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袨褌懈胁邪屑 褋懈 械 胁褗蟹胁褉邪褌械薪 谐谢邪谐芯谢
袨褖械 锌褉械写懈 鈥炐炑傂感残靶� 褋懈 械 胁褗蟹胁褉邪褌械薪 谐谢邪谐芯谢鈥� 写邪 懈蟹谢械蟹械 薪邪 锌邪蟹邪褉邪, 胁 屑械写懈懈褌械 蟹邪 薪械谐芯 褋械 懈蟹锌懈褋邪褏邪 械写薪邪 褌芯褉斜邪 褏胁邪谢斜懈. 袙械写薪褗卸 写邪 褋械 芯泻邪卸械, 褔械 械 懈屑邪谢芯 蟹邪褖芯. 袩褉芯锌褍褋薪械褌械 谢懈 鈥炐炑傂感残靶� 褋懈 械 胁褗蟹胁褉邪褌械薪 谐谢邪谐芯谢鈥�, 锌褉芯锌褍褋泻邪褌械 械写懈薪 芯褌 薪邪泄-写芯斜褉懈褌械 褉芯屑邪薪懈 薪邪 谐芯写懈薪邪褌邪.
鈥� The Economist
孝邪泄械 小械谢邪褋懈 锌懈褕械 褋 谢械泻邪褌邪 褉褗泻邪 薪邪 斜谢械褋褌褟褖 锌芯械褌, 褋 写芯蟹邪 写褗褉蟹芯褋褌 懈 褋 写褗谢斜芯泻邪 械屑芯褑懈芯薪邪谢薪邪 芯褌写邪写械薪芯褋褌 薪邪 卸懈胁芯褌邪 懈 褌褉邪薪褋褎芯褉屑邪褑懈褟褌邪 薪邪 谐械褉芯懈褌械 褋懈. 小褗谢蟹懈褌械 褋械 褋褌懈褔邪褌 薪械褍褋械褌薪芯 锌褉械蟹 锌邪褋邪卸懈, 锌褗谢薪懈 褋 褉邪蟹泻芯褕薪懈 芯锌懈褋邪薪懈褟 懈 锌褋懈褏芯谢芯谐懈褔械褋泻懈 锌芯褉褌褉械褌懈, 懈 芯褋褌邪胁褟褌 褋谢械写 褋械斜械 褋懈 褋懈谢薪芯 胁褗蟹写械泄褋褌胁邪褖 锌芯褉褌褉械褌 薪邪 械写薪芯 鈥炑佇敌夹敌寡佈傂残� 胁 斜械蟹褌械谐谢芯胁薪芯褋褌鈥�, 胁 斜芯褉斜邪 芯褌薪芯胁芯 写邪 褋械 褋谐谢芯斜懈.
鈥� The Guardian
袙械谢懈泻芯谢械锌械薪. 袧邪锌芯屑薪褟褖 薪邪 袛卸褍屑锌邪 袥邪褏懈褉懈, 薪芯 褋 写芯褉懈 锌芯胁械褔械 褌芯锌谢芯褌邪 懈 卸懈蟹薪械薪芯褋褌, 褉芯屑邪薪褗褌 薪邪 小械谢邪褋懈, 蟹邪写胁懈卸胁邪薪 芯褌 械泻褋锌褉械褋懈胁薪懈褟 泄 械蟹懈泻, 褉邪蟹泻邪蟹胁邪 胁褗蟹写械泄褋褌胁邪褖邪褌邪 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟 薪邪 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯, 泻芯械褌芯 芯褌泻褉懈胁邪, 褔械 褌芯胁邪, 泻芯械褌芯 械写薪芯 胁褉械屑械 谐懈 械 褋胁褗褉蟹胁邪谢芯, 屑芯卸械 芯褌薪芯胁芯 写邪 谐懈 褋锌谢芯褌懈.
鈥� Publishers Weekly
鈥炐炑傂感残靶� 褋懈 械 胁褗蟹胁褉邪褌械薪 谐谢邪谐芯谢鈥� 械 泻邪泻褌芯 斜褗褉蟹芯 褉邪蟹谐褉褗褖邪褖邪 褋械 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟 蟹邪 褋褗褋褌芯褟薪懈械褌芯 薪邪 械写薪芯 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯, 褌邪泻邪 懈 械褍褎芯褉懈褔薪芯 懈蟹褋谢械写胁邪薪械 薪邪 胁褗褌褉械褕薪懈褟 卸懈胁芯褌 薪邪 薪械谐芯胁懈褌械 褔谢械薪芯胁械. 小褗褋 褋褗胁褗褉褕械薪芯 懈蟹锌懈锌邪薪邪褌邪 褋懈 锌褉芯蟹邪 懈 斜械蟹褍锌褉械褔薪邪褌邪 褋懈 褌械褏薪懈泻邪, 小械谢邪褋懈 薪械 锌褉芯褋褌芯 锌褉械褌胁芯褉褟胁邪 锌褉械写褋褌邪胁邪褌邪 薪懈 蟹邪 邪褎褉懈泻邪薪褋泻懈褟 褉芯屑邪薪, 褌褟 锌褉械褌胁芯褉褟胁邪 锌芯薪褟褌懈械褌芯 薪懈 蟹邪 褉芯屑邪薪邪, 褌芯褔泻邪. 袠蟹褍屑懈褌械谢械薪 写械斜褞褌.
