Tag: NOBEL LIT

The Hunger Angel by Herta Muller

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The hunger angel by Herta Muller

German  title Atemschaukel

Translator Philip Boehm

Source – review copy

Well this is the third book from the German /Romanian Nobel winning writer  Herta Muller ,Every time I try her books I found myself more drawn into her style and quirky imagery and wordplay .She is a true one-off, this book is another that is set partly in her homeland of Romanian but this time it is in the mid forties as the war is drawing to an end .We see how the German Romanian suffered at the hands of the Soviets .

What can be said about chronic hunger .Perhaps that there’s a hunger that can make you sick  with hunger .That it comes in addition to the hunger you already fell .Then there is a hunger which is always new ,which grows insatiably ,which pounces on the never-ending old hunger that already took such effort to tame .

Leo on hunger when he has been at the camp a while .

We meet Leo he is in his teens and he is a German Romanian just like Herta Muller is herself .We see his life as he is caught up in the post world war two events ,as Romania side with the Germans the Soviets are now rounding up all the German connected Romanians Like Leo to send to the Labour camps ,WE see how this young man caught up in this copes with the horrors of a labour camp we see how a normal man ,this man has a poet’s eye as you will see from who it based on ,has to struggle and change to cope with the system in the camps and is thus on the other side is a broken man and maybe not as free as he seems  .It seems that Muller largely based Leo on Oskar Pastior a German Romanian like Muller ,she was friends with him and they had planned to write this book together meeting near the end of his life and making a journey to the place he had been sent in the old soviet union (now in Ukraine ) to get a feel for the man here is him reading one of his own poems in German  but Oskar passed  away before they could  finish the project ,so this is her take on his time in a labour camp from what she learned in the time they spent together ..

There are also other partners .

I’ve danced with the teapot .

With the sugar bowl .

With the biscuit tin.

With the telephone .

With the alarm clock .

With the ashtray .

With the house key .

This poem on the last page sounds like Paitor from the two poems I ve read and is Leo when he is free or is he ?

 

Well it is an easy piece to compare this to Aleksandra Solzhenitsyn one day in the life .. and in some ways Darkness at noon by Koestler .Both of which show the horror of the labour camps or soviet prison system (yes I know darkness never says it is russia but it is implied that it is ).It does and it doesn’t ,I feel it is Muller own unique style that maybe sets this above the others and the clever use of the Hunger angel metaphor ,each person has their own Hunger angels in their minds what form it takes is unique to each of them .Another hard look into her own origins and that of her fellow German Romanians .Like in her other books they always seem stuck between two worlds and not of one place or the other not Romanian or German and this is rather like Muller’s writing that always seems misplaced not quite german and not quite east european , it is always uniquely her .Another great read for Lizzy’s and Caroline’s German lit month

Have you read this book ?

Do you have a favourite book set in the labour camps ?

 

Nobel winner for 2012 in literature Mo yan

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Nobel Literature prize winner for 2012 is Mo yan

He was given the for his motivation, realism , folk-tales and history .I ve yet to read Mo Yan my self but have red sorghum on my tbr pile that I ll be starting shortly and have a review of by the weekend .he is from a pheasant family left school at twelve to work in the fields ,gained his education from the Chinese army .Made his début in 1981 ,his best known book is Red sorghum that was made into a film that won an award in Berlin film festival .Franz Kafkaesque is how I ve seen him mentioned he is a  writer about rural china and the mixture of myths and supernatural world he grew up hearing from stories as a child  .He is a true rags to riches writer .

Here is his wiki page 

Here is from a recent china daily piece 

Nobel literature prize 2012 who’s going to win ?

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Nobel literature prize 2012 who’s going to win ?

