melissa
«D'abord, il produisait un “vrai” roman, mais aussi il s'amusait» (from the post-scriptum)
And that was obvious throughout. I heard about the book when i was a teen, it took me ten years to find it in a bookstore and another ten to finally read it. I thought it would be an exercise, a group of texts or poems, but i did not expect to read an actual novel with an interesting plot and very silly humour. Perec was not struggling with the condition he forced on himself but he was enjoying every bifurcation, taking the plot along with him. And you enjoy with him his choices; the loan words, the switching of languages, the continuous lists, the puns, the meta references to the missing letter... a very enjoyable book that should be taken as it was intended, a playground of a writer.
I get the concept and it's a good concept, a black man during Jim Crow America uses the fact that he's white-passing to exact revenge on white society after the lynching of his brother. In the preface Vian makes a point that many white-passing black people use this as a privilege to live as white people instead of avenging their societies from within, which is why this book exists. Boris Vian wrote the book under the name “Vernon Sullivan” a supposed black american, but really it feels like it's a caricature of America, like how you imagine the US after watching a few film noir movies. I think that's where the french got their Nouvelle Vague vibe from, and it's also obvious how the french cared more about social justice in America than the white americans ever did.
The fact that Jazz and later rock n roll reached europe before it did white america, and how french people believed america needed to have race equality to prove that it's the “new world” they were all promised, lead to these kinds of books being written by French people (a bit delusional when you know america was built on genocide, but it's a concept i find in many french thinkers from Hugo to Verne and later Vian). Also during that time african american artists would leave to France, feeling there the freedom they never did find in the US (James Baldwin spoke about this). Same with how Rock n Roll reached europe before white america and that it lead to the “british invasion” couple decades later.
Moving on, about the book though, there was just too much graphic sexual scenes with minors and continuous sexual assaults, that a feeling of nausea stayed with me throughout the reading. I think this is part of what i referenced as the american caricature, the book's first half did not need to be mostly about an adult sleeping with drunk teens.
The bigger disappointment though was the fact that the writer basically skipped the reveal of the revenge, which made the whole book senseless. What's the point of a revenge story when the writer doesn't write the reaction of the people getting destroyed, and the why. When the avenger faces off with his victims and explains his reasons. Maybe the author wanted to show that there is no satisfaction with revenge? But that would be in contradiction of the book's concept. Anyway, important book to know about culturally, but was a bit disappointing, i'm not sad i read it though.
**i did really much enjoy the preface of Boris Vian writing about Sullivan's writing style and his genius as if he's not waxing lyrical about himself. He must've really enjoyed that bit.
Pure Orientalism from a guy who visited the “middle east” (israel).
The info about Baal are from the Ugarit tablets and the Bible, so nothing new there. He just takes his time writing every reference of Baal in the Bible, which didn't need 70 pages, more like two. He mentions his skiing in “israel” in between, which is never a good sign of someone knowing the native culture of the land. Then he makes up rituals for Baal, if the book wasn't ridiculous enough.
If it were actual rituals he's describing or social events, that could've been passable, but this western concept of doing rituals to benefit yourself only is so weird. You're burning a candle and offering meat to a god to get money? Anyway, usual american nonsense.
I don't know what i expected of Jules Verne but it wasn't that. Hollywood adaptations has turned Verne into a shallow adventure writer, when i've never come across such a well researched work. It was very impressive, from the history, geography, physics and marine biology written in this book, everything i searched was accurate. This book was more of a journal of travels than an adventure book, where i got to learn about every corner of the world (except the then undiscovered ones, where Verne's imagination was quite interesting). Then there's Captain Nemo, the actual hero of this story.
Turns out there was a book released about him before this one, so i will have to read that. But coming in blind like the narrator and trying to figure out Captain Nemo, i loved the mystery even if not much is answered. I just know that i empathize with this man's hatred of the so called “civilized world”.
I'll end it with this quote from him:
«Je suis le droit, je suis la justice ! me dit-il. Je suis l'opprimé, et voilà l'oppresseur ! C'est par lui que tout ce que j'ai aimé, chéri, vénéré, patrie, femme, enfants, mon père, ma mère, j'ai vu tout périr ! Tout ce que je hais est là ! Taisez-vous ! »
It's good to finally read about our people's mythology when it's all happening in our land and it's part of our History. Main problem i got was the highfalutin translation, it felt too British and got me out of the Canaanite mood.