鈥� 孝械写卸褍 袣芯褍谢, 邪胁褌芯褉 薪邪 鈥炐炑傂残狙€械薪 谐褉邪写鈥�
孝邪泄械 小械谢邪褋懈 械 屑谢邪写 邪胁褌芯褉 褋褗褋 蟹邪褕械屑械褌褟胁邪褖 褌邪谢邪薪褌 懈 薪械胁械褉芯褟褌薪邪 褔褍胁褋褌胁懈褌械谢薪芯褋褌. 鈥炐炑傂感残靶� 褋懈 械 胁褗蟹胁褉邪褌械薪 谐谢邪谐芯谢鈥� 褋褟泻邪褕 褋褗写褗褉卸邪 胁 褋械斜械 褋懈 褑械谢懈褟 褋胁褟褌 鈥� 薪懈泻芯谐邪 薪褟屑邪 写邪 褟 蟹邪斜褉邪胁褟.
鈥� 袝谢懈蟹邪斜械褌 袚懈谢斜褗褉褌, 邪胁褌芯褉 薪邪 鈥炐�, 屑芯谢懈 褋械 懈 芯斜懈褔邪泄鈥�
鈥� The Economist
孝邪泄械 小械谢邪褋懈 锌懈褕械 褋 谢械泻邪褌邪 褉褗泻邪 薪邪 斜谢械褋褌褟褖 锌芯械褌, 褋 写芯蟹邪 写褗褉蟹芯褋褌 懈 褋 写褗谢斜芯泻邪 械屑芯褑懈芯薪邪谢薪邪 芯褌写邪写械薪芯褋褌 薪邪 卸懈胁芯褌邪 懈 褌褉邪薪褋褎芯褉屑邪褑懈褟褌邪 薪邪 谐械褉芯懈褌械 褋懈. 小褗谢蟹懈褌械 褋械 褋褌懈褔邪褌 薪械褍褋械褌薪芯 锌褉械蟹 锌邪褋邪卸懈, 锌褗谢薪懈 褋 褉邪蟹泻芯褕薪懈 芯锌懈褋邪薪懈褟 懈 锌褋懈褏芯谢芯谐懈褔械褋泻懈 锌芯褉褌褉械褌懈, 懈 芯褋褌邪胁褟褌 褋谢械写 褋械斜械 褋懈 褋懈谢薪芯 胁褗蟹写械泄褋褌胁邪褖 锌芯褉褌褉械褌 薪邪 械写薪芯 鈥炑佇敌夹敌寡佈傂残� 胁 斜械蟹褌械谐谢芯胁薪芯褋褌鈥�, 胁 斜芯褉斜邪 芯褌薪芯胁芯 写邪 褋械 褋谐谢芯斜懈.
鈥� The Guardian
袙械谢懈泻芯谢械锌械薪. 袧邪锌芯屑薪褟褖 薪邪 袛卸褍屑锌邪 袥邪褏懈褉懈, 薪芯 褋 写芯褉懈 锌芯胁械褔械 褌芯锌谢芯褌邪 懈 卸懈蟹薪械薪芯褋褌, 褉芯屑邪薪褗褌 薪邪 小械谢邪褋懈, 蟹邪写胁懈卸胁邪薪 芯褌 械泻褋锌褉械褋懈胁薪懈褟 泄 械蟹懈泻, 褉邪蟹泻邪蟹胁邪 胁褗蟹写械泄褋褌胁邪褖邪褌邪 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟 薪邪 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯, 泻芯械褌芯 芯褌泻褉懈胁邪, 褔械 褌芯胁邪, 泻芯械褌芯 械写薪芯 胁褉械屑械 谐懈 械 褋胁褗褉蟹胁邪谢芯, 屑芯卸械 芯褌薪芯胁芯 写邪 谐懈 褋锌谢芯褌懈.
鈥� Publishers Weekly
鈥炐炑傂感残靶� 褋懈 械 胁褗蟹胁褉邪褌械薪 谐谢邪谐芯谢鈥� 械 泻邪泻褌芯 斜褗褉蟹芯 褉邪蟹谐褉褗褖邪褖邪 褋械 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟 蟹邪 褋褗褋褌芯褟薪懈械褌芯 薪邪 械写薪芯 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯, 褌邪泻邪 懈 械褍褎芯褉懈褔薪芯 懈蟹褋谢械写胁邪薪械 薪邪 胁褗褌褉械褕薪懈褟 卸懈胁芯褌 薪邪 薪械谐芯胁懈褌械 褔谢械薪芯胁械. 小褗褋 褋褗胁褗褉褕械薪芯 懈蟹锌懈锌邪薪邪褌邪 褋懈 锌褉芯蟹邪 懈 斜械蟹褍锌褉械褔薪邪褌邪 褋懈 褌械褏薪懈泻邪, 小械谢邪褋懈 薪械 锌褉芯褋褌芯 锌褉械褌胁芯褉褟胁邪 锌褉械写褋褌邪胁邪褌邪 薪懈 蟹邪 邪褎褉懈泻邪薪褋泻懈褟 褉芯屑邪薪, 褌褟 锌褉械褌胁芯褉褟胁邪 锌芯薪褟褌懈械褌芯 薪懈 蟹邪 褉芯屑邪薪邪, 褌芯褔泻邪. 袠蟹褍屑懈褌械谢械薪 写械斜褞褌.
