***REGION 5: Southern Africa

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***REGION 5: Southern Africa

1avaland
dec 25, 2010, 5:08 pm

If you have not read the information on the master thread regarding the intent of these regional threads, please do this first.

***5. Southern Africa: Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland

2aulsmith
dec 25, 2010, 8:21 pm

Thanks to avaland for setting up these threads.

I recently finished Alan Paton's Too Late the Phalarope. Paton was South African writer, mostly known for Cry, the Beloved Country. Too Late the Phalarope was his second novel. It is about a Boer family living in the veldt. It is mostly about the effect of their very strict Calvinist religion on their lives and decisions.

There is much to like about this novel from the point of view of reading globally. While not as lyrical as Cry, the Beloved Country, the descriptions of the land are very rich and make you see the place. The family structure and the religion are also shown with compassion, though not necessarily agreement. I have read a number of books about South Africa, and this one got me closest into the mind set of the descendants of the Dutch settlers.

However, as a good read, this novel has a number of problems. There is a lot of very heavy handed foreshadowing and a huge amount of religious angst. It is also told from the odd point of view of someone who was not a direct participant in the action, but is able to relay information about scenes they did not witness.

This wouldn't be my first read about South Africa, but if you've read other books and want a better appreciation of the Boers, give it a try.

3katrinasreads
dec 31, 2010, 6:56 am

I just finished July's People a really good read, and nicely just 160 pages.
The novel focuses on the time of the riots in South Africa where black people fought for inderpendence and in doing so destroyed a lot of white homes, business and people.

July's 'people' are actually the family he works for, in order to help them to safety he transports them to his village, housing them in a mud hut. The novel looks at the way the white family react, adapt and change in this new society. The children and adults both experiencing life in a new social setting in a different way. We also see the way that the black society changes in its response to the white family as they become a more familiar part of the setting.

4akeela
dec 31, 2010, 7:33 am

Finished two good South African books this week: Thirteen Hours by Deon Meyer translated from Afrikaans by K. L. Seegers, a police procedural set in Cape Town and its surrounds. The central character is seasoned detective, Bennie Griessel, a recovering alcoholic who is in the process of losing his wife due to the drinking.

It's about two American girls, tourists, who find themselves in trouble in Cape Town. One is brutally murdered, while the other continues to be pursued and Griessel has thirteen daylight hours, to find her.

I considered reading the book in Afrikaans but the 400-odd pages seemed daunting since I haven't read Afrikaans in a while. Having said that, it was a quick enjoyable read. I would consider reading Meyer again.

The second book was Karma Suture by medical doctor, Rosamund Kendal. It's about Sure Carey, a hardworking, motivated 20-something medical doctor who works in one of the biggest public hospitals in Cape Town. Her shifts are filled with extensive hours of seeing innumerable patients with conditions ranging from the more-than-regular stabbings, and rape, to HIV-AIDS, and cancer, and everything in-between.

She mentors interns, so always has young doctors-in-training with her on her rounds. Her long hours pretty much rule out a social life, though she longs for male company. When she eventually gets off from work, she drinks a tad too much, and always swears off alcohol afterwards – until her next break from the harshness of working amongst a poverty-stricken population with its own terrible social and economic problems.

Most of the book is set in the hospital, as Sue goes about administering to her patients. The book has been likened to Bridget Jones and hinges on chick-lit. There is a bit of romance, a struggle to come to terms with the illness of a friend, hurdles in her professional career as she grows and learns to roll with the punches life doles out to her.

This was a light, fun read. It’s a pleasure to finally find South African material that appeals!

5aulsmith
Redigerat: jan 2, 2011, 11:46 am

3: I really liked July's People. I read it just before the collapse of apartheid, when it read like a near future science fiction novel.

I've liked all the Nadine Gordimer I've read, though I haven't read her for a while.

Edited to make more sense.

