ext_939: Sheep wearing an eyepatch (skywardprodigal Cog Flowers)
[identity profile] spiralsheep.livejournal.com
6, 7, & 8. Three poetry collections by Moniza Alvi: Carrying My Wife, A Bowl of Warm Air, and The Country At My Shoulder (all three collections are available together in an omnibus also called "Carrying My Wife"). I have to admit, out of about 150 poems, there were three that did anything for me. I mostly found the expression of content incomprehensible, possibly due to the author reaching for innovative imagery, and the aesthetics of form uninteresting, but she's a comparatively popular mainstream Establishment poet so my judgement is extremely questionable (and I haven't heard her read her own work live). There are two of the poems, which did speak to me, at my dw journal.

9. The Redbeck* Anthology of British South Asian Poetry, edited by Debjani Chatterjee, is a nearly 200 page collection with a wide variety of content and style, which I enjoyed. There are two example poems at my dw journal and a third example poem but, of course, three poems can't reflect the breadth (or depth) of this anthology.

* I keep misreading it as "Redneck". ::facepalm::

10. The Lost Thing by Shaun Tan didn't appeal to me visually as much as the previous Tan books I've perused but the gist, that it's more important to be happy than to fit in, is another good theme, especially for kids.

Note to tag wranglers: "british-asian" and/or "british-south-asian" is correct usage and, yes, some of the authors (and/or their subjects) are also caribbean / african / &c.

Tags: women writers, poetry, anthologies, asian, british-asian, pakistan, britain, british, caribbean, african, bangladesh, india, indian, indian-british, pakistani, bangladeshi, pakistani-british, bangladeshi-british, british-south-asian, asian-australian, australian, chinese-australian, picture books
zeborah: Zebra against a barcode background, walking on the word READ (books)
[personal profile] zeborah
I'm very enthusiastic about this book, and not only because at one point it refers to Sultana's Dream and I'm like, “Yes, I've read that!" As one might half expect from such a reference this is a deeply feminist story: the story of those who wait, but don't just wait.

The prologue tells of Rehana's children being taken from her after her husband's death, so it's a bit of a jolt to have chapter 1 begin 10 years after she's won them back. But this lacuna becomes instrumental later while the story explores her determination to protect her children in another context entirely: Bangladesh's struggle for independence from Pakistan. Her love of and fear for her son Sohail is a staple of such stories, but I especially liked the development of her more difficult relationship with her daughter Maya; and of her own character in supporting her children and friends and country – with which she has yet another nuanced relationship. There is a subtle but I think a very deliberate interplay of themes which holds the tales of family and country effortlessly together.
vass: Jon Stewart reading a dictionary (books)
[personal profile] vass
19. Angélica Gorodischer, Kalpa Imperial
If I believed in schools handing out books and insisting people read them, which I don't, then this would be one of the books they should hand out and insist people read. It's just wonderful. "A storyteller is nothing less than a free man."

I did find the ending a little bit too cute for my taste, but your mileage may vary. I also would have liked a slightly blunter interrogation of the concept of empire (it's there, but it's very subtle) but that's probably just me. It was, as I said, wonderful as it was.

20. Taslima Nasrin, Shame (original title: Lajja)
This book was written about the ethnic and religious conflict between the Hindus and Muslims in Bangladesh in 1992. Her thesis is that it's not 'conflict' when one side's doing it to another side. This point of view did not make her popular with Muslim leaders, who declared a fatwa on her for the book. I think if I'd known that Taslima Nasrin was so emphatically anti-Islam I wouldn't have read the book, but Shame does not actually attack the religion itself, only fundamentalism of all kinds, and the actions of some Muslims.

This is a very difficult book to read. It has two conflicting aims: to narrate a novel, and to bear careful and detailed witness to atrocity. The latter purpose often overwhelms the former, as the author bursts into long, horrifying lists of places that were looted and burned, people who were beaten, women who were raped.