Second, the analysis is too jewish-centric, no mentions of the Christians and Arabs and the parallelisms there, even though these are the cultures that mainly stayed in the land. Barely any mention of the greeks and babylonians in the analysis too, it just felt (with the amount of isr3li professors and universities mentioned) like it's part of a zi0nist plan to take Ugarit and every Phoenician city on their way, as “land of the israelites”, and here's our proof.
Edit: Checked the author, apparently he teaches Biblical studies in Harvard. So it's an interesting angle, when we know that judaism started from the land of Canaan, just a weird angle for a book of stories. I would've read that essay independently and preferred to enjoy the myths on their own, with a more general analysis.
I wanted to read the book because of it being referenced in “La vie d'Adele” and now over 10 years have passed and i've completely forgotten most of the movie lol.
But anyway, i'm glad i read it, a french classic, and like all french classics they're always lovely to read. I still haven't figured out if Marivaux chose not to finish the book or if it happened accidentally, the change in interlocutor mid way makes me think it's the former. I could've read another 1000 page, it's entertaining to see how humans were in the 18th century, and how similar they still are now. Enjoying reading the analysis too.
Thinking of rewatching the movie or at least its beginning, to remember what parallelism other than the title there is between the two.
I was going to give this book a 2/5 star rating, but the last couple of pages saved it.
My main problem is the first half of the novel, Saramago believes himself doing a social commentary but it's obvious he has no idea how society, government, religion or just life in general works. His commentary felt more like the thought of a teenager writing their first diy comic.
Second problem were the tangents. They were neither interesting, funny nor observational.
The second half is just 80 pages on thoughts that if they were poetic would've worked, maybe something was lost in translation here cause anything could be salvaged with a good literary style. Maybe it's just that English is not made for this, latin languages tend to be beautiful while saying nothing.
The last 20 pages were the best, they were human, and that's always good.
This one is action packed which is the right thing to do in a final installment. Finally a book that's delves into the Deb x Dexter x Brian dynamic, which really is my favourite part. I believe it's a better finale than the series but also would've loved some closure. Somehow with Dexter we are always cursed with an unsatisfying ending.
That was a fun one, more focus on the life with Rita here. I really like how the characters around Dexter developed in the book series. It's interesting to see how the tv series understood the characters, how they developed them and how different it can be.
While the tv series “Dexter” is quite intense and dramatic, the books are run on ridiculous slapstick that i'm enjoying very much. I find it hilarious when Dexter speaks about being “off his game” when the guy hadn't had anything going his way in 6 books lol.
That was the most well constructed book of the series thus far. There was actual detective work, some not too obvious hints for the reader that went completely over the narrator's head, some mystery, suspense, a bit of emotion and finally an ending with a closure and not the abrupt ending of the earlier books.
The series is still consistent, there was some more “emotion” in this one, if we can call it that, sadly very briefly, tho again, makes sense when your narrator is a psychopath.
The more the series goes, the more Dexter fumbles and the funnier it's getting. Another fun book, tho a bit all over the place. I mainly wanted some more Deb basically.
*the Cuba mentions were annoying but not as annoying as in other American media, so a bit bearable.
There's the aspect of the “Medecin Malgré lui” (The Doctor in Spite of Himself) that i find hilarious. The concept of this scary heartless serial killer that finds himself risking his life and saving people cause he doesn't want his sister to be sad and just sucks at social interactions tickles me.
I do wish the endings would be less abrupt, maybe get to know what the characters are thinking about what went on, but it does make sense for the self-centered narrator to not care to share.
*Very different from the series but fun to see which details the series writers decided to use and how.
Picked this book cz i just finished watching the series and i got hooked. Season 1 is supposed to be based on this one, but it was quite different which is perfect cause not much was spoiled. I know the writers of the series only read the first two books, so it'll be interesting to see how they both diverged.
We visit Maya Angelou's childhood in scenes throughout the book, introducing us to her life as much as the life of the black population during Jim Crow. Really good book, my only problem is that a book written in independent scenes is not made for a person with my attention span and it took me forever to finish it.