Translated from Italian by Ann GoldsteinPublished by Alfred A. Knopf, 2016, 233 pages. Original version published in 2016.Review by Imran Ali Khan In Other Words by Jhumpa Lahiri is a beautiful read that explores the relationship between a writer, language and the nature of the self. The book explores the writer's relationship with Italian, a …
Mengele Zoo: Gert Nygårdshaug
1989, 454 pages. Widely regarded to be the best Norwegian book ever written, and recipient of numerous literary awards, it is strange that Mengele Zoo has yet to be published in English. It is the first in a trilogy that continues with Himmelblomsttreets muligheter (The Sky Flower Tree’s Opportunities, 1995) and Afrodites basseng (Aphrodite’s Pool, …
Fiction v Nonfiction – English Literature’s Made-Up Divide (from The Guardian)
As readers in the English-speaking world debate about the merits of fiction over non-fiction, this distinction does not even exist in several cultures. In this article from The Guardian's website, Richard Lea writes about how Bosnian, Arabic, Gikuyu and other languages label (or don't label) genres. "There’s a mighty canyon that runs down the middle …
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Cathedral of the Sea: Ildefonso Falcones
Translated from Spanish by Nick CaistorPublished by Black Swan / Dutton, 2008, 611 pages. Original version published in 2006. The first chapter of this book felt like a piece of music—flutes gently celebrating the wedding of Bernat Estanyol, a Catalonian farmer, and his bride, the lovely Fransesca. Then the approach of the feudal lord Llorenç …
Euphoria: Lily King
Published by Picador, 2015, 272 pages. Using an incident in the life of anthropologist Margaret Mead (about a trip that Mead—Nell Stone, in the novel—had taken with her husband to study tribes in New Guinea), Lily King turns it into a story about relationships and the inability to completely know someone, let alone an entire …
Our Lady of the Nile: Scholastique Mukasonga
Translated from French by Melanie MauthnerPublished by Archipelago Press / Daunt Books, 2014, 240 pages. Original version published in 2012. Scholastique Mukasonga paints a picture of a country by focusing on the microcosm of a girls’ boarding school in Rwanda around 1980. Our Lady of the Nile is a secondary school for girls run by …
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My Brilliant Friend: Elena Ferrante
Translated from Italian by Ann GoldsteinPublished by Thorndike Press, 2016, 497 pages. Original version published in 2011. Elena Ferrante has become a literary sensation in the Anglophone world with The Neopolitan Quartet, books about a friendship between two women. The books not only chart the story of Elena and Lila’s friendship over several decades but …
The Intangibility of Books: The Digital Bibliophile, by Eric Burns-White
An interesting article on the ongoing and seemingly endless debate on the merits of paper books and ebooks. Personally, I'm very much a paper book person and don't even own a Kindle. But I did enjoy this article on the joys of ebooks--and modern information technology--and thought I'd share it. "We’ve all heard it said that …
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Fiela’s Child: Dalene Matthee
Published by Knopf / Longman, 1986, 350 pages.Review by Sadhana Ramchander The power a woman or an animal has when she is a mother—this is the idea that is central to Fiela's Child. It also asks the question—is identity, which people give utmost importance to—an abstract thing after all? It is a gripping story, set …
Em and the Big Hoom: Jerry Pinto
Published by Aleph Book Company, 2012, 235 pages. Both books I’ve read this month—Elena Ferrante’s My Brilliant Friend and Jerry Pinto’s Em and the Big Hoom—have been excellent. And the year has only just begun! Em and the Big Hoom is a moving, funny account of living with a mentally ill, suicidal mother—Em of the …
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