Well its that time of year again when people start asking who is going to win the Nobel prize for literature .In the last two days there has been posts on Complete review  where Michael discusses the betting . I must admit in recent years the winner has jumped in the betting last day .The Guardian also picked up on the betting and the fact that Haurki Murkami is favourite at the moment .So who do I think they’ll pick well it is like shooting fish in a barrel there are maybe 50 plus writers that could be in a position to win the prize .I always feel the prize is like a golden gong to say well done on being a great writer ,so the writers in the mix tend to be middle to end of their  writing life writers .Well I ll throw a few names in the mix as I have done previous years I ll go round the continents and say a few names and briefly why my feeling is it may be a Asian or African writer this year but I think I said that last year  –

Asia –

Haruki Murkami – ok 1q84 wasn’t quite the masterpiece we had all hoped it would be but has any writer such a good collection of novel,short stories and non fiction  ?

Salman Rushdie – counting that his best books are set in India and he grew up there I putting him down as Indian for this lots of good books and one great book midnight’s children is wonderful insight into India after british rule .(you could also include Rohinton Mistry and Vikram Seth both great writers .

Mo Yan – I don’t know a lot about but is called the chinese Franz Kafka ,but is only 57 .I think Chinese writers will win the Nobel but the problem is they have only in the last 15 -20 years grown in popularity in the west .But their time is coming .

Middle east –

Adonis – the Syrian poet is a Nobel speculation favourite he has been mention for years and years .I had him as one of my favourites last year with the Arab spring and with recent events in his homeland maybe this year is his .

Amos Oz – the voice of Israeli in many ways Oz has chronicle his homeland for more than 50 years ,he has won every major prize round the world bar this one .

Aharon Appelfeld – another Israeli writer Appelfeld has kept the horrors of the second world war alive in his fiction and made people think of what happened ?

Europe

 

Peter Nadas /Lazslo Krasznahorkai – I ve read books by both these Hungarian modernist in the last year they are shoulder to shoulder in my mind and the last Hungarian Nobel winner was ten years ago but for a country with such a rich heritage I wouldn’t be surprised to see one of these two win .

Juan Goytisolo – the Spaniard has long experimented with his fiction recent talk of english fiction being experimental makes me laugh Goytisolo has been doing it for decades .(Enrique Vila-Matas may also be a contender from spain )

Ulrich Holbein another writer that is always in the betting and one I ve mention a lot of times here on winstonsdad as one that needs to be translated into english .If he won how long would it take not long I ‘d say !!

Cees Nooteboom – I had an interview with Cees on the blog last year ,he is such a  talent writer poet ,novelist and travel writer  .He is too  many the voice of holland .Another writer I d like to win

Africa –

Ngugi wa thong – the Kenyan is another name that has been mention in recent years .He also recently published his first novel for twenty years the wizard which I ve on my tbr pile .

Chinua Achebe – Nigeria’s most famous writer best known for things fall apart one of the first modern african novels .

Assia Dejbar – rose high on  last year betting ,the Algerian is a member of the French academy and she is one of the  most respected writers from north Africa

Americas –

Philip Roth – I ll say same as I did last year neither Mailer or Updike won the nobel so maybe Roth should ,only concern for me is the recent books not been his best.

Alice Munro /Lorrie Moore – two great short story writers ,both have chronicle contemporary america life in their own ways .

Isabel Allende – She has long been the best female writer in latin america and not enough women from latin america have won .

Cesar Aira – The  major writer I ve missed covering and reading from Argentina ,but he has written over thirty novels .

So who do you think ?

here is the latest betting  

Parallel stories by Peter Nadas

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Parallel stories by Peter Nadas

Hungarian fiction

Translator Imre Goldstein

When I was asked earlier in the year to review Parallel stories I said yes, no problem and when it fell on the doorstep all 1100 plus pages of this modern epic I thought have I made a mistake ,but no I decide to set aside a couple of weeks to work my way through this modern masterpiece ,I finished it a few weeks ago but struggled with how to review it how to pay justice to Nadas vision and scope this book is deep and so multi layered it is hard to sum up with out drifting of into the individual and multiple story lines in this book so I then had to think of a different way of conveying the book and then it struck me the other day when I said in my thoughts how do you cover a master piece then it hit me describe the book as thou it was a piece of art using loose ideas and AI d be able to catch the spirit of the book .