鈥� 孝械写卸褍 袣芯褍谢, 邪胁褌芯褉 薪邪 鈥炐炑傂残狙€械薪 谐褉邪写鈥�
孝邪泄械 小械谢邪褋懈 械 屑谢邪写 邪胁褌芯褉 褋褗褋 蟹邪褕械屑械褌褟胁邪褖 褌邪谢邪薪褌 懈 薪械胁械褉芯褟褌薪邪 褔褍胁褋褌胁懈褌械谢薪芯褋褌. 鈥炐炑傂感残靶� 褋懈 械 胁褗蟹胁褉邪褌械薪 谐谢邪谐芯谢鈥� 褋褟泻邪褕 褋褗写褗褉卸邪 胁 褋械斜械 褋懈 褑械谢懈褟 褋胁褟褌 鈥� 薪懈泻芯谐邪 薪褟屑邪 写邪 褟 蟹邪斜褉邪胁褟.
鈥� 袝谢懈蟹邪斜械褌 袚懈谢斜褗褉褌, 邪胁褌芯褉 薪邪 鈥炐�, 屑芯谢懈 褋械 懈 芯斜懈褔邪泄鈥�
372 pages, Paperback
First published March 5, 2013
807 people are currently reading
23317 people want to read
About the author
Taiye Selasi
20听books724听followersBorn in London to Nigerian and Ghanaian parents, Taiye Selasi was raised in Massachusetts. She graduated summa cum laude from Yale before returning to England to earn an M.Phil. in International Relations from Oxford. In 2006 Taiye joined the WGAE Screenwriting Lab at Colubmia University, studying under Oscar nominee Zach Sklar (JFK). Sid Ganis will produce her first feature WHITE GIRL, co-written with policy expert and MSNBC contributor Heather McGhee, with Kasi Lemmons (ON BEAUTY) attached to direct, Keke Palmer (AKEELAH & THE BEE) to star. Taiye worked in television production before committing full-time to fiction, screenwriting, and photography. An avid traveler, she aims to visit 100 countries by the age of 50. She lives in Rome.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,486 reviews
March 22, 2013
Real talk, the first third or so of the book is a damn mess--slow, not fully realized, kind of irritating because it could be better with.... more editing, perhaps, or more care. BUT. The last 2/3 of the book is outstanding and electric. If you are an immigrant or child of immigrants you will feel like this book knows you, down to your bones. And you will know this book, down to its bones. The prose style is original and as raw as it is poetic. The narrative structure is also intriguing. Selasi is clearly a young writer but she has a whole lot of talent. Please read this book and forgive it's rough beginnings.
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July 13, 2013"So what d'you reckon, did you fall for the hype on this one?"
"Well, yes, to a certain extent. I mean with over 100,000 new books being published each year in the UK alone, there's no way to escape the danger of being led down the marketing path really, is there? I mean I read some reviews, but they've all been blinded too, by the celebrity endorsements from Toni Morrison and Salman Rushdie, and they can hardly fail to be impressed by the appeal of a strikingly good-looking young woman author, it makes for an attractive opener on the front page of the review section, doesn't it? So yes, once I'd seen that amazing portrait of her on the front page of the literature supplement in Die Zeit, wearing a purple quilted coat that on anyone else would have reminded me of a dressing gown, and then read about her, yes, she got lodged in my mind as worth looking out for."
"You're just influenced by her appearance? How shallow."
"I don't think I'm entirely guiltless there, but it's more the recognizability of the image than the mere fact that she's a looker. Because having seen her on the cover of Die Zeit, I then recognized her as the very same when she appeared in the latest . Actually, I probably only did recognize her again because she was wearing the same quilted coat for the Granta photo shoot."
"Aha! the coat it was what done it!"
"Yeah, and the gloves - did you see those bad-ass gloves? So I remembered her. But I did test out the water before I went for the novel: I read her piece Driver in Granta and thought it was terrific, I loved it. It starts:
I am the full-time driver here. I am not going to kill my employers. I have read that drivers do that now. I will just make a few observations.
I mean wow! How could anyone resist that? That short story plays around with preconceptions and clich茅s and identity and roles and facades."
"So you fooled yourself into thinking that you'd made up your own mind, based on your reading of a short story? Without being manipulated?"
"Probably, yes. Self deception is an under-valued art. Anyway, guess what happened then?"
"What?"
"You'd never guess this: my sister-in-law gave me Ghana Must Go for my birthday."
"Well, why wouldn't she? She knows you like reading."
"Yes, yes, yes, but she's been remarkably inept at selecting thus far: either something I didn't want (Jodi Picoult, I ask you!), or something spot on because I'd already read it. Even this time round it wasn't quite the thing; she gave it to me in German originally. I got it changed - I mean for goodness sake, why would I want to read a translation of a book that was written in my own language? Pfff."
"It can't be easy choosing a book for someone as picky as you."
"True enough. You have to admire her determination."
"So to get back to this novel, what do you think, does it stand up to the hype?"
"It can't really, can it? It never could. I mean she's been lauded to the skies, so expectations are far too high. And it didn't wow me the way that her short story did. So my reactions are probably a bit skewed. But there is one major problem with it: I mean, please don't get me wrong, it's good, it's probably great, but there's something that doesn't sit right with me.
You see, basically it's the story of a family. And the way I read it, this family is representative. I mean it's very clearly flagged that Kweku has no business dying of a heart attack, not at his age, not with his healthy lifestyle, not as a doctor who surely must have read the signs and got help quickly. He's dying of a broken heart, not a medical condition. His heart has been broken by all the leavings he's done. So he stands for the cracked hollowness of a misplaced, displaced, dislocated existence. And this pain plays through to the next generation, his four children, each of them disturbed, damaged, in pain."
"Sounds bleak."
"It is. Oceans of tears. But that's not my problem. You see, apart from Kweku's wife, Fola, who remains very shadowy, these characters are lovingly painted, so much so that I began to connect with them as real people."
"Well, isn't that what novels do? Isn't that what you want, that emotional connection, that empathy?"