6streamsong
jan 2, 2011, 11:43 am

I just finished my first book from Mt TBR that I hope to knock off with the journeys challenge, Return to Nisa, by Marjorie Shosak. Unfortunately, this book, like several others on the mountain, is non-fiction and by a US author. Its good points (besides being one off the mountain) are that it is about a fascinating part of Africa, namely Botswana and Namibia, and a people, the !Kung or Bushmen. The journey was mostly cultural and spiritual with a bit of wandering in the sub-Saharan Kalahari.

Four stars. Full review on the book page.

7deebee1
jan 27, 2011, 2:16 pm

The Love Songs of Nathan J. Swirsky by Christopher Hope (South Africa), 1993

Into a small middle-class Johannesburg suburban community whose idea of excitement was a trip to Uncle Monty's Pleasure Farm for a picnic lunch, sometime in 1950s came Nathan J. Swirsky to set up his pharmacy. He is a whiff of fresh, if not, colourful and extravagant air, in this stuffy and provincial town. The kids could not have enough of him and followed him everywhere. But the adults think otherwise, and regard him as a danger. A seemingly humorous novel, but there is nothing comic about its themes. It is the early years of apartheid and bigotry has reared its ugly head. The story does not involve anything hugely passionate or violent in relation to the injustices, nobody arrives to relieve -- the rejected suffer or end in silence. And the kids keep their own brand of innocence, or at least until Nathan J. Swirsky disappears from their lives.

8Thrin
jan 28, 2011, 4:33 am

>7 deebee1: deebee1 Thanks for reminding me about Christopher Hope's books. Some time ago I read his My Mother's Lovers and before that Me, the Moon and Elvis Presley. I suspect the title of the latter might put some people off, but it's well worth a read: Both funny and sad. It's a story about a community in S.Africa trying to adapt to the changes in their society after WWII and following their trials, tribulations and hopes up until the late 1950s (if I remember correctly).

The Love Songs of Nathan J. Swirsky goes on to Mount TBR!

9deebee1
jan 28, 2011, 6:14 am

#8 I like Christopher Hope's writing a lot. It's a pity his books are not better known. I would strongly recommend A Separate Development, my first Hope and what hooked me. A story about a white boy's "transformation" into a coloured person, by dint of a series of seemingly petty misfortunes. Achingly funny and tremendously sad at the same time. Hope's best, in my opinion.

10cammykitty
feb 5, 2011, 5:21 pm

deebee1> I hadn't heard of Hope. I'll have to look for his books.

3&5> I just finished July's People. What an oddly written book, but her style was perfect for what she was doing. My review of it is here if anyone is curious. http://www.librarything.com/work/85697/reviews/67649804

11avaland
feb 9, 2011, 8:20 am

>6 streamsong: The author is an anthropologist. Did you read Nisa? I read it as part of an anthropology class years ago, found it fascinating. I can't speak for Return to Nisa but Nisa was essentially the results of her anthropological research.

12streamsong
Redigerat: feb 13, 2011, 12:43 pm

Hi avaland;

I guess my comments on Return to Nisa were a bit cryptic, but I think you missed my review of it. (Always a problem in journalism when the reader is directed to another page as I'm sure you know).

It was a marvelous book. I hadn't read Nisa} but this book stands well enough on its own. You might enjoy it as an update on these people as their culture changed so markedly since Nisa was written in the 70's.

I'm always hesitant to post my books that are nonfiction and by a western author since they don't quite fit into the stated theme of fiction by author native to the country. Nevertheless, this one is well worth the read. So... here's my review:

In the 1970’s, anthropologist Marjorie Shostak spent time living with the !Kung or Bushmen people of Botswana. This resulted in her first book, Nisa, published in 1981 telling the life story of a remarkable woman of these people.

Shostak returned to Botswana in 1989. In the preceding year, while still nursing her youngest child, she had been diagnosed with breast cancer. After a year of treatment and hospitals, not knowing if she had been cured or not, she returned to the !Kung for thirty days. She hoped to find both spiritual and physical healing among these people.

