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A review by foggy_rosamund
The Winged Histories by Sofia Samatar
4.0
The four parts of this novel are each told by a different woman. Their narratives interconnect, and sometimes directly interact with one another, but they each give a different perspective on one subject: civil war in the imaginary country of Olondria. The novel deliberately shows us the perspective of different women in a mainly patriarchal society so that it can ask the reader to consider women's role in war and in written history in our own world.
I reread this book's companion, "A Stranger in Olondria", shortly before I read this, so I couldn't help making comparisons. I do not think it is necessary to read one of these books first, because they tell different stories, though they occur around the same time. One of the strongest sections in "A Stronger in Olondria", is told from the perspective of Jissavet, an illiterate woman far from her home, who tells her own story to the protagonist of the novel. The writing of her section is vivid, full of details, and elliptical, wandering back and forth between moments of Jissavet's life that she found particularly vital or charged. This section is immersive and compelling. The majority of "The Winged Histories" is written in exactly this style: full of details of vivid memories that evoke the feelings of loss, full of repeated words and themes. It wanders away from the story into the protagonists' memories and pasts, and returns us to the narrative feeling their loss and nostalgia. Writing this intense must be very hard to sustain, but for the most part, I felt it worked. From time to time I felt Samatar gave too many repetitions or wandered too far, but generally I was hooked.
Samatar is not overly concerned with plot. We hear about most of the events only as they are reported. The main characters frequently are not there for them, or observe them from a distance. Again, I feel this is deliberate: women are frequently denied a place at the forefront of the action, and so are left wondering, and desperate for news. However, at times Samatar does have female characters at the centre of action, but at these times she usually doesn't write their story directly but against tells it after the fact, which can be frustrating for the reader and made me feel that her characters are sometimes denied agency.
The lack of plot, however, didn't impact on my engagement with this book much at all. Each character, and their personal history, is richly drawn and given space. We see Seren, the nomad, and learn about her people's culture and song, and we meet Tav, the soldier, and we watch as they learn to love one another. Then we have Siski, socialite and lover of the king, who gets just as much narrative space as more dynamic characters, and whose inner world is wonderfully rendered by Samatar. Perhaps the most difficult character is Tialon, whose father was the powerful Priest of the Stone, and who has been deemed a heretic during the civil war. Tialon's narrative takes place while she is locked in her room by soldiers, and when she is powerless. But she has been powerless for most of her life, and we see her grapple with her lack of agency, and her longing for some form of kindness. She is given hope of a happy ending, and this, Samatar's refusal to abandon her characters to grief, is something I found winning and almost revolutionary.
These two novels could be compared with Borges at his best, or Italo Calvino's "Invisible Cities". They are told in gripping, original prose, that should remain part of our literature for a long time, and even when Samatar's prose fails to do what she wants, it is still interesting and worthwhile. I would recommend both these books without question.
I reread this book's companion, "A Stranger in Olondria", shortly before I read this, so I couldn't help making comparisons. I do not think it is necessary to read one of these books first, because they tell different stories, though they occur around the same time. One of the strongest sections in "A Stronger in Olondria", is told from the perspective of Jissavet, an illiterate woman far from her home, who tells her own story to the protagonist of the novel. The writing of her section is vivid, full of details, and elliptical, wandering back and forth between moments of Jissavet's life that she found particularly vital or charged. This section is immersive and compelling. The majority of "The Winged Histories" is written in exactly this style: full of details of vivid memories that evoke the feelings of loss, full of repeated words and themes. It wanders away from the story into the protagonists' memories and pasts, and returns us to the narrative feeling their loss and nostalgia. Writing this intense must be very hard to sustain, but for the most part, I felt it worked. From time to time I felt Samatar gave too many repetitions or wandered too far, but generally I was hooked.
Samatar is not overly concerned with plot. We hear about most of the events only as they are reported. The main characters frequently are not there for them, or observe them from a distance. Again, I feel this is deliberate: women are frequently denied a place at the forefront of the action, and so are left wondering, and desperate for news. However, at times Samatar does have female characters at the centre of action, but at these times she usually doesn't write their story directly but against tells it after the fact, which can be frustrating for the reader and made me feel that her characters are sometimes denied agency.
The lack of plot, however, didn't impact on my engagement with this book much at all. Each character, and their personal history, is richly drawn and given space. We see Seren, the nomad, and learn about her people's culture and song, and we meet Tav, the soldier, and we watch as they learn to love one another. Then we have Siski, socialite and lover of the king, who gets just as much narrative space as more dynamic characters, and whose inner world is wonderfully rendered by Samatar. Perhaps the most difficult character is Tialon, whose father was the powerful Priest of the Stone, and who has been deemed a heretic during the civil war. Tialon's narrative takes place while she is locked in her room by soldiers, and when she is powerless. But she has been powerless for most of her life, and we see her grapple with her lack of agency, and her longing for some form of kindness. She is given hope of a happy ending, and this, Samatar's refusal to abandon her characters to grief, is something I found winning and almost revolutionary.
These two novels could be compared with Borges at his best, or Italo Calvino's "Invisible Cities". They are told in gripping, original prose, that should remain part of our literature for a long time, and even when Samatar's prose fails to do what she wants, it is still interesting and worthwhile. I would recommend both these books without question.