Scan barcode
A review by gmrickel
The Republic of Imagination: America in Three Books by Azar Nafisi
2.0
I wish I had read this with a pen in hand rather than listening to the audiobook. The audio was great, and there is a lot I would have enjoyed deconstructing in the margins had I read it the old fashioned way.
Some thoughts that I can remember: part one is a moving read that profiles a friendship as much as it does literature. You won’t be able to help thinking about your best friend, loss, grief, and how to honor friendship when you read this section. AND this is the section that focuses on Huck Finn so she weighs in on the n-word debate. Her quotes from Huck Finn were often ones that included the n-word. All of this made me uncomfortable.
The remaining parts gave me the distinct impression that Nafisi wouldn’t be on team “stay in your lane” when it comes to writing the other. She doesn’t bring up publishing at all in her analysis, she is focused on reading and occasionally ventures into writing. Leaving out publishing is kind of a big deal! It’s not JUST about why/what people want to write/read, it’s also about the power dynamics inherent in publishing. There is one anecdote that has Baldwin telling his publisher to fuck off when they told him to write for black audiences, but she uses this to point out how writers can write whatever because it’s about the “human experience” rather than talking about why a publisher would ask that.
Her analysis of TWs is incomplete as it doesn’t bring up the difference between acknowledging trauma versus completely removing material to “avoid” trauma. Her view is basically life isn’t safe, there are no safe spaces, literature can help teach you (not harm you), those who need these things are “sissies”. Within her response to TWs for college campus class materials she is going through a document that lists various isms, including cissexism, and says “I don’t even know what cissexism is!” All I could think was, you don’t have access to the Internet? You’re just gonna bash on all this and not bother to do real research first?
There were some thought nuggets I enjoyed and loved, and there were many I found to be problematic. Well written, I mostly just didn’t agree with her.
Some thoughts that I can remember: part one is a moving read that profiles a friendship as much as it does literature. You won’t be able to help thinking about your best friend, loss, grief, and how to honor friendship when you read this section. AND this is the section that focuses on Huck Finn so she weighs in on the n-word debate. Her quotes from Huck Finn were often ones that included the n-word. All of this made me uncomfortable.
The remaining parts gave me the distinct impression that Nafisi wouldn’t be on team “stay in your lane” when it comes to writing the other. She doesn’t bring up publishing at all in her analysis, she is focused on reading and occasionally ventures into writing. Leaving out publishing is kind of a big deal! It’s not JUST about why/what people want to write/read, it’s also about the power dynamics inherent in publishing. There is one anecdote that has Baldwin telling his publisher to fuck off when they told him to write for black audiences, but she uses this to point out how writers can write whatever because it’s about the “human experience” rather than talking about why a publisher would ask that.
Her analysis of TWs is incomplete as it doesn’t bring up the difference between acknowledging trauma versus completely removing material to “avoid” trauma. Her view is basically life isn’t safe, there are no safe spaces, literature can help teach you (not harm you), those who need these things are “sissies”. Within her response to TWs for college campus class materials she is going through a document that lists various isms, including cissexism, and says “I don’t even know what cissexism is!” All I could think was, you don’t have access to the Internet? You’re just gonna bash on all this and not bother to do real research first?
There were some thought nuggets I enjoyed and loved, and there were many I found to be problematic. Well written, I mostly just didn’t agree with her.