She found the !Kung had also been through many changes in the years she had been gone. The sudden closing of the border between Botswana and Namibia split the Bushmen people between the two countries and divided families as devastatingly and as permanently as the Berlin Wall had done with the Germans. This border closing also contributed to the Bushmen leaving their traditional hunting/gathering lifestyle and becoming herders, mostly of animals belonging to other tribes who felt themselves superior to the !Kung. In addition, the constant flow of anthropologists studying the !Kung people had changed the people’s attitudes and souls in much the same way that in quantum physics one cannot observe a phenomena without affecting the outcome.

In spite of the cultural changes of the people, Shostak was able to reconnect with old acquaintances and find a measure of spiritual peace. She passed away from her breast cancer before this book was published.

I found this book interesting, well written, and very enlightening about the fate and humanity of this remarkable people. 4 stars.

13Nickelini
Redigerat: jun 21, 2011, 1:30 am

I'm currently reading a book by a South African author called Loving, Living and Lying Awake at Night, by Sindiwe Magona. It's very, very good but a little preachy.

edited a few months later to say that I read the book again, and I didn't find it preachy at all the second time around.

14cammykitty
jun 4, 2011, 1:02 am

I just finished reading Moxyland. It was a fantastic dystopia that included everything and the kitchen sink. It was very much formed by the experience of apartheid, but in this world people were divided by wealth rather than by race.

15madknitta
jun 20, 2011, 9:57 pm

As part of a Read Africa challenge that I set up for myself (one year to read one book from each country, written by someone from that country), I read Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee.

I’m dissatisfied, perplexed, annoyed, conflicted. I feel like I need someone way smarter than me to tell me how I’m supposed to read this book.

My review is at http://www.librarything.com/work/3481/reviews/74740502. Warning: Contains potential spoilers.

I’m now curious how other authors---particularly women and black South Africans---have dealt with the post-Apartheid transition, so I’ve added to my list two more South African books: The House Gun by Nadine Gordimer and The Heart of Redness by Zakes Mda.

Any other suggestions? I'm enjoying reading your posts and mining them for my challenge list.

16Nickelini
jun 21, 2011, 1:29 am

madknitta - I think your review is very thoughtful and that you show a lot of understanding of the book (not that I pretend to know it well). It's been a while since I've read the book--was the main character really supposed to be sympathetic? I'm not sure he was. Isn't his behavior supposed to mirror the behavior of Europeans in Africa? If you reread your review and substitute European for the professor, does it make sense?

17cammykitty
Redigerat: jun 22, 2011, 12:10 am

#15 madknitta - I hated the experience of reading Disgrace and would love to call it a horrible book, but that would be being naive. It's what Coetzee wanted - a loathsome character depicted during a loathsome time of history.

I read your review, and I think you did understand the book. He wanted the reader to be conflicted about David Lurie. He wanted you to keep trying to like him, and keep trying to justify him without being able too. He wanted it to be an uncomfortable book. At least, that's my take on it from my reading and what little I know about the author.

As for Gordimer, I only read July's People which is also a very good but not terribly pleasant book. I found myself comparing it to works like The Diary of Anne Frank.

18DorsVenabili
Redigerat: jul 20, 2011, 9:34 am

I'm currently reading The Conservationist by Nadine Gordimer . This is my first Gordimer novel, but I've read one of her short stories in an anthology while taking a women's literature course. I can't remember much about it, other than that the writing was beautiful, and it was quite powerful. I'll be sure to post a review when I'm done.

19berthirsch
jul 25, 2011, 12:39 pm

the discussion about Disgrace is actually very interesting. My take was the same- Coetzee meant the reader to be uncomfortable, the main charcter was not a sympathetic figure, he was loathsome in many ways and in creating this charcter Coetzee was able to convey the feel of the country and its inhabitants. Apatheid had to be a most dehumanizing experience for all.

a bigger question is _ do we want to be entertained by what we read? do we want to be educated? do we want to experience on a gut level what others beyond our life experience- how they live?

very interesting.

