archytas 's review for:

This Mournable Body by Tsitsi Dangarembga

3.5

challenging dark reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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I liked the second of Dangarembga's trilogy a lot less than the first, and rather stupidly assumed the auhor had not realised how unlikeable her protagonist had become. It is clear in the brilliant, but difficult, This Mournable Body that Dangarembga is very clear on how unpleasant Tambu is - the use of a sharp, claustrophobic second person forces the reader to walk with her through decisions that are often selfish and yet self-destructive all at the same time. There is no space from Tambu, no easy capacity to coolly judge her, and yet no way not to be constantly judging her at the same time. In a world with increasingly critiques of colonialism featuring loveable, idealistic and caring protagonists, Tambu sits as an anomaly. I can admire this, in many ways. The book challenges our assumptions about who deserves compassion, and what the impact of colonialism is. In one telling passage: "You grow increasingly galled by your cousin and her assumption that everyone has the luxury she has of surviving without being obsessed with one’s own person."

Nevertheless, the first half, following her slide into desperation fuelled by infuriating decisions, I simply hate reading. Around the middle of the book, when the story becomes more linear and the plot less telegraphed, I found myself far more engaged, and able to admire the skill and the complexity with which we were being asked to see Zimbabwe through Tambu's status-obsessed eyes. By living so intently with her, we also feel her trauma and her desperate need for healing. Her continuous rejection of connection - selfish acts and neglect which push others away - is like the behaviour of the wounded and the shocked. That we can see this, and yet must live through it with Tambu, makes it visceral.

And even as the tension around the clearly looming destruction of all that Tambu thinks she wants builds unbearably, there is sharpness in the portraiture of those around her - the white boss blind to the exploitation that enables her, the war veterans trying to build in a nation of destruction, the immigrants and urban poor. I suspect this will be a book that stays with me forever, but it wasn't a lot of fun to read.