Je vis comme une bête, une bête qui a faim, puis qui est fatiguée. Jamais je ne me suis senti si abruti, si vide de pensée, et je comprends que l’accablement physique, qui ne laisse pas aux êtres le temps de réfléchir, qui les réduit à ne plus éprouver que des besoins élémentaires, soit un sûr moyen de domination. Je comprends que les esclaves se soumettent si aisément, car il ne leur reste plus de forces disponibles pour la révolte, ni l’imagination pour la concevoir, ni l’énergie pour la concerter. Je comprends cette sagesse des oppresseurs, qui retirent à ceux qu’ils exploitent l’usage de leur cerveau, en les courbant sous des tâches qui épuisent. Je me sens parfois au bord de cet envoûtement que donnent la lassitude et la monotonie, au bord de cette passivité animale qui accepte tout, au bord de la soumission qui est la destruction de l’individu.
Another teeny, tiny, two hundred year old book. CONVERSATIONS ON THE PLURALITY OF WORLDS, 1809.
‘Fontenelle addresses female readers and suggests that the offered explanation should be easily understood even by those without scientific knowledge. This move has been praised by some modern feminist critics as admitting women’s intelligence in scientific matters’.
nobody ever used footnotes better than de Laclos, who wrote in his own novel that he was omitting a big chunk of storyline cause it’s not very interesting
“I’ve read this one though, over and over. This is Les Vraies Richesses by Monsieur Giono. I wanted to understand why the store was named after this book. Listen, this is my favorite part: ‘They were used to waiting for orders and being told how to live. Now they decided to live as they pleased, simply, not listening to anyone, and everything was lit up, truly, as when we find the match and the lamp, and the house is illuminated, and we know at last where to reach for what we need, as when the dawn lights up a larger dwelling, and a part of the world that had been smothered by night’s mud, with its valleys, rivers, hills, and forests, is revealed in all its living joy.’ That’s what I felt when I came to work in this bookstore.”
InOur Riches Kaouther Adimi weaves together almost 90 years of Algerian history, from late French colonial rule and independence to a few years shy of the present, with the history of Les Vraies Richesses the unique bookshop/library/publishing house founded by Edmond Charlot.
This small multiple award-winning book, translated to English by Chris Andrews, is an ode to books and the great cultural enrichment around them. Yet at the same time it also simply presents the stoicism and resiliency of Algeria and its people over the years through wars, insurgency, bureaucracy, and authoritarianism. While Adimi has crafted both with imagination and meticulous research an agreeable short fiction novel, it does do the reader good to be familiar with the many figures of literature and past of Algeria in the last century to fully appreciate the richness of the work.
Our Riches by Kaouther Adimi (alternately titled A Bookshop in Algiers) is available in English translated by Chris Andrews, in print and digital (including audio)
Don’t Whisper Too Much and Portrait of a Young Artiste from Bona Mbella by Frieda Ekotto
“Everyone knew what children, young girls, women had to endure. They kept silent, even though they were bursting with remorse. They told themselves, “Let the secret be kept as long as the ancestors shall live.” But every secret, whatever it may be, is uncovered someday.”
Don’t Whisper Too Much is a novel first published in 2001 (though at under 100 pages more regarded in English as a novella) by a Cameroonian lesbian author whose queer work was the first such fiction to portray African women-loving-women positively.
Yet this book surprisingly put me off a bit. Perhaps, I am simply culturally ignorant of context since while I know a good deal about French literature, I cannot claim the same about Cameroon where author Frieda Ekotto was born and too where she has set these stories. Maybe my literacy is slipping as I was rather preoccupied with the generational patriarchal cycle depicted that link these women with abuse. Similar to points in the introduction by Lindsey Green-Simms, I think the nuggets found here are about silence and confinement— the many methods of oppression and resistance how one may or may not engage with such. The work is also interesting in the way it’s written. Rhythmical, different narrators, voices through texts in text, translated expertly to English in 2019 by Corine Tachtiris. Yes, writing quite a long time coming both in original publication and new editions.
Portrait of a Young Artiste from Bona Mbella made up of short vignettes originally published in 2010, and the second part of the book, may be more approachable in style though, colloquial. These pieces written in majority from the perspective of a young woman named Chantou.But again, neither light reading for what is a small tome.
I’d propose these works for those interested in ‘path-breaking’ literature.
Don’t Whisper Too Much and Portrait of a Young Artiste from Bona Mbella by Frieda Ekotto, is available in English translated by Corine Tachtiris, in print and digital from Bucknell University Press
Man, books in the 150-300 years old range are strange because you’re too far removed from the context in which the text was written to experience it as “intended,” but you’re close enough to it to recognize the shape or shadow of what you’re missing.
As I’ve said i’m reading the Count of Monte Cristo and the snobbish veneer age tends to give books (or at least their cover designs) doesn’t wipe out the fact that this is an exciting, over-the-top adventure story packed to the brim with “coolness.” I don’t really know how to describe it other than it’s a Lot.