20cammykitty
jul 26, 2011, 12:34 am

I've begun to appreciate Disgrace a little more now that I've had some distance from it, but I truly did hate the experience of reading it. The depth of my discomfort is a tribute to his writing. If I look at it as entertainment, Disgrace never should've been published at all. As an exploration of gender roles, race relationships, politics an cultural expectations, it is quite masterful. He let no one off the hook. The whites were represented by such a loathsome character that it was impossible to view them as innocent victims. Setting up David Lurie as such an (insert favorite expletive here) gave Coetzee the freedom to also show the horrible manipulation/crimes of his daughter's farming neighbors. As for the dog rescue, I've heard this is an issue close to Coetzee's heart. It definitely took the novel down into a base, desperate place that I badly wanted to change.

As for July's People, one of my friends just came back from South Africa and his comments about his experience made it clear to me that Gordimer truly was making a comparison to the Holocaust, and that the loss of life during the "upheaval" (for lack of a better term) makes this a relevant comparison.

Sigh. We must be reading these books to be educated. They weren't written to entertain. They were written to witness. These books exist so we can recognize what has happened, perhaps make it a bit better, and hopefully avoid doing the same thing again.

21cammykitty
aug 17, 2011, 1:20 am

Thanks to the person who recommended The Good Doctor to me. What an amazing book. Cruel and gentle at the same time.

22BiblioEva
sep 21, 2011, 12:54 am

I'm in the middle of Loving, Living and Lying Awake at Night, which I see Nickellini (#13) read a few months ago! I'm really loving it for the way it humanises the Black women who work as domestics. I just finished part one, and almost every chapter was told in the voice of a different maid: I'm v impressed with Magona's ability to change the tone of her prose for each narrator! :)

The copy I'm reading (an interlibrary loan) has two copyrights: one in 1991 and one in 1994. It makes me curious about when the book was published and where, considering apartheid's 1994 ending, but I can't seem to find much info online.

23akeela
sep 21, 2011, 5:19 am

> 22 Eva, the Magona was published in 1991.

I recently read Other lives by André Brink. This volume of short fiction was a quick, compelling read by the celebrated South African novelist. It seems Brink enjoyed pushing the boundaries with these stories. He plays with the idea of alternate lives and seeing life and people from different perspectives. There are characters who appear as the main characters in one story and then as peripheral characters in the other stories thereby providing the opportunity for differing perspectives.

He also explores issues of race and discrimination in the new South Africa. One man wakes up and looks in the mirror to find a black man looking back at him. The realisation that he is black has a huge impact on his psyche and we follow him through the day as he struggles to come to terms with who he is, and how others, including his wife and children, now perceive him.

Another story sees a painter stepping out to buy groceries. When he steps back in, he is confronted by a whole other life - there's a wife he has never seen before, and two children he doesn’t recognise. They certainly appear to know and love him; while in his mind, he still has another wife waiting for him at home.

The protagonists are all men and I enjoyed the male perspective on love, women, family life, and identity. The initial stories fit together perfectly but I am still wondering how the last story fitted in. I can't quite put my finger on what bound the final tale to the others...

In any case, the surrealist experiences of the protagonists serve to pull one in and one is constanly wondering how far Brink will take it, and also if he will succeed - or if it will all just fall apart at some point. It worked for me, mostly.

24Nickelini
sep 21, 2011, 10:17 am

#22 - Yea! Another fan of Living, Loving and Lying Awake at Night. I enjoyed that book very much. And it's one that I have thought about regularly since I read it (unlike some books that quickly disappear into the back corners of my memory)

25BiblioEva
sep 21, 2011, 10:42 pm

#24 I finished it last night, and I think it will definitely stay with me! At first, I was a bit confused by the structure of the second part, but once I figureod out there were short stories, rather than chapters, I was good. I just loved her writing: so descriptive! My library has two of her other books (a novel and a memoir), and I'm definitely going to read them. :)

#23 Thanks for letting me know on the pub date! I've read a sprinkling of South African authors, but not anything by Brink. He has quite the back list! Was Other Lives your first go with him? I'm just wondering if it would be a good place to start, or if one of his other books would be a better intro.