"Perhaps, yes. But not when the psychology doesn't add up."
"But you said you read it as a novel of ideas, that these are representative figures, not real people with a personal idiosyncratic psychology? So surely it shouldn't matter if their motivation sits oddly sometimes?"
"Yes, there's the rub. D'you think it's possible to do both at the same time? I mean she works hard to make sure that we don't relax into this novel and let it all wash over us like a warm bath, the action jumps around a lot in time and place, you're asked to stay on your toes, ready to switch and leap and dance, at least at the beginning until the family finally come together for the funeral. A cerebral pleasure rather than an emotional one. Which is fine. But it's a novel. You live with these characters for a week or so, they get under your skin. But as a real-life family it's all a bit much, too even a share-out of problems, one major one each, you know? Artificial. Can it be artificial and real at the same time?"
"As I said, you're too picky."
"Yeah, but you have to admire my determination."
"Well, yes, to a certain extent. I mean with over 100,000 new books being published each year in the UK alone, there's no way to escape the danger of being led down the marketing path really, is there? I mean I read some reviews, but they've all been blinded too, by the celebrity endorsements from Toni Morrison and Salman Rushdie, and they can hardly fail to be impressed by the appeal of a strikingly good-looking young woman author, it makes for an attractive opener on the front page of the review section, doesn't it? So yes, once I'd seen that amazing portrait of her on the front page of the literature supplement in Die Zeit, wearing a purple quilted coat that on anyone else would have reminded me of a dressing gown, and then read about her, yes, she got lodged in my mind as worth looking out for."
"You're just influenced by her appearance? How shallow."
"I don't think I'm entirely guiltless there, but it's more the recognizability of the image than the mere fact that she's a looker. Because having seen her on the cover of Die Zeit, I then recognized her as the very same when she appeared in the latest . Actually, I probably only did recognize her again because she was wearing the same quilted coat for the Granta photo shoot."
"Aha! the coat it was what done it!"
"Yeah, and the gloves - did you see those bad-ass gloves? So I remembered her. But I did test out the water before I went for the novel: I read her piece Driver in Granta and thought it was terrific, I loved it. It starts:
I am the full-time driver here. I am not going to kill my employers. I have read that drivers do that now. I will just make a few observations.
I mean wow! How could anyone resist that? That short story plays around with preconceptions and clich茅s and identity and roles and facades."
"So you fooled yourself into thinking that you'd made up your own mind, based on your reading of a short story? Without being manipulated?"
"Probably, yes. Self deception is an under-valued art. Anyway, guess what happened then?"
"What?"
"You'd never guess this: my sister-in-law gave me Ghana Must Go for my birthday."
"Well, why wouldn't she? She knows you like reading."
"Yes, yes, yes, but she's been remarkably inept at selecting thus far: either something I didn't want (Jodi Picoult, I ask you!), or something spot on because I'd already read it. Even this time round it wasn't quite the thing; she gave it to me in German originally. I got it changed - I mean for goodness sake, why would I want to read a translation of a book that was written in my own language? Pfff."
"It can't be easy choosing a book for someone as picky as you."
"True enough. You have to admire her determination."
"So to get back to this novel, what do you think, does it stand up to the hype?"
"It can't really, can it? It never could. I mean she's been lauded to the skies, so expectations are far too high. And it didn't wow me the way that her short story did. So my reactions are probably a bit skewed. But there is one major problem with it: I mean, please don't get me wrong, it's good, it's probably great, but there's something that doesn't sit right with me.
You see, basically it's the story of a family. And the way I read it, this family is representative. I mean it's very clearly flagged that Kweku has no business dying of a heart attack, not at his age, not with his healthy lifestyle, not as a doctor who surely must have read the signs and got help quickly. He's dying of a broken heart, not a medical condition. His heart has been broken by all the leavings he's done. So he stands for the cracked hollowness of a misplaced, displaced, dislocated existence. And this pain plays through to the next generation, his four children, each of them disturbed, damaged, in pain."
"Sounds bleak."
"It is. Oceans of tears. But that's not my problem. You see, apart from Kweku's wife, Fola, who remains very shadowy, these characters are lovingly painted, so much so that I began to connect with them as real people."
"Well, isn't that what novels do? Isn't that what you want, that emotional connection, that empathy?"
"Perhaps, yes. But not when the psychology doesn't add up."
"But you said you read it as a novel of ideas, that these are representative figures, not real people with a personal idiosyncratic psychology? So surely it shouldn't matter if their motivation sits oddly sometimes?"
"Yes, there's the rub. D'you think it's possible to do both at the same time? I mean she works hard to make sure that we don't relax into this novel and let it all wash over us like a warm bath, the action jumps around a lot in time and place, you're asked to stay on your toes, ready to switch and leap and dance, at least at the beginning until the family finally come together for the funeral. A cerebral pleasure rather than an emotional one. Which is fine. But it's a novel. You live with these characters for a week or so, they get under your skin. But as a real-life family it's all a bit much, too even a share-out of problems, one major one each, you know? Artificial. Can it be artificial and real at the same time?"
"As I said, you're too picky."
"Yeah, but you have to admire my determination."
March 26, 2013
鈥淭hen Ghana, and the smell of Ghana, a contradiction, a cracked clay pot: the smell of dryness, wetness, both, the damp earth and dry of dust. The airport. Bodies pushing, pulling, shouting, begging, touching, breathing. He鈥檇 forgotten the bodies. The proximity of bodies. In America the bodies were distant. The warmth of it"
Ghanaian doctor Kweku Sai loses his job in the US, abandons his Nigerian wife and his four children and moves back to Ghana. Years later, when Sai dies from a heart attack, his family, who have not been in regular contact in the previous several years, go back 鈥渉ome鈥� to Ghana for the funeral. The rest of the story outlines what they had to deal with after their father left.
