Scan barcode
A review by estanceveyrac
Our Violent Ends by Chloe Gong
5.0
Very good! Same complaint about the use of untranslated text, without bottom pages to provide the translation.
I especially mind the romanization of the Russian, pinyin at least has fixed rules & it's only a few words so it's obvious what is being said, there is only some doubt for names, but the Russian is romanized differently in French & in English, so the English romanisation hurts my brain.
I do believe English language publishing house should change their practices to start using bottow page notes more widely, so that there is no need to repeat in English only for the reader's benefit & not for the plot. Bottom page notes !
It is strange to see all the characters who don't become Communists. Those were peak years to join the Communists, info about the horrors of Lenin's regime were barely getting out, so it makes very little sense to me that people would not buy into collectivism, solidarity & equality, that they would be apathetic to it. I don't know, it was a time of hope for most people, you would think at least some of the people in the book would see the beauty of that movement, of that hope. I feel maybe the recollection is tainted by what happened afterwards, so people forget how it was then, before, when theere was hope for a real revolution of the people... The Communists are not given a kind role in this duology, we will see what comes next...
I especially mind the romanization of the Russian, pinyin at least has fixed rules & it's only a few words so it's obvious what is being said, there is only some doubt for names, but the Russian is romanized differently in French & in English, so the English romanisation hurts my brain.
I do believe English language publishing house should change their practices to start using bottow page notes more widely, so that there is no need to repeat in English only for the reader's benefit & not for the plot. Bottom page notes !
It is strange to see all the characters who don't become Communists. Those were peak years to join the Communists, info about the horrors of Lenin's regime were barely getting out, so it makes very little sense to me that people would not buy into collectivism, solidarity & equality, that they would be apathetic to it. I don't know, it was a time of hope for most people, you would think at least some of the people in the book would see the beauty of that movement, of that hope. I feel maybe the recollection is tainted by what happened afterwards, so people forget how it was then, before, when theere was hope for a real revolution of the people... The Communists are not given a kind role in this duology, we will see what comes next...