26akeela
sep 26, 2011, 10:16 am

Hi Eva, I'm afraid I'm a rather infrequent visitor to LT these days. Apologies for the delayed response.

Brink is indeed prolific. I've read An Instant in the Wind, A Dry White Season and The Ambassador, all of which I enjoyed ages ago, but which are all set in the old Apartheid South Africa and deal with the issues of the day then.

My preference as a South African now would be books set in the New South Africa, which deal with SA beyond Apartheid.

We cannot wish away Apartheid. It was real and the majority of South Africans are still reeling from its effects and will do so for decades to come - so it is worth reading those novels, too. I guess it really depends on your preference.

I'm not sure if my response has been useful! Other Lives was great and I would recommend it. I would also be interested to read his memoir, A Fork in the Road.

27cushlareads
sep 26, 2011, 10:27 am

Eva and Akeela, I've read A Dry White Season too and A Fork in the Road. I loved A Dry White Season and really liked A Fork in the Road (but would have liked it even more if I'd read more of his work). And I own a third by him, The Other Side of Silence, which is about the German colonisation of Namibia, and looks pretty grim and has sat on the bookshelf for a year so far. I have to be in the right mood.

28akeela
sep 26, 2011, 10:50 am

Lovely to cross paths with you again, Cushla :) If you enjoyed A Fork in the Road, chances are, I probably will, too. Thanks for your input.

29cushlareads
sep 26, 2011, 11:24 am

Waving at you from Switzerland!! I'm sure you'd get even more out of it from being South African - there was a lot that I enjoyed (or squirmed through) reading but did not have as much meaning for me without having lived through it. When I read The Other Side of Silence I'll post some comments here.

30BiblioEva
okt 1, 2011, 5:23 pm

Akeela, no worries! As you can tell, I'm not always super-fast at replying (I'm on a bit of a typing break due to health stuff). But thanks for your run down of his books! Before your reply I'd already requested A Dry White Season (since I tend to start with the earlier books of a new-to-me author) but I'll have to give his newer stuff a go soon too!

Cushla, I have to save books like that for a certain mood as well!

31theni
Redigerat: okt 28, 2011, 6:25 pm

#7 sounds really interesting.

32theni
okt 28, 2011, 6:33 pm

I am in Botswana with Mma Ramotswe of the No 1 Ladies Detective Agency in Morality for Beautiful Girls by Alexander McCall Smith. Am not done yet but so far its amusing, engaging, a light read.
From the comments above The Love Songs of Nathan J. Swirsky goes on my wishlist.

33Trifolia
dec 1, 2011, 9:42 am

Botswana: Black Mulberries by Caitlin Davies


This is the story of a family from Botswana that's torn between tradition and progress. This book has a lot of potential: a fluid style, interesting perspectives, interesting characters, interesting issues but IMO it lacked some depth, some drama and tension. We get to meet three generations of women and two nationalities. There's the personal luggage of the mater familias who's raised her family rather succesfully in somewhat difficult circumstances after her husband died. There's the grand-daughter who has a special connection with her grand-mother. There's the beautiful daughter who has a carreer in modelling and there's the female neighbour-journalist who has a crush on the brother. The interaction between those women against the beautiful backdrop of Botswana gives plenty to write about. However, there are far too many loose ends, far too many easy-way-outs, too many gimmicks to make me overenthusiastic. In fact I had the same problem with this book as I did with Brooklyn by Colm Toibin. It's not exactly chicklit but it's coming close. On the other hand, if you liked Brooklyn, I'm pretty sure, you'll love this one. I liked it, didn't love it.

