to castigate the world at large for its indifference. As humans, we are often careless with each other and too self-involved to see the consequences our actions (or more often inactions) are likely to have, and the undercurrents that shaped World War II are apparent in passengers' attitudes and in events on board. Generalizations and assumptions based on nationality and appearances run rampant; few are challenged or corrected through the course of the book.
I'm not usually a big fan of allegory, as I often find it heavy-handed, and this book is no exception. I was interested in a number of the characters and quite liked the close quarters as a means for forcing confrontation, but I found the overall effect to be ponderous as your choices in reading didactically are between a story that doesn't really go anywhere (even though the ship does) and being preached to.
Recommended for: fans of Orwell's Animal Farm, people who believe Lord of the Flies tells the truth about human nature, non-claustrophobes, anyone who thinks "hell is other people."
Quote: "We will go on for a while, and it will be worse and worse, and we will say and do more and more outrageous things to each other, and one day we will strike the final death-giving blows. There is nowhere to go back and begin again with this...there is no place to go. The past is never where you think you left it: you are not the same person you were yesterday -- oh where did David go, I wonder? The place you are going towards doesn't exist yet, you must build it when you come to the right spot."
Katherine Anne Porter's long novel Ship of Fools modernizes the old Christian allegory to trace the roots of Nazism. It doesn't take more than 100 pages to understand the point of the book, it continues on for 400 pages as the ship slowly makes its way from Argentina to Europe.
Porter took her inspiration for the novel from her first sea voyage from Mexico to Germany. She took the trip in 1931 and wrote a long letter describing her fellow passengers with the hope of turning it into a short story.
Except for Ship of Fools, Porter was a writer of short stories and it shows in the novel. The book is made up of a series of very short scenes and they often read more like a series of connected short stories than as a single novel. All of that starting and stopping made it difficult to read at my usual speed an worked against my enjoyment of it.
The book was adapted into a film in 1965 which is in my queue.
Porter took her inspiration for the novel from her first sea voyage from Mexico to Germany. She took the trip in 1931 and wrote a long letter describing her fellow passengers with the hope of turning it into a short story.
Except for Ship of Fools, Porter was a writer of short stories and it shows in the novel. The book is made up of a series of very short scenes and they often read more like a series of connected short stories than as a single novel. All of that starting and stopping made it difficult to read at my usual speed an worked against my enjoyment of it.
The book was adapted into a film in 1965 which is in my queue.
One of those parts are greater than the sum books
Other people in this house are probably glad I'm finally finished this and will stop reading passages out loud to them.
I adored this and pox on those who don't want to get with a 700 page novel with no plot! Savage, delicious details - keen characterisations.
I adored this and pox on those who don't want to get with a 700 page novel with no plot! Savage, delicious details - keen characterisations.
I liked it because I like stories about sea voyages, but not a very happy book.