The titular character is hyper-competent at everything and has a ton of “unrealistic” skills and abilities. He’s a sailor, he’s super smart and cunning, he’s a master of disguise, he can see in the dark because of his years in a dark dungeon, he knows science and lots of languages, powerful bandit lords are at his beck and call, and he’s dark and brooding and mysterious, full of pain and a desire for REVENGE…a couple other characters have a discussion where they call him a Byronic hero and debate whether or not he is a vampire.
So far we’ve been to Rome and Paris and met up with bandit lords and ocean smugglers, hung out with high society in France, pulled off a sick prison break, found secret treasure, done opium and hashish (both at once), flirted with loads of hot ladies, and seen all sorts of marvelous luxuries and trendy gadgets and excitement. For a book that is over 1,300 pages long, it sure is fast paced.
Apparently it was originally published as a serial, which explains all the cliffhangers.
Anyway, the Count of Monte Cristo is one of those “classics” that ended up there purely by being wildly popular and I sure can see why people loved it!
There is edgy anime character art of Edmond Dantés. I checked.
The Nutcracker and the Mouse King was written by the Prussian writer E.T.A Hoffman and was published in 1816. The book starts out on Christmas Eve when a little girl and her brother Fritz are examining their Christmas presents. Their Godfather Drosselmeir makes fantastic toys for them every year. This year one of these toys is a nutcracker which Marie is very drawn to. In the middle of the night a mouse king with 7 heads attacks and the nutcracker and various toys fight him off. In an interlude we hear the nutcracker’s backstory. Then after the nutcracker is victorious against the mouse king he takes Marie to a Christmas wonderland, apparently called The Kingdom of Dolls which is a land made of sweet things.
Did I Like It?:
I enjoyed reading the original tale behind the nutcracker ballet although it did seem much different than I remember it. The tale did seem extravagant and all over the place, although magical. I couldn’t believe how many toys Marie and Fritz got for Christmas. Their childhood seemed so weirdly extravagant. Yet the tale was fun. So filled with dolls and sweets. This tale did seem firmly rooted in it’s Prussian/German background as well. I will say that I feel this translation wasn’t that great as it felt a bit disjointed unfortunately.
The Tale of the Nutcracker
About:
The Tale of the Nutcracker is an adaptation of Hoffman’s story and was written by the French writer Alexandre Dumas and published in 1845. Dumas does not really do anything new to the plot, which I was expecting. However, I was grateful to read this version because Dumas is such a great storyteller. I felt his version was more cohesive and read better to me. Although, like I said I don’t think Hoffman’s story was translated well, so I might feel differently if I had read a better translation.
Overall impression of both versions:
I’m glad to have read them both! Of course I’m glad to have read Hoffman’s original, but then also grateful to read Dumas version, which brought more cohesion and his great knack for storytelling. I have a different perspective on this story in hindsight. The story seemed so excessive to me at first. Marie and Fritz’s life so spoiled. However Hoffman showed the life of bourgeois children of that time, spoiled, but orderly. Their toys even put on display instead of played with. Through her mysterious odd Godfather Marie is able to open up her imagination. Anything can become alive, fantasy can become reality, all her wildest dreams could become true. Not only that, but these bizarre occurrences make her more compassionate. She sees beyond the nutcracker’s deformities and has love for him anyway. In contrast is her brother Fritz who seems more spoiled, more out of touch with imagination. Rigid. Obsessed with his soldier toys. Marie breaks free from her previous potential and almost transcends reality. It’s a bizarre fairytale, but I see it’s merit.
Do I Recommend it?:
Yes! If you grew up watching or participating in the ballet, it’s always interesting to read the original story. This is for lovers of fairytales and the bizarre as well.
Of course, don’t miss the amazing Works by Edouard Levé, translated by Jan Steyn for The Dalkey Archive. The thesis of the book is captured in its first point: “1. A BOOK OF WORKS THAT THE AUTHOR HAS CONCEIVED BUT NOT BROUGHT INTO BEING.” That’s just the start.
3. Proust’s head is drawn on a page of In Search of Lost Time. The words tracing out the contour of his face form a grammatically correct sentence.
15. A leather jacket made from a mad cow.
19. A butterfly is released into a room, hidden from sight. Every night, its flight, detected by laser beams, is transmitted to a mobile machine equipped with an hourglass. By morning, the imprint of the nocturnal flight is drawn in sand on the floor.
26. A building is transformed into a cemetery. The rooms become vaults.
35. Fake drawings by artists from the early twentieth century are folded up and inserted into books in provincial libraries. The books are chosen for the coincidence of their dates of publication and the supposed dates of the drawings. At an undetermined date, a reader discovers the work. Not imagining that it might be a fake, since the usual motive for forgery – the financial enrichment of the forger – is not operative here, experts authenticate the drawing. The artist’s body of works is augmented. Wrongly so.
Natalie Clifford Barney was an American writer who hosted a literary salon at her home in Paris for more than 60 years, bringing together writers and artists from around the world. Her own works were often thematically tied to her lesbianism and feminism, and attendees of various sexualities expressed themselves and mingled comfortably at the weekly Salon gatherings. Barney later said she knew she was a lesbian by age twelve, and she was determined to “live openly, without hiding anything.”