34kidzdoc
dec 11, 2011, 3:05 pm

Other Lives by André Brink



This book consists of three interconnected short stories, all set in contemporary Cape Town and its surrounding cities. In "The Blue Door", the main character is a middle aged teacher who is also a successful painter, who lives in an apartment with his wife, in a comfortable but stolid and childless marriage. He owns a studio across town, which also serves as a haven of solitude for him. He leaves the studio one day to go to a local delicatessen, but when he returns there, he is greeted by an attractive younger woman who claims to be his wife, and two small children who smother him with hugs and kisses. Shaken, he leaves and attempts to return home, but his plight becomes increasingly surreal. In the second story, "Mirror", a successful architect prepares to go to work one morning after his wife and children have left, but he is shocked at the change in his appearance in the bathroom mirror. Finally, "Appassionata" is narrated by a concert pianist, who engages in a professional relationship with a renowned but mysterious singer with a dark past, with whom he falls madly in love.

In Other Lives, Brink plays with shifting identities and roles in the new South Africa, a country that is adjusting to new realities and expectations. The technique of using the same characters in different stories was largely successful, although "Appassionata" was a far weaker story than the brilliant first story and the very good second one. This book slipped from a 5 star read after "The Blue Door" to a 4 star one at the end, but it was still a very good read overall, and is highly recommended.

35Artymedon
apr 30, 2013, 8:20 pm

The books on South African society by Victorian writer Bertram Mitford are great fictional tales showing the influences of Europe on traditional African societies in the 1890s.

36kidzdoc
Redigerat: maj 6, 2020, 12:36 pm

Ualalapi: Fragments from the End of Empire by Ungulani Ba Ka Khosa

  

My rating:

This short novel in fragments is a re-examination of Ngungunhane, also known as Mdungazwe Ngungunyane Nxumalo, who was the last ruler of the Gaza Empire, which lasted from 1824 to 1895 and at its height encompassed all of what is currently Mozambique and southern Zimbabwe. Ngungunhane brutally took over power after the death of his father, the previous emperor, in 1884 after he slew his brother, but he was deposed by General Joaquim Mouzinho of the Portuguese colonial army in 1895 after he refused to surrender, which allowed Portugal to claim the territory and name it Mozambique, or Moçambique in Portuguese. Ngungunhane was captured, imprisoned, and died in exile in 1906.

Ngungunhane is generally viewed as a hero and tragic figure by modern day Mozambicans, particularly by members and supporters of FRELIMO, the Mozambique Liberation Front, which was created in 1962 in opposition to the colonial government, successfully gained independence for the country in 1975, and is the majority party in the country. However, Ungulani Ba Ka Khosa, the director of the Instituto Nacional do Livro e do Disco in Mozambique, portrays him as a bloodthirsty and brutal man, obese and frequently drunk, whose lust for power, drink and women only grew after he ascended to the throne. The title of the book comes from one of his most trusted warriors, and the reader learns about Ngungunhane from personal accounts from Ualalapi, others in his circle, colonial military men and governors, and a Swiss evangelical who was a respected visitor to Ngungunhane's court before his downfall. The author wrote this book in 1987 to correct the widely held narrative, and as a critique of the corrupt and brutal FRELIMO government at that time.

Ualalapi is a valuable contribution to the history of the precolonial Gaza Empire and its last ruler, although it is a mostly forgettable novella.

37kidzdoc
maj 6, 2020, 12:35 pm

Dumba Nengue: Run for Your Life by Lina Magaia

  

My rating:

Mozambique gained its independence from Portugal in 1975 after a nearly decade long war between FRELIMO, the Frente de Libertação de Moçambique (Mozambique Liberation Front), which was largely supported by China, the Soviet Union and non-governmental organizations in Western Europe, and colonial forces. Fearing a spread of the independence movement into their neighboring countries, the apartheid governments of Rhodesia and South Africa created the Mozambican National Resistance (RENAMO or MNR) in 1975, a militant organization that won support from the conservative United States government during the Cold War as it was viewed as an anti-communist group. RENAMO joined with another rebel group, the Revolutionary Party of Mozambique, and together the two groups enacted a brutal campaign directed primarily at civilians in southern Mozambique, a formerly prosperous area of the country, by burning their fertile fields and villages, killing babies with bayonets, raping girls and women, and capturing young men in order to force them to join their campaign of evil.