Scene –

Well Nadas has sat down and drawn time from the centre point this is 1956 and 1961 two turning points in Hungary’s modern history in the context of this book the first the revolution that the russians so violently crushed ,the other is set in the bathhouse in Budapest where the three main characters that feature in the book talk about the city all have shady pasts and form the main body of the book .Nadas expands the lines out to recent history be it in Hungary or Germany and back to pre world war two and how this effect the Hungary on the fifties and sixties in this way showing how the events that happened in these two years happened and how the affected the future like a newtons cradle as what happened in 38 or 44 having a knock on effect via these two years to the modern world .

 

Sketches-

the sketches are the outlines of the three main characters there are a number of others but the three main ones are Hans von Wolkstein his mother was german and had a dark link to the Nazis regime in the war ,Agost from a connected Hungarian family his father served in a number of posts for different governments in Hungary and the last and maybe the darkest character is Andras Rott he is a spy and has very dark ideas .Like a spider’s web these three characters connect to most if not all of the people involved in the stories whether it is there parents stories or the lovers or lovers families all the little vignettes that make the most part of parallel stories connect to the three main stars of the narrative .

For a moment she thought Agost has gone mad .That he’d really lost his mind …..

and she would have loved tp love – no, worship his ankles ,his wrists hi every part ,his cock and every little bone in his body ,even impalpable things like the curve of the arches of his feet ,she adored him .

Agost future with about him .

 

Style

Well this is a post modern book and like a classic post modern art the rule book of writing has been thrown out ,we drift from crime ,through highly erotic prose and into political drama oh and if you want any indication as to when people are talking forget it Nadas isn’t a fan of quotation marks but it is no harder than Ulysses in that regard .This book is like a collage of different styles that may on the surface seem chaotic , but as you work your way through they all seem to drop into place and in some ways the jarring styles works and yes it jumps from sex to the political but hey doesn’t real life a lot of the time ?

Subject

well when I first thought of the way to describe the book like art ,two things came to mind and that was Goya’s spanish french war pieces those horrific torture sketches and the art of Francis bacon ,like bacon Nadas takes the formal eastern european history especially hungarian history , which is the frame of the book like Bacon used the pope image or the crucifix but like Bacon Nadas has taken a personal view of these matters and yes here it is sex, sex and even more sex .This book is littered with sex ,good ,bad and downright vile sex but this is the flip people with no real freedom they find freedom in sex so that is what Nadas describes the end of book one is a novella length chapter that follows one grandiose act of sex between Agost and his future wife .So like the bacon at first you are a little scarred of the images but you then look beyond the picture to the painter and the same is said of Parallel stories Nadas describes the act of sex so well in places he must have had some practice whilst writing the book also the lexicon of rude parts is used to the max her bodily parts are described and over described at times .The connection to the Goya is politics how it plays a part war and conflict, from the nazi regime and the aftermath of that to communism and its faults .The Budapest revolution and lost freedom but how that one event affect the three main characters .

His black shirt and black pants ,wet with other mens urine and filthy with their sperm ,stuck to his back ,chest ,bottom and thighs they clung to him ,adhered to him like a skin ,white-hot with shame .

a scene from book two to give you an idea of the sex content of the book .

 

 

The final painting –

Well Parallel stories isn’t going to be to every ones taste to say the least it is not an easy read it needs time having read 2666 and Don Quixote in the last couple of years does it stack up against them yes long books tend to drift and diverge and this does maybe more than 2666 but not as much as Don Quixote .Is it gonna stand the test of time yes in my opinion it seems to lift the veils on the personnel lives of post war eastern Europeans more than any other book I ve read has this takes you in the bedroom even into the toilet more than you may want to know but sometimes you need a little uncomfortable in your reading not everything is comfortable in the world and nadas reminds you of this time and time again .It took Nadas eighteen years to write this book and Imre Goldstein a further five to translate her work on this book has made it accessible to the English reader Hungarian is a very hard language to translate from and she has done a sterling job here ,this is a strong IFFP contender and helps Nadas Nobel claims even more .

Have you a favourite Hungarian writer ?

Do you like post modern fiction ?

