A review by mariebrunelm
Babel: An Arcane History by R.F. Kuang

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

A warning, first: no amount of gushing can do justice to this masterpiece.
Babel feels like the ultimate book. It’s captivating, thought-provoking, moving, beautiful, intricate but not complex. It was the perfect book for me at this moment of my life and I’m just happy to have read it, and sad that it’s over. It was probably the most hyped book of 2022 and 2023, which is why I took my time before starting it. Also because I couldn’t find a copy when it came out in 2022 and I was in Oxford, so I waited a year to come back and buy the paperback. I’m that kind of person. But back to the book.
Its narrative starts out deceptively classically, although the focus is put very early on the many types of violence enacted by colonialism. Babel is at its heart a bildungsroman, which is a genre I’m getting a little fed up with, except when it’s done brilliantly. We meet Robin Swift, born in Canton and soon taken from his dying relatives to be raised in England by a benefactor that is determined to help Robin enrol at Babel, the Royal Institute of Translation. And so Robin is fed languages, is encouraged to keep practising his native Chinese language, and despite the ambient racism, gets entry at Oxford’s prestigious institution, where he slowly learns about silver and the translation-based magic that underlines every aspect of English life. He also learns about friendship and trust with his cohort, three other students cherry-picked to make their way up Babel’s eight floors. And little by little, he learns about the less savoury side of this grand English endeavour. How colonialism preys on foreign cultures and peoples, how everything is linked in a web of privilege and racism.
This novel is as brilliant and mind-opening as it is crystal-clear. It relies heavily on the research the author made and the knowledge she acquired as an Oxford student herself, but all this treasure of information, part fiction, part revolting facts, is handed out to the readers through an engaging narrative with characters you’d give the world to, and through a scattering of footnotes that delighted me highly. It is a deep dive in the mechanics of colonial violence through the veneer of dark academia, a genre which thrives the most when it addresses the privileges surrounding who has access to knowledge and who gets to write the books from which knowledge is acquired.
There are other parts I could go on and on about but they’re spoiler-territory so I’ll refrain.
Tldr; this book was catnip to me, and yes, I cried at the end.
CW : racism, colonialism, suicide ideation, suicide, police violence, gun violence.
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