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A review by h2oetry
The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk
5.0
“The World is a deceitful lie, rehearsed theater.”
These Books show myriad perspectives on the prophetic and ordinary goings on of Jacob Frank and those surrounding him and the effect he left on many. “Who could resist this young man who has a hundred ideas a second, and who works faster than anybody else?”
It reads like my favorite modern artist’s (Ricky Allman) paintings: apocalyptically geometric and topographic depictions of luminescence. The translation by Jennifer Croft is astounding. I was shocked at how lively and delicious the prose was. Give her every award under the sun (and, obviously, the author Olga Tokarczuk).
“They are used to whatever Jacob says being the truth. The truth is like a gnarled tree, made up of many layers that are twisted all around each other, some layers holding others inside them, and sometimes being held. The truth is something that can be expressed in many tales, for it is like that garden the sages entered, in which each of them saw something else.”
To repeat the words of the Zohar: “Salvation is located in the worst place.”
So many beautiful sentences — just a few underlined passages after thumbing randomly through the book after reading:
“All kinds of different shoes can tread a path to God…” … “I don’t believe in the disasters that might come. I believe in the ones we have been able to escape.” ... “War is a jumble between marketplace and nightmare.” … “Every order, every system, is simply a matter of what you’ve gotten used to.”
Stuff like that happens on almost every one of the 965 pages. I almost certainly have to read this again in a few years. I feel like I know everything and nothing simultaneously. So much of the book echoed familiarity. I made the mistake of reading this on and off over almost the entire year when I should have just read it all the way through without breaks.
I felt these words deeply from Polish poet Mrs. Elżbieta Drużbacka: “She does not even try to pray, the words of prayer exhaust her, as if she were pouring out something that is empty into something that is void, grinding the same grain over and over, infected with ergot, poisoned through and through.”
Reading this book felt like a prayer, but in the good way.
These Books show myriad perspectives on the prophetic and ordinary goings on of Jacob Frank and those surrounding him and the effect he left on many. “Who could resist this young man who has a hundred ideas a second, and who works faster than anybody else?”
It reads like my favorite modern artist’s (Ricky Allman) paintings: apocalyptically geometric and topographic depictions of luminescence. The translation by Jennifer Croft is astounding. I was shocked at how lively and delicious the prose was. Give her every award under the sun (and, obviously, the author Olga Tokarczuk).
“They are used to whatever Jacob says being the truth. The truth is like a gnarled tree, made up of many layers that are twisted all around each other, some layers holding others inside them, and sometimes being held. The truth is something that can be expressed in many tales, for it is like that garden the sages entered, in which each of them saw something else.”
To repeat the words of the Zohar: “Salvation is located in the worst place.”
So many beautiful sentences — just a few underlined passages after thumbing randomly through the book after reading:
“All kinds of different shoes can tread a path to God…” … “I don’t believe in the disasters that might come. I believe in the ones we have been able to escape.” ... “War is a jumble between marketplace and nightmare.” … “Every order, every system, is simply a matter of what you’ve gotten used to.”
Stuff like that happens on almost every one of the 965 pages. I almost certainly have to read this again in a few years. I feel like I know everything and nothing simultaneously. So much of the book echoed familiarity. I made the mistake of reading this on and off over almost the entire year when I should have just read it all the way through without breaks.
I felt these words deeply from Polish poet Mrs. Elżbieta Drużbacka: “She does not even try to pray, the words of prayer exhaust her, as if she were pouring out something that is empty into something that is void, grinding the same grain over and over, infected with ergot, poisoned through and through.”
Reading this book felt like a prayer, but in the good way.