The tongue’s blood does not run dry by Assia Djebar

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The tongue’s blood does not run dry by Assia Djebar

Algerian Fiction

Translator – Tegan Raleigh

Assia Djebar name has flown high in the nobel odds the last couple of years so I decided to try her ,before she does win it .Assia Djebar is her pen name her real name being Fatima-Zohar Imalayen ,she is a Algerian of Berber origins , she was the first Algerian women to go the prestigious ENS  the elite Parisian college .Her first book was published in 1957 ,she was also the first Maghreb to be voted on to the  Académie française and won the Neustadt prize .I must say given all that she is still not well-known in the english speaking world and really should be .

This collection the first of two books I got by her from the library is a collection of short stories and a 80 page novella Felicie’s body ,I ll leave the stories mainly set in Algeria and all dealing with a female perspective on what it is to be a women in modern Algeria ,Felicie’s body deals with a women near the end of her life and indeed after her death she is french catholic and was married for her life to her Algerian husband who died before her now nearing the end of her life we see her having to take a muslim name to be buried beside her beloved husband this story really catches what it is to be between two worlds as this family is some of her children drawn to Algeria other to France we see how this family copes with her death of the mother and her wishes to be buried beside her husband in Algeria .

You arrive on a Monday morning in February ,unconscious already.In the ambulance ,I sit down next to my sister Ourdia ,who’s come with you from Oran .I tell myself this time you’ve come to die by my side ,right under my eyes .But will you at least look at me ,just once ? Smile at me ,maybe talk ?

The opening of Felicie’s body .

I was trying to  think of a way to sum up her writing and how it impacted me but I think  she  has  best summed up by a quote of her own –

I write like many other Algerian women with a sense of urgency against regression and misogyny .

That sums up so well how this book grabbed me and her as a writer feisty and lots of strong female characters .I asked my self is this a potential nobel winner having read other Nobel winners work and the answers is yes and I hope she does so her work can reach a wider audiences of readers .Her’s is a voice that lifts the lid on the female Muslim world of north africa and also how these women or there families are effected in France .The translation works a treat her the translator is new to me but has done a great job here .The book was published in the US  by seven stories press in 2006 and the original stories were published in French in 1997 .

Have you read her works ?

Have you a favourite North African writer ?

Nobel winner 2011 ?

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Well its nobel time again the yearly award that in last few years has got harder to call as the choices seem more obscure to us english language readers but not on the world stage so I ll throw a number of names up and why they could and why they couldn’t from favourites I ve seen mention and my own feelings –

Philip Roth – well he is the one I feel will win as it has been a long time since an us winner and he is probably the last of the big writers from sixties ie mailer and Updike etc .

PROS – well-known ,make up for Updike or mailer not winning Nobel

CONS – has won man booker this year ,recent books not as good as earlier cannon .

Juan Goytisolo – father of modern spanish writing ,

PROS – he is in Nobel mode of recent years tends to be experimental in his fiction ,best regarded living writer in Spain

CONS – rare for two writers from same language to win in following years

Haruki Murakami Japans best known writer

PROS – he’d be a very popular and well-known choice ,his masterpiece has just come out iq84 due in english soon

CONS – maybe to young ,maybe to well-known

Elias Khoury -my favourite arabic writer (I ll also note the Syrian poet Adonis I ve note read him but he’d have similar reasons to Khoury )

PROS – he is just a wonderful writer ,also with Arab spring be nice to see a voice of Arabic world chosen .

CONS – none really he be a great choice

Ben Okri – I like him enough said and have met him and he is so passionate about fiction

Pros does a lot to promote literacy and reading ,African winner is need at some point

CONS – too young ,maybe not lived up to early promise fully

Ismail Kadare – Has been on the list of contenders a number of times

PROS – Has not written a bad novel ,a new language to win the Nobel prize

CONS – Maybe should have won and as Michael Orther said to me on twitter there has been a lot of eastern european winners .

Ulrich Holbein – the German writer yet to be translated to English ,did shoot up last year in odds .

