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tornadox 's review for:
Hiddensee: A Tale of the Once and Future Nutcracker
by Gregory Maguire
Lovely rich novel about the transmission of culture, primarily through the oral tradition. Memories and stories change over time and storyteller. The reader is at a (dis)advantage because they can refer back to the "truths" laid down in a fixed medium. I wonder about the different per/reception of this novel by people who listened to the audio book.
A story about the personal history of a storyteller, who mostly tells other people's stories. It is odd reading about a character who relies so much on sound in a fixed medium. The mentions and description of Bach and Chopin made me want to listen to them immediately. I tried putting them on the background, but they distracted me too much from the words.
Did have some quibbles, mainly with how dialect was only glancingly addressed. Every mountain and valley in the Alps has its own version of German; people would be able to figure out your history just by listening to you speak (kind of like how each borough of New York has its own accent.) Oh wait, that is probably how Pfaffer Johannes identified Dirk's parents.
TL;DR: Loved it, want to write a 100 page thesis about it.
A story about the personal history of a storyteller, who mostly tells other people's stories. It is odd reading about a character who relies so much on sound in a fixed medium. The mentions and description of Bach and Chopin made me want to listen to them immediately. I tried putting them on the background, but they distracted me too much from the words.
Did have some quibbles, mainly with how dialect was only glancingly addressed. Every mountain and valley in the Alps has its own version of German; people would be able to figure out your history just by listening to you speak (kind of like how each borough of New York has its own accent.) Oh wait, that is probably how Pfaffer Johannes identified Dirk's parents.
TL;DR: Loved it, want to write a 100 page thesis about it.