I found this book so tragic. The entire family was hurt in one way or another by Sai's abandonment, as their personal stories show. One scene in particular was truly awful and I had to skip over the majority.
Selasi is a wonderful writer and this is such a great debut. Her writing is very beautiful and lyrical, though there were some instances where I wasn鈥檛 sure who was speaking as the point of view changed so abruptly. Sometimes she interrupts her straight-forward prose with something like this:
鈥淭aiwo pursed her lips to mute her revulsion, but what she felt next had no shape and no sound:
An odd emptiness, weightlessness, as if she were floating, as if for a moment she鈥檇 ceased to exist: some new odd sort of sadness, part grief, part compassion, a helium sadness, too airless to bear.鈥�
I like the fact that Selasi wrote a story about the African diaspora. I think it鈥檚 still a relatively new concept in African literature. I read somewhere that Selasi coined the term 鈥淎蹿谤辞辫辞濒颈迟补苍鈥� to describe Africans in the diaspora, and I hope to see more Afropolitan literature in the future.
Ghanaian doctor Kweku Sai loses his job in the US, abandons his Nigerian wife and his four children and moves back to Ghana. Years later, when Sai dies from a heart attack, his family, who have not been in regular contact in the previous several years, go back 鈥渉ome鈥� to Ghana for the funeral. The rest of the story outlines what they had to deal with after their father left.
I found this book so tragic. The entire family was hurt in one way or another by Sai's abandonment, as their personal stories show. One scene in particular was truly awful and I had to skip over the majority.
Selasi is a wonderful writer and this is such a great debut. Her writing is very beautiful and lyrical, though there were some instances where I wasn鈥檛 sure who was speaking as the point of view changed so abruptly. Sometimes she interrupts her straight-forward prose with something like this:
鈥淭aiwo pursed her lips to mute her revulsion, but what she felt next had no shape and no sound:
An odd emptiness, weightlessness, as if she were floating, as if for a moment she鈥檇 ceased to exist: some new odd sort of sadness, part grief, part compassion, a helium sadness, too airless to bear.鈥�
I like the fact that Selasi wrote a story about the African diaspora. I think it鈥檚 still a relatively new concept in African literature. I read somewhere that Selasi coined the term 鈥淎蹿谤辞辫辞濒颈迟补苍鈥� to describe Africans in the diaspora, and I hope to see more Afropolitan literature in the future.
October 19, 2019
Very impressive debut novel about a Nigerian/Ghanaian family who are fragmented when Kweku, the father, is wrongly dismissed from his post as a surgeon in a Massachusetts hospital. Too ashamed to admit his predicament to his family he abandons them and moves back to his native land. His loyal Nigerian wife Fola and their four children are left to piece together the mystery of his disappearance.
The novel begins with Kweku dying of a heart attack in his new Ghanaian home. To all intents and purposes he is dying of a broken heart. His death will reunite a family which has splintered as a result of his disappearance. There's lots of brilliant writing in this novel (some overwriting too); some clever plotting (some over elaboration too) and some impressive structuring. It offers plenty of insights into the challenges of migration, not least of all the stresses and strains of frequently having to adapt identity. I'll definitely be reading her next novel.
The novel begins with Kweku dying of a heart attack in his new Ghanaian home. To all intents and purposes he is dying of a broken heart. His death will reunite a family which has splintered as a result of his disappearance. There's lots of brilliant writing in this novel (some overwriting too); some clever plotting (some over elaboration too) and some impressive structuring. It offers plenty of insights into the challenges of migration, not least of all the stresses and strains of frequently having to adapt identity. I'll definitely be reading her next novel.
Read
July 14, 2013This is how a reader gets the distinct feeling of being ripped off: when the publishers are obviously so keen to jump on the publicity bandwagon that they don't bother with a proof read at all. How else would you explain the mis-spelling of the main character's name in the blurb on the back? All through the novel his name is Kweku Sai, the blurb has him Kwaku.
Worse: page 79. "Until this very moment Kweku would have bet money that her younger son couldn't have said where he worked-not the name of the hospital, one of several in the vicinity, nor the location of the entrance hall-but here Kehinde was:" Kweku is the father of Kehinde, that's his son to my way of thinking.
A minor gripe I suppose.
I find it interesting to note how reviews and interviews, nay even , all stress Ms Selasai's international background;'born in london raised in boston lives in new york new delhi rome'. For me it is obvious that her default mode is American. She helps the reader out when in Ghana. Accra is explained to us outsiders: Then hired a taxi to take him to Jamestown-the oldest part of Accra and the smelliest by far, a fetid seaside slum of corrugated tin-and-cardboard shanties in the shadow of the country's former Presidential Palace-where, braving the stink (re-dried sweat, rotting fish), he inquired in rusty Ga about a carpenter. But no such help is given when we are in the US. Brookline. (Mis-spelling for Brooklyn? Ooops, no) This was the Colonial she hated, in Brookline, which the man had bought proudly after Sadie was born (and though Mom had wanted a townhouse, South End...
There's noo need to explain. No? No.
Not a gripe, just saying.
And actually, I didn't like the language. It's described as glittering and poetic and all that, but mostly I found it jerky, spiky, prickly, bucking along like a square wheeled wagon. The cadences all the same, sentences running on, with piled up short phrases, separated by commas, and then, tripping, stumbling, (and often interrupted by parentheses) (ones that serve to confuse) (but also to add in layers) a couple of choppy sentences at the end. Without subject. Like this.
