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A review by marathonreader
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
emotional
funny
informative
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
We have two distinct voices, of a jaded but well-read 50-something hotel concierge, and an intellectually-gifted teenager contemplating suicide. Palome, the teenager, lives with her family at the hotel at which Renee the concierge works. Their stories don't overlap until the end, where they profoundly affect each other, but I never really felt like I was waiting for that to happen. I was too busy falling in love with each female lead for her quips and quirks.
Renee:
"I had already been long acquainted with the solidarity that weaves written signs together, the infinite combinations and marvellous sounds that had dubbed me a dame in this place... No one knew. I read as if deranged, at first in hiding and then, once it seemed to me that the normal amount of time to learn one's letters had elapsed, out in the open for all to see, but I was careful to conceal the pleasure and interest that reading afforded me" (45)
"I have read so many books.. And yet, ike most autodidacts, I am never quite sure of what I have dined from them. There are days when I feel I have been able to grasp all there is to know in one single geez, as if invisible branches suddenly spring out of nowhere, weaving together all the disparate strands of my reading - and then suddenly the meaning escapes, the essence evaporates, and no matter how often I reread the same lines, they seem to flee ever further with each subsequent readings dn I see myself as some mad old fool who thinks her stomach is full because she's been attentively reading the menu. Apparently this combination of ability and blindness is a symptom exclusive to the autodidact. Deprived of the steady guiding hand that any good education provides, the autodidact possesses nonetheless the gift of freedom and conciseness of thought, where official discourse would put up barriers and prohibit activities" (53)
"Tea is the beverage of the healthy and of the poor" (91)
"true novelty is that which does not grow old, despite the passage of time" (p.100, quoted from Ozu's Munekata Sisters movie)
Palome: "From now on, for you, I'll be searching for those moments of always within the never. Beautfy, in this world" (325)
- but the best part was where she says her mother is apparently smart because she has a PhD in literature, but for the fact she speaks to the cat as if the cat is a person
Renee:
"I had already been long acquainted with the solidarity that weaves written signs together, the infinite combinations and marvellous sounds that had dubbed me a dame in this place... No one knew. I read as if deranged, at first in hiding and then, once it seemed to me that the normal amount of time to learn one's letters had elapsed, out in the open for all to see, but I was careful to conceal the pleasure and interest that reading afforded me" (45)
"I have read so many books.. And yet, ike most autodidacts, I am never quite sure of what I have dined from them. There are days when I feel I have been able to grasp all there is to know in one single geez, as if invisible branches suddenly spring out of nowhere, weaving together all the disparate strands of my reading - and then suddenly the meaning escapes, the essence evaporates, and no matter how often I reread the same lines, they seem to flee ever further with each subsequent readings dn I see myself as some mad old fool who thinks her stomach is full because she's been attentively reading the menu. Apparently this combination of ability and blindness is a symptom exclusive to the autodidact. Deprived of the steady guiding hand that any good education provides, the autodidact possesses nonetheless the gift of freedom and conciseness of thought, where official discourse would put up barriers and prohibit activities" (53)
"Tea is the beverage of the healthy and of the poor" (91)
"true novelty is that which does not grow old, despite the passage of time" (p.100, quoted from Ozu's Munekata Sisters movie)
Palome: "From now on, for you, I'll be searching for those moments of always within the never. Beautfy, in this world" (325)
- but the best part was where she says her mother is apparently smart because she has a PhD in literature, but for the fact she speaks to the cat as if the cat is a person