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maxgardner's reviews
367 reviews
Babel by R.F. Kuang
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
I absolutely loved this book. R.F. Kuang created a story and characters that I felt invested in, and in at least one moment, I was actually angry for the rest of the night after I finished a chapter (but in a good way - in that way you only can be when you care a lot and it feels like there’s a lot at stake).
I don’t have much knowledge of linguistics or translation theory, so I found the paragraphs that go into detail explaining these subjects interesting. You can tell Kuang definitely has a passion for language as the way she handles these topics is almost romantic and, as a result, makes it easy for the reader to fall in love with Oxford and the Royal Institute of Translation alongside Robin. She’s also created some really loveable side characters in Ramy, Victoire, and Letty; their dynamic with Robin as they all face the intense workload of their studies is well developed and cozy, and seeing how they come to love and support each other is heartwarming.
I don’t have much knowledge of linguistics or translation theory, so I found the paragraphs that go into detail explaining these subjects interesting. You can tell Kuang definitely has a passion for language as the way she handles these topics is almost romantic and, as a result, makes it easy for the reader to fall in love with Oxford and the Royal Institute of Translation alongside Robin. She’s also created some really loveable side characters in Ramy, Victoire, and Letty; their dynamic with Robin as they all face the intense workload of their studies is well developed and cozy, and seeing how they come to love and support each other is heartwarming.
The overarching conflict is introduced pretty early on, which I appreciate, and it bubbles up to the surface at a nice pace as the story unfolds. Through Robin’s journey, Kuang minces no words in her takedown of colonialism and the greed-fueled wreckage European white men left in their wake as they sought more power and wealth at the expense of people and countries that they denigrated and enslaved (and ultimately, ironically enough, at the expense of their own people and countries). Though this isn’t news to anyone who’s done even the slightest bit of research into the history of the modern world, it’s an important and sadly still relevant story nonetheless, and Kuang has taken an interesting approach to it with the fantasy-light addition of silver magic as a metaphor for intellectual thievery. I loved the idea behind this magic - that it’s the ineffable meaning lost in the passage of words between languages that gives it its power. It works great to portray an element of colonialism that Kuang is especially interested in exploring - the way colonizers take bits and pieces of culture from the people they invade and enslave and bastardize these pieces to their benefit. However, I do think she could have gone in greater depth on the mechanics of the magic system. We don’t really understand how it works or what its exact limitations are (which she explains away in the book by basically saying nobody does), but for a book that goes into such great detail on so many other things, it feels noticeably light on the lore for this core magic system that ends up being so important in the overarching conflict. I ultimately attribute this to my earlier point that I think this is very obviously a metaphor for the intellectual and cultural theft that European countries committed in their colonization efforts, so Kuang wasn’t really interested in the magic system beyond it being able to represent this. And to her credit, I think it works; this didn’t take away from my enjoyment of the book. I just think it would have been interesting to see it better fleshed out.
On a similar note, some of the side characters could have been fleshed out more as well. The book already runs a bit long, so I imagine it would be tough to strike a balance, especially with the characters that become more important toward the end, but there are some people who are noticeably flatter than others. We get just enough that it’s still satisfying, but I would have liked to spend more time learning about them and wish Kuang had dug more into the complexities of their feelings and thoughts toward the revolution. Some of the characters feel a bit one-note at the end as sides are taken and we don’t get much insight into why some people make the decision they do. There is enough action going on that this isn’t distracting, but again, just something that I think could have really strengthened the book and elevated it further as I imagine everyone didn’t come to their decisions for the same reasons.
Ultimately, this is a beautiful, well-written book with a memorable story and memorable characters. Definitely going on my favorites shelf.