Which can be effective.
Sometimes.
But not all the time.
Sometimes you need a change of pace.
This book won't let me go will it?
The title: A 'Ghana Must Go' designates that ubiquitous light plastic carry-all bag that is used by immigrants all over the world. The name comes from the series of expulsions of mainly Ghanaian nationals from Nigeria especially in the 80s, when illegal immigrants were given no more than two weeks to pack up and leave, hastily packing their possessions into these cheap, lightweight bags.
In such a bag, Kweku's slippers are returned to Fola, his first wife:
"We did what we knew. It was what we knew. Leaving."
Was it?
"We were immigrants. Immigrants leave."
Worse: page 79. "Until this very moment Kweku would have bet money that her younger son couldn't have said where he worked-not the name of the hospital, one of several in the vicinity, nor the location of the entrance hall-but here Kehinde was:" Kweku is the father of Kehinde, that's his son to my way of thinking.
A minor gripe I suppose.
I find it interesting to note how reviews and interviews, nay even , all stress Ms Selasai's international background;'born in london raised in boston lives in new york new delhi rome'. For me it is obvious that her default mode is American. She helps the reader out when in Ghana. Accra is explained to us outsiders: Then hired a taxi to take him to Jamestown-the oldest part of Accra and the smelliest by far, a fetid seaside slum of corrugated tin-and-cardboard shanties in the shadow of the country's former Presidential Palace-where, braving the stink (re-dried sweat, rotting fish), he inquired in rusty Ga about a carpenter. But no such help is given when we are in the US. Brookline. (Mis-spelling for Brooklyn? Ooops, no) This was the Colonial she hated, in Brookline, which the man had bought proudly after Sadie was born (and though Mom had wanted a townhouse, South End...
There's noo need to explain. No? No.
Not a gripe, just saying.
And actually, I didn't like the language. It's described as glittering and poetic and all that, but mostly I found it jerky, spiky, prickly, bucking along like a square wheeled wagon. The cadences all the same, sentences running on, with piled up short phrases, separated by commas, and then, tripping, stumbling, (and often interrupted by parentheses) (ones that serve to confuse) (but also to add in layers) a couple of choppy sentences at the end. Without subject. Like this.
Which can be effective.
Sometimes.
But not all the time.
Sometimes you need a change of pace.
This book won't let me go will it?
The title: A 'Ghana Must Go' designates that ubiquitous light plastic carry-all bag that is used by immigrants all over the world. The name comes from the series of expulsions of mainly Ghanaian nationals from Nigeria especially in the 80s, when illegal immigrants were given no more than two weeks to pack up and leave, hastily packing their possessions into these cheap, lightweight bags.
In such a bag, Kweku's slippers are returned to Fola, his first wife:
"We did what we knew. It was what we knew. Leaving."
Was it?
"We were immigrants. Immigrants leave."
December 29, 2014
Philip Hensher encapsulated it in of the Granta Best Young British Novelists, of whom Selasi is one.
bog-standard products of the American creative-writing machine: present-tense narratives introducing western readers to exotic places, with a surface conventional lyricism and a glossary explaining how to pronounce Lagos.
Those who don't share this jaded, cynical sense of a generic litfic / creative writing course / MFA style may take more kindly to Ghana Must Go, a family saga that mixes Jonathan Franzen, Zadie Smith's On Beauty and a bit more Africa for good measure.
I'm not saying that there aren't some lovely metaphors and descriptions here, bits of alliterative wordplay I liked, moments that pull at the heart, occasionally with personal resonance - but it was easy to forget them when wading through paragraphs of that standard, over-serious "poetic" stuff. I found most of the scenes in West Africa more interesting, anything which provided a sense of a culture I don't know well, but chiefly this is an American book: another moderately fucked-up upscale intellectual family over a few decades. (One of today's favoured templates just as Austen's "three or four families in a country village" once was.)
It's possible to imagine being quite impressed with this book in a different context: "she was the best writer in our year" ... but set alongside the amount of hype it's received, nope. I think the hype simply shows how much attention you can get for your okay first novel if you went to Harvard AND Oxford AND have the right media-friendly personality and opinions AND have already worked in the industry. Looking like a supermodel rarely does any harm either.
The publishers could have done more with editing and to encourage rewriting. (To some, surely they would have said "this is promising, but come back to us with your next novel instead".) I don't require fast-paced books but in the first 200 pages Ghana Must Go actually became repetitive and tedious. Moments of Kweku's, the father's, death are slowed down like time-lapse photography and supplied every few pages between flashbacks to various parts of his past life and his family's; then in Part II the same happens with the moments people find out he has died. Described this way I like the approach, but as it is in the book, it doesn't work very well; it's too drawn out and even sometimes disorganised. It's a structure perhaps better suited to film - Selasi has also worked in TV and screenwriting.
The characters, as they each first appear, have believable essences that make them seem somehow more real than the book, Kweku being the best drawn. But as the story wears on there are a lot of details and responses that don't fit together psychologically, that feel like the work of a writer who's either very young and sheltered or isn't a briliant observer of a really wide range of people and also doesn't know much psychology in depth, just taking bits and pieces from the media. Many of the best writers, including those from hundreds of years before anything specifically about psychology was written down, can transmit a sense of three-dimensional people who possess attachment styles and schemas of relating and reacting based on their experiences, show clearly how these were formed in their early lives and how they were affected later. Selasi's characters aren't entirely without psychological depth, it's more that there are collage-like instances of "that happened to them therefore they do this" - but often without setting it in the wider context of the person's earlier experiences and therefore certain things just do not compute. And as this is not a great novel, and also a first novel from someone with what appears to be a very privileged background ... this might be a cheap shot... the inclusion of a particular serious issue that's quite common in recent fiction, films etc seems somewhat exploitative.