Lina Magaia left the capital of Maputo to travel to the south of Mozambique, in order to return to her family, and to chronicle the suffering of her people. Reports of atrocities did reach the Western press, particularly The New York Times, but in keeping with today's far right in the United States, extreme conservatives led by Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina, Patrick Buchanan and the Heritage Foundation dismissed these reports as fake news in the late 1980s, and the Republican led government did not act on those reports.

The term "dumba nengue" refers to a proverb that states that "you have to trust your feet," and those civilians who did so survived, although they returned to devastated homes and decimated crops and livestock, and the area has remained in deep poverty since then.

Dumba Nengue consists of 22 actual accounts of these atrocities, which are difficult to read due to their extreme brutality and Magaia's vivid descriptions, and I could only bear to read a half dozen of them.

38Trifolia
dec 9, 2021, 6:13 am

South Africa: The Promise by Damon Galgut - 4,5 stars


The story begins with the death of the mother of the white Swart family on a farm in South Africa and a promise her husband made on her deathbed to give a small house on their land to the black maid. It is the start of four long chapters, each set in a different decade in which something happens to a different member of the family. The promise of the father runs like a red thread through the story, but it is actually not the most important issue in this book.
In parallel with the personal events, South Africa's history also seeps through: the apartheid, the initial optimism under Nelson Mandela, the growing disillusionment and frustration and ultimately the chaos, corruption and climate impact.
As a reader you look through the eyes of various characters in a kind of collective stream of consciousness. The perspective is constantly changing from one to the other, sometimes even mid-sentence, but while this might be confusing, it works great. It is striking that the black characters are never in that stream of consciousness but always have to watch from the sidelines and are viewed and treated from the white point of view. And that in itself is significant. But the white point of view is anything but unison either. As a reader you do have to pay attention, but it is never unclear whose head you are in.

It is also wonderful how the author manages to sketch a complete character in a few sentences without falling into clichés. There is always something that makes them something unique. They are all people of flesh and blood, often not pleasant people at all, but because of their petty traits and because of what they experience, you can understand their situation (or sometimes not at all).

This is a very mathematical work: four decades, four main characters, four parallel events that unfold in four different ways, etc. Yet it never feels forced. The book sparkles and vibrates, surprises and continues to fascinate until the last page.

This book turns out to be one of the biggest surprises of 2021. There is still so much to say about it and much more to think about, but I don't want to say too much about it so as not to spoil the reading pleasure. Highly recommended.

39labfs39
dec 9, 2021, 4:38 pm

I'm glad you posted your review here and reinvigorated the thread. I definitely want to read The Promise, if you liked it so much, as I know we often have similar reading taste.

40labfs39
dec 20, 2021, 6:07 pm

SOUTH AFRICA:



The Folly by Ivan Vladislavić
Published 1993, 179 p.

One evening a man carrying a fake leather portmanteau gets out of a taxi in front of a vacant lot next to the Malgas′ home. He is odd, scurrying around the lot picking up trash and making things out of it, camping in the corner by the hedges, and never seeming to leave. Mrs. Malgas is suspicious and keeps an eye on him out the window and wonders if she should call the police. Mr. Malgas, however, is intrigued and soon approaches him. The man introduces himself as ″Father,″ although later he says his name is Nieuwenhuizen. He is there to take ownership of the lot and build a house. Mr. Malgas is excited at the prospect and offers to help. As time goes by, and the plans for the house never materialize, Mr. Malgas must imagine the house in order to remain friends with his neighbor. As the imaginary house becomes more real, Mr. Malgas begins to become less so.