PRO – obscure ,experimental

CONS – Not well-known outside Germany

Cees Nooteboom – Hollands greatest living writer and master of numerous styles of writing poetry ,fiction and travel writing .

PRO – truly talented

CONS – none really he would be the ideal winner

Peter Nadas – the Hungarian master

Pro – maybe the best living writer (as I draw to end of his latest book)

Cons – he has not written a lot as a slow writer .

my tenth choice is a handful of names I ve not read but heard mentioned

Ko Un – Korean poet

Les Murray – Australian Poet

Antonio lobo Antunes – Portuguese writer (frank Wynne suggested I read him ,still waiting for library copy )

Ngugi wa Thiong’o – Kenyan writer ~(read him but one book many years ago)

Here are the odds on Ladbrokes a big move up odds , late on is usually sign of the winner .

Nobel winner 2011 ?

~ winstonsdad ~ 22 Comments

Well its nobel time again the yearly award that in last few years has got harder to call  as the  choices seem more obscure to us english language readers but not on the world stage so I ll throw a number of  names up and why they could and why they couldn’t from favourites I ve seen mention and my own feelings –

Philip Roth – well he is the one I feel will win as it has been a long time since an us winner and he is probably the last of the big writers from sixties ie mailer and Updike etc .

PROS – well-known ,make up for Updike or mailer not winning Nobel

CONS  – has won man booker this year ,recent books not as good as earlier cannon .

Juan Goytisolo – father of modern spanish writing ,

PROS  – he is in Nobel mode of recent years tends to be experimental in his fiction ,best regarded living  writer in Spain

CONS – rare for two writers from same language to win in following years

Haruki Murakami Japans best known writer

PROS – he’d be a very popular and well-known choice ,his masterpiece has just come out iq84 due in english soon

CONS – maybe to young ,maybe to well-known

Elias Khoury -my favourite arabic writer (I ll also note the Syrian poet Adonis I ve note read him but he’d have similar reasons to Khoury )

PROS – he is just a wonderful writer ,also with Arab spring be nice to see a voice of Arabic world chosen .

CONS – none really he be a great choice

Ben Okri – I like him enough said and have met him and he is so passionate about fiction

Pros does a lot to promote  literacy and reading ,African winner is need at some point

CONS – too young ,maybe not lived up to early promise fully

Ismail Kadare – Has been on the list of contenders a number of times

PROS – Has not written a bad novel  ,a new language to win the Nobel prize

CONS – Maybe should have won and as Michael Orther said to me on twitter there has been a lot of eastern european winners .

Ulrich Holbein – the German writer yet to be translated to English ,did shoot up last year in odds .

PRO – obscure ,experimental

CONS – Not well-known outside Germany

 

Cees Nooteboom – Hollands greatest living writer and master of numerous styles of writing poetry ,fiction and travel writing .

PRO – truly talented

CONS – none really he would be the ideal winner

Peter Nadas – the Hungarian master

Pro – maybe the best living writer (as I draw to end of his latest book)

Cons – he has not written a lot as a slow writer .

my tenth choice is a handful of names I ve not read but heard mentioned

Ko Un – Korean poet

Les Murray – Australian Poet

Antonio lobo Antunes – Portuguese writer (frank Wynne suggested I read him ,still waiting for library copy )

Ngugi wa Thiong’o – Kenyan writer ~(read him but one book many years ago)

Here are the odds on Ladbrokes  a big move up odds , late on is usually sign of the  winner .

 

The museum of innocence by Orhan Pamuk

~ winstonsdad ~ 23 Comments

Source – library

Translator – Maureen Freely

Orhan Pamuk won the nobel prize in 2006 ,he was the first Turkish citizen to win a nobel prize .he is professor of comparative literature at Columbia university ,he has been at odds at times with his own country about its past he has had a number of books translated into in english by Maureen Freely that has also done the Istanbul memories book and his novel snow .,this book like his book Istanbul memories of a city which I read and I feel probably inspired this book in a lot of ways Istanbul is like an extra character at times