Perhaps Selasi won't change her modern international family saga subject matter or her writing style a great deal, but I'm sure she'll polish the latter somewhat. Her next book (it's not like there isn't going to be one, is it?) will surely be better - though it probably won't be quite my sort of thing, so I won't read it unless I'm repeating this present game of reading stuff (likely to be) nominated for awards. And in any case - like Franzen - she's still interesting as a pundit regardless of the novels.
bog-standard products of the American creative-writing machine: present-tense narratives introducing western readers to exotic places, with a surface conventional lyricism and a glossary explaining how to pronounce Lagos.
Those who don't share this jaded, cynical sense of a generic litfic / creative writing course / MFA style may take more kindly to Ghana Must Go, a family saga that mixes Jonathan Franzen, Zadie Smith's On Beauty and a bit more Africa for good measure.
I'm not saying that there aren't some lovely metaphors and descriptions here, bits of alliterative wordplay I liked, moments that pull at the heart, occasionally with personal resonance - but it was easy to forget them when wading through paragraphs of that standard, over-serious "poetic" stuff. I found most of the scenes in West Africa more interesting, anything which provided a sense of a culture I don't know well, but chiefly this is an American book: another moderately fucked-up upscale intellectual family over a few decades. (One of today's favoured templates just as Austen's "three or four families in a country village" once was.)
It's possible to imagine being quite impressed with this book in a different context: "she was the best writer in our year" ... but set alongside the amount of hype it's received, nope. I think the hype simply shows how much attention you can get for your okay first novel if you went to Harvard AND Oxford AND have the right media-friendly personality and opinions AND have already worked in the industry. Looking like a supermodel rarely does any harm either.
The publishers could have done more with editing and to encourage rewriting. (To some, surely they would have said "this is promising, but come back to us with your next novel instead".) I don't require fast-paced books but in the first 200 pages Ghana Must Go actually became repetitive and tedious. Moments of Kweku's, the father's, death are slowed down like time-lapse photography and supplied every few pages between flashbacks to various parts of his past life and his family's; then in Part II the same happens with the moments people find out he has died. Described this way I like the approach, but as it is in the book, it doesn't work very well; it's too drawn out and even sometimes disorganised. It's a structure perhaps better suited to film - Selasi has also worked in TV and screenwriting.
The characters, as they each first appear, have believable essences that make them seem somehow more real than the book, Kweku being the best drawn. But as the story wears on there are a lot of details and responses that don't fit together psychologically, that feel like the work of a writer who's either very young and sheltered or isn't a briliant observer of a really wide range of people and also doesn't know much psychology in depth, just taking bits and pieces from the media. Many of the best writers, including those from hundreds of years before anything specifically about psychology was written down, can transmit a sense of three-dimensional people who possess attachment styles and schemas of relating and reacting based on their experiences, show clearly how these were formed in their early lives and how they were affected later. Selasi's characters aren't entirely without psychological depth, it's more that there are collage-like instances of "that happened to them therefore they do this" - but often without setting it in the wider context of the person's earlier experiences and therefore certain things just do not compute. And as this is not a great novel, and also a first novel from someone with what appears to be a very privileged background ... this might be a cheap shot... the inclusion of a particular serious issue that's quite common in recent fiction, films etc seems somewhat exploitative.
Perhaps Selasi won't change her modern international family saga subject matter or her writing style a great deal, but I'm sure she'll polish the latter somewhat. Her next book (it's not like there isn't going to be one, is it?) will surely be better - though it probably won't be quite my sort of thing, so I won't read it unless I'm repeating this present game of reading stuff (likely to be) nominated for awards. And in any case - like Franzen - she's still interesting as a pundit regardless of the novels.
February 10, 2021
小褗卸邪谢褟胁邪屑, 褔械 褑褟谢邪 谐芯写懈薪邪 褌邪蟹懈 锌褉械泻褉邪褋薪邪 泻薪懈谐邪 芯褌谢械卸邪胁邪 薪邪 褉邪褎褌邪 懈 锌芯褋褌芯褟薪薪芯 斜械 懈蟹屑械褋褌胁邪薪邪 芯褌 写褉褍谐懈, 泻芯懈褌芯 泻褍锌褍胁邪褏 懈 锌芯褔胁邪褏 薪邪 屑懈谐邪, 蟹邪褖芯褌芯 械 锌芯胁械褔械 芯褌 锌褉械泻褉邪褋薪邪, 斜懈褏 泻邪蟹邪谢邪 胁械谢懈泻芯谢械锌薪邪.
袩懈褋邪薪械褌芯 薪邪 小械谢邪褋懈 械 泻褉邪褋懈胁芯 懈 锌芯械褌懈褔薪芯. 袩褗褉胁芯薪邪褔邪谢薪芯 斜褟褏 芯斜褗褉泻邪薪邪 芯褌 褉邪蟹褏胁褗褉谢褟薪懈褌械 褎褉邪谐屑械薪褌懈褉邪薪懈 褋谢褍褔泻懈, 薪芯 褋谢械写 50-80 褋褌褉邪薪懈褑邪 锌芯胁械褋褌胁芯胁邪薪懈械褌芯 屑械 锌芯胁谢械褔械, 鈥溞垦€芯锌邪写薪邪褏鈥� 胁 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟褌邪 懈 胁械褔械 薪械 屑芯卸械褏 写邪 褋锌褉邪. 袣薪懈谐邪褌邪 锌芯褋褌邪胁褟 屑薪芯谐芯 胁褗锌褉芯褋懈 懈 锌褉械写懈蟹胁懈泻邪 屑薪芯谐芯 褉邪蟹屑懈褋谢懈 胁 屑械薪, 薪芯 薪邪泄-褋懈谢薪芯 褋褟泻邪褕 屑械 写芯泻芯褋薪邪 褌邪蟹懈 蟹邪 褉芯写懈褌械谢褋褌胁芯褌芯 懈 斜褉邪褌褋泻芯 - 褋械褋褌褉懈薪褋泻懈褌械 芯褌薪芯褕械薪懈褟.