Parable, fable, allegory? It′s hard to say exactly what this book is, but it is well-written and funny, with thought-provoking threads. But like the strings outlining the foundation of the planned house, they seem to meander into a tangled dead-end heap. I was following a line I thought was a religious allegory, but in the end was left staring at an amorphous cat′s cradle. Was Father God and Malgas his disciple? Were they building His church not on a rock, but an anthill? Or was this a cautionary tale about totalitarian state plans, being forced to ″see″ what you are told to, and then being left with nothing when the plan changes? The genius in this book lies not in what is written, but in what must be conjectured. Do we as readers buy into the premise, or do we remain with Mrs. Malgas on the outside looking in?

The writing is very clever and humorous. Things are described like punctuation marks, lists of objects reflect personality, and words beginning with C seem to be important, but are they? The first sentence and the last are nearly the same; what do the differences mean? I would love to be reading this with others, as the possibilities for discussion are endless. Recommended for those who liked The Investigation by Philippe Claudel or perhaps Paul Auster′s Travels in the Scriptorium.

41labfs39
sep 8, 2023, 7:23 am

SOUTH AFRICA



The Exploded View by Ivan Vladislavić
Published 2004, 197 p., Archipelago Press

According to the dictionary, an exploded view is an illustration or diagram of a construction that shows its parts separately but in positions that indicate their proper relationships to the whole. It's the perfect title for this short novel in that it is comprised of four stories that illustrate components of South African society close up and in relation to each other. It begins with a census taker who is gathering input on a new batch of demographic questions. He is a person who thinks in statistics and is able to view his own actions from a remove. He becomes infatuated with a woman who lives in Villa Toscana, a faux Italian enclave, down the highway from a new housing project.

A sanitation engineer who is working on the new housing project has been invited to dinner by his boss. He worries about whether to bring a gift, what to wear, and is surprised to find two community liaisons and an unintroduced man at the dinner as well. He is the only white person at the table, and when the conversation lapses into Sotho and Zulu he is left out, leaving him to wonder if there is more going on than meets the eye.

He could already see himself looking back on it {the dinner}, from a tremendous distance, and understanding, at last, what it was all about. He wished he was there now, at that reassuring remove, on a height, filled with the wisdom of hindsight.

The restaurant where they are eating is decorated with dozens of African masks, the work of the artist S. Majara, who is hosting a party after the closing of his show called Curiouser or curio user. He had bought several cartons of masks, probably stolen, and repurposed them for his art. One party goer challenges him that the Africans who made the masks were paid peanuts, yet he is being paid outrageous sums for his art.

'...But I can't help being aware of the balance of power, the imbalance, one should say. The way you live here, the way the people who made these masks live.'

'And you, poor thing, sleeping on a bench at the station.'

'Oh, I'm talking about myself too, you mustn't take it personally. It's just a question of awareness, of being conscious and
staying conscious of how things are, even if you can't change them. Especially then.'

Later, the artist thinks,

Where had Leon picked up this girl Amy? He knew the type. They drove to their televised protests in their snappy little cars, they took their djembe drums on board as hand luggage, they gazed upon exploitation and oppression through their Police sunglasses. And all along they demonstrated that there was nothing to be done. Their radicalism consisted in making manifest the impossibility of change.

Our fourth and final protagonist runs a business putting up billboards. He's on his way home from installing one in the new housing project, when he realizes that he's forgotten his phone, probably dropped at the work site. He turns back and meets the minibus that the census taker had passed in the first story.

The interconnectedness of these seemingly random strangers is similar to the way components of an exploded view seem complete unto themselves, but are parts of a larger whole. Race, class, and education level seem to divide these characters, yet they are entwined in a larger, complicated societal whole. Although the story is set post-apartheid, racism and de facto segregation are realities acknowledged by everyone. Although all the characters are besmirched by the system, I found myself drawn to them and their petty struggles. Although not a cheerful book, I was comforted by the common humanness of their situations.

This is the second book by Vladislavić that I've read, and it's very different from The Folly, which has a fantastical or allegorical element. But I found both books thought-provoking and well-written, and although I finished both with more questions than answers, I enjoyed pondering those questions.