Well Museum of innocence is an epic book ,it has scope and vision it use the Janus like city of Istanbul ,a city torn between the arabic and western world ,between old and new ,also between classes .The book is a history of a love affair between   a lowly shop girl and a much older businessman ,now I know what you are thinking this is going be a book about a dirty old man ,a new Lolita  .W ell no it is a bout true love in its purest sense ,about obsession ,class and society within turkey ..so who are these people ? the lowly shop girl Fusun is beautiful the sort of girl who stops men in the track but she is only a shop girl ,the man is Kemal he is heir ,a man railroad into marriage by expectations of his class to keep the status quo going .so they embark on a 20 year affair ,The clandestine couple meet at an apartment ,this place becomes the home of the museum of innocence as Kemal start converting every thing about Fusun ,he has put this lowly girl on a pedestal ,over the course of the book we see the affair unfold and the collecting of items increase greatly .

During my eight years of going to Keshkins for supper ,I was able to squirrel away 4,213 of Fusun’s cigarette butts .Each one of these had touched her rosy red lips and entered her mouth ,some even touching her tongue and becoming moist ,as I would discover when I put my finger on the filter soon after she had stubbed the cigarette out ,the stub ,reddened by her lovely lipstick bore the unique impression of her lips .

Kermal gathering items for his collection .

This book is the best of the four I ve read by Pamuk ,he even writes himself into the story at a couple of points being observed at some parts .I found this love affair touching and sad touched with the sadness of what should have been in a different world .The apartment is a bit like bridge  that cross the Bosphorus connecting the two parts of the city ,in this case the apartment connects two classes of Istanbul .There is something timeless about the story ,I can see this being popular for a long time due the love ,obsession ,city and characters that make up Museum of innocence .the book is on the IFFP short list

Istanbul the heart of this story .

HAVE YOU READ THIS BOOK OR ANY BY PAMUK ?

THE PEARL BY JOHN STEINBECK

~ winstonsdad ~ 8 Comments

source – personal copy

John Steinbeck was probably on of Americas greatest writers in the middle period of the twentieth century ,his books caught the character of America in the depression .He won the Nobel prize for literature in 1962 .He is a name that makes many people jump after being made to read of mice and men at school ,but would ask people to give him another try this very short novella is a perfect book to get yourself reaquainted with him or discover him .

The book is set in a small Mexican fishing village and follows a poor Mexican fisherman Kino   .He finds a huge wonderous Pearl .

And the beauty of the pearl ,winking and glimmering in the little candle ,cozened his brain with its beauty .So lovely it was ,so soft ,and its own music came from it -its music of promise and delight guarantee of the future ,of comfort ,of security .

Kino looking at the pearl .

The pearl has his fortune in it but as it turns out his downfall as well ,at the same time .the book was a retelling of a Mexican folk tale ,Kino his wife Junna and son Coyotito are all effect by the finding of the pearl .The book has a moral theme running through it that is we should be happy who we are and that greed and wealth ,which is what the pearl represents isn’t all it is meant to be .The story remind me of a quote from a Basil Rasthbone Sherlock Holmes film the pearl of death about a famous pearl the bourgeis pearl he said for its beauty it is cover in the blood of many a man and should really be thrown back in the sea .That is what Kino should have done but instead he Kept the pearl got greedy want more and more money for it and eventually when his wife decided the pearl was too much of burden it led to a shocking  conclusion .The book is very short ninety pages long and can easily be read in an evening .The book shows Steinbeck powers of writing taking a simple folk tale and expanding it to a full novella .

Have you a favourite Steinbeck ?

Winstons coffee and muffins A challenge

~ winstonsdad ~ 6 Comments

One day last week Meike from peierne press was highlighting a blog post on harvil secker about translation and wondered if any one could suggest some well I suggest one from German book list and also said that ulrich holbein was over due translation ,as I said in my post a few weeks ago. He shot up in Nobel betting which remind me of reading a short piece when I lived in Germany in a magazine about him .well the downshot  of this discussion was a challenge from Meike to myself if I could some how generate interest in holbein and that people would want to read and buy this book by Germany’s most avant grade writer ,she will try and publish one of his shorter works in English well I tried to think of ways to highlight him and on the whole have drawn a blank so any one any ideas I d welcome a guest post from one my German friends about him below I ve collect a few pieces from German papers about him .I know Meike has been in touch with his German publishers and she is the first English publisher to show interest so if you want to help and want see Ulrich Holbein in English  contact me or do a post about him !! it would be most welcome .

wiki entry from german wiki need use a translator to read in english

taz interview

A collection of reviews from a german culture magazine


THE BAD GIRL BY Mario Vargas Llosa

~ winstonsdad ~ 8 Comments

Well I had this down to rea on my around the world in 52 books list .Having read a couple many years ago by him ,after seeing the aunt Julia film which had a great performance from Peter Falk .Well if you didn’t know Mario won this years Nobel prize being the first Nobel winner from south America since Gabriel Garcia Marquez in 1982 .Mario Vargas Llosa was born in the Peruvian provinces in late thirties ,he went to military academy the subject of his first novel ,his books are both historic and have modern-day setting he often uses his own life experiences in his books .

The bad girl follows the life of Ricardo ,we meet him as a teenager in the 50’s in lima a love affair with lily or as in the title the bad girl starts and ends due to the difference in class etc ,Ricardo does well in his studies and ends up in paris working as a translator in numerous languages ,this is in the sixties so there is a backdrop of the city in the sixties with its protests and bohemian atmosphere ,Ricardo meets Comrade Arlette ,this women reminds him of lily in so many ways they have a passionate affair ,the book continues on the same path him traveling to different cities and meet women with the spirit of Lilly and having increasingly passionate and kinky love affairs .this takes us through london ,Tokyo back to peru and ending up in paris ,all this with a sparkling cast of friends including a mute boy .We see the history of times hippies ,seventies and Japans rise .

My only contact with Peru ,for by now I rarely saw Peruvians in paris ,continued to be the increasingly desperate letters from uncle Ataulfo and Aunt Delores always sent me regards in her own hand ,and from time to time I would send her scores for playing the piano was great diversion in her invalid life .

Ricardo family struggles at home in Peru unde General Alvarado’s dictatorship  .

Now I loved this Llosa has a real flow to his writing that draws you in bit by bit ,there is a lot of sex in this book but it is well written and helps the plot also gives you the true scope of the affair or affairs there is a question whether it is the same women or different women with the same spirit this isn’t answered but I felt form a man falls for the same spirit in different bodies ,the affair is a life long passion the encompasses the world ,these part the cities and times they were written really feel like they are from Llosa own life and that he’d been in paris and in London and Tokyo during the periods described in the book .Worthy nobel winner yes his books are always readable and  meaningful .Like Aunt Julia that was made into a film I could see this novel-making the move into a great film .The book is translated by Edith Grossman ,she has previously tranlated 5 of his books previously as you’d expect is perfection from the best translator of Latin American fiction

Have you read him ?

have you seen the films made of his books ?

nobel 2010 ?

~ winstonsdad ~ 9 Comments

Over the weekend i heard a podcast about jewish book week ,and an interview with the israeli writer Amos Oz where it was suggest he may be a future nobel winner .he wasn’t sure if he would win but would be honoured if he did ,In recent years the winners have been relatively unknown in britain ,but hugely succesful in their own country’s people like Hertha Muller ,J M G Le Clezio and Orhan Pamuk .After a run of four european winners i feel it ll be a non european writer this time round .here are a few i ve in mind

america’s

  • Michael Ondaatje -the Canadian has written many great novels and is well-respected
  • Carlos fuentes-mexicos most prolific novelist of the last twenty years
  • h c Moya -outspoken houndrian writer
  • Mario Vargas Llosa – the peruvian has a wonderful body of work behind him

asia

  • Murkami – the japanese writer should win one day would be great time to win with new novel due late this year
  • Rohinton mistry-respected indian writer
  • Peter Carey australia greatest living novelist

africa

  • Al AswanY – popular egyptian writer
  • Tsitsi Dangaremga -zimbawian writer would be a fresh choice

you any ideas for this year ?

LIST OF PREVIOUS WINNERS