袩懈褋邪薪械褌芯 薪邪 小械谢邪褋懈 械 泻褉邪褋懈胁芯 懈 锌芯械褌懈褔薪芯. 袩褗褉胁芯薪邪褔邪谢薪芯 斜褟褏 芯斜褗褉泻邪薪邪 芯褌 褉邪蟹褏胁褗褉谢褟薪懈褌械 褎褉邪谐屑械薪褌懈褉邪薪懈 褋谢褍褔泻懈, 薪芯 褋谢械写 50-80 褋褌褉邪薪懈褑邪 锌芯胁械褋褌胁芯胁邪薪懈械褌芯 屑械 锌芯胁谢械褔械, 鈥溞垦€芯锌邪写薪邪褏鈥� 胁 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟褌邪 懈 胁械褔械 薪械 屑芯卸械褏 写邪 褋锌褉邪. 袣薪懈谐邪褌邪 锌芯褋褌邪胁褟 屑薪芯谐芯 胁褗锌褉芯褋懈 懈 锌褉械写懈蟹胁懈泻邪 屑薪芯谐芯 褉邪蟹屑懈褋谢懈 胁 屑械薪, 薪芯 薪邪泄-褋懈谢薪芯 褋褟泻邪褕 屑械 写芯泻芯褋薪邪 褌邪蟹懈 蟹邪 褉芯写懈褌械谢褋褌胁芯褌芯 懈 斜褉邪褌褋泻芯 - 褋械褋褌褉懈薪褋泻懈褌械 芯褌薪芯褕械薪懈褟.
April 7, 2013
About 10 years ago, I spent 3-4 months teaching English in a tiny Ghanaian village (electricity only in two or three houses, no running water) in the heart of the Ashanti region. I realize that a) this does not make me an expert on Ghana, and b) is not a particularly unique experience; however, it does mean that I have a very soft spot in my heart for Ghana. After reading the blurb on this, and reading about the author's backstory after seeing her short story in last year's Best American, I was excited to dig into this one.
Honestly, I finished it a few days ago, and I've been struggling with what I thought about it. For about the first 50 pages, I vacillated a lot in my opinion of Selasi's writing - stylistically speaking. It's very impressionistic, very poetic, and has a lot of beautiful sentences, but I also thought she had quite a few annoying tics (the one word paragraph, the redundant proliferation of several phrases to describe one thing when one would do just as nicely, etc.) and that it was in need of an editor by about half. Also, for a novel that is primarily about how a family breaks apart over time (and their struggles to come back together), and in which very little in the present time actually happens, I thought some of the backstory seemed a little farfetched and overly melodramatic (especially the storyline with the twins- not that it couldn't happen, but couldn't something a little less over the top have happened to drive them apart?). The sensational nature of what happened to the twins made it difficult for me to stay with them as real characters rather than caricatures, moreso than I did with the moments between Sadie and Fola, Kehinde and Kweku, or Olu and all of them.
But - and it's a big one - I'm giving it four stars. Because my two most important reading criteria are: 1) I feel genuinely moved by the time I finish a piece, and 2) it stays with me after I close the book. It might be a little early to tell for #2, but I haven't stopped thinking it over since I finished it. And as for the 1st one, I will say that Selasi has a tremendous ability (despite the narrative tics that got to me here and there) to render very real, very nuanced characters. She is great with details, with dialogue, and with pacing, and very subtly handled what was a rather complicated chronological approach in this novel. By the time I finished the book, I cared very, very deeply about the Sai family, and hoped for the best for them, despite their faults. I'll be excited to read whatever Selasi puts out next, but for now I'm glad she's been getting a lot of attention for this one.
Honestly, I finished it a few days ago, and I've been struggling with what I thought about it. For about the first 50 pages, I vacillated a lot in my opinion of Selasi's writing - stylistically speaking. It's very impressionistic, very poetic, and has a lot of beautiful sentences, but I also thought she had quite a few annoying tics (the one word paragraph, the redundant proliferation of several phrases to describe one thing when one would do just as nicely, etc.) and that it was in need of an editor by about half. Also, for a novel that is primarily about how a family breaks apart over time (and their struggles to come back together), and in which very little in the present time actually happens, I thought some of the backstory seemed a little farfetched and overly melodramatic (especially the storyline with the twins- not that it couldn't happen, but couldn't something a little less over the top have happened to drive them apart?). The sensational nature of what happened to the twins made it difficult for me to stay with them as real characters rather than caricatures, moreso than I did with the moments between Sadie and Fola, Kehinde and Kweku, or Olu and all of them.
But - and it's a big one - I'm giving it four stars. Because my two most important reading criteria are: 1) I feel genuinely moved by the time I finish a piece, and 2) it stays with me after I close the book. It might be a little early to tell for #2, but I haven't stopped thinking it over since I finished it. And as for the 1st one, I will say that Selasi has a tremendous ability (despite the narrative tics that got to me here and there