The translator, Kankabatti Datta, is, I think, translating out of his/her first language, not into it (as is best practice in translation.) As a result, this edition is rather stilted and purple; it also has more typoes than I'd like.

Here's Dr Nasrin at her best: "Riots are not natural phenomena or disasters. Riots reflect the perversity of human nature." To make this intersectional for a moment, she reminds me how people say that a woman 'was raped', instead of 'somebody raped her' - as if it's a natural disaster that happened to her. The riots in Bangladesh are like that: they didn't happen, people did them.

A warning, for people who like warnings: the protagonist graphically rapes a woman.
ext_20269: (Mood - sleepy/lazy hippo)
[identity profile] annwfyn.livejournal.com
'Brick Lane' is one of these books that I'd heard a lot about before I bought it - it had a lot of good reviews, was turned into a film, inspired protests from the Bangladeshi community and provoked a minor contraversy regarding the authenticity of the author and whether it was reasonable for an Asian writer from a fairly western and assimilated background to write about first generation Bangladeshi immigrants.

And so I read it, and having done so I can see why so many people liked it - it is a well written, thoughtful, insightful book in which Ali is incredibly good at not creating bad guys, or cardboard cut outs, but a lot of different men and women trying to do their best. I also really enjoyed seeing the east end of London - which I know well - through immigrant eyes. It was really interesting to look at the city I live in in a different way. Some of the things she said also reminded me of how I felt about England when I came back after living in Nepal for six months - I remember how big and grey and concrete everything felt, and how everyone seemed to move so quickly and looked so big and doughy, and I had only been away from England for six months!

Yet for all that, 'Brick Lane' failed to connect with me. I think a big part of the problem for me was the sheer scale of the novel. It starts in the early 80s in Tower Hamlets, and runs through until the present day. That's an awful lot of time to cover, with the main character starting off as an 18 year old girl who has just arrived in England, and ending as a mature woman with two teenage daughters. I think that's an ambitious structure for a novel, and one which I think mostly worked, but did leave me feeling a little lost behind at times, as it jumped about.

I've just finished this book, and I'm still unsure if I enjoyed it. I didn't dislike it, and I'm sure a lot of people will really enjoy it. It just didn't satisfy me, and I felt at times as if I'd have got as much out of it by just dipping in and out, and picking out bits of the descriptions that appealed.

It isn't a bad book, but I think if I had my time again I'll move it to the back of my pile and save it for a slow and rainy day.
[identity profile] lyras.livejournal.com
1. The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid.

I enjoyed this - if you can use the word "enjoy" about such an uncomfortable book. It's a quick read, and I was immersed from the very beginning. Unlike other reviewers I've seen, the rather artificial set-up (Muslim man approaches Westerner sitting in cafe and keeps him talking by pouring out the story of his life in the USA) didn't bother me, because I was too interested in where the story was going.

Cut for vague spoilers )

The ending )

Overall, worth reading, but not a favourite.


2. Spiral Road by Adib Khan

"Masud Alam has lived in Australia for the past 30 of his 53 years. Now his father is dying‚ drifting in a haze of Alzheimer′s‚ and Masud has returned to Bangladesh to say goodbye and to reconnect with his family."

I know virtually nothing about Bangladesh, so I was always going to find this interesting, and the timing (post-911) made it even more fascinating. Masud is a fairly typical "blank" protagonist who has spent most of his life trying to escape his past, which includes fighting in Bangladesh's war of independence. As soon as he returns home, he is caught up in all sorts of intrigues, from his mother's attempted matchmaking to his brother's problematic business dealings to his nephew's worrying extremism.

I loved this book. The quietly wistful writing is just up my street, and despite knowing very little about the setting I was quickly drawn into Masud's world. I'll be looking for more of his work now.

Adib Khan was born in Bangladesh but has lived in Australia for over thirty years, and from what I can tell his stories focus on the clash of cultures and the question of home. He doesn't seem to be very well known, but I highly recommend him to people doing the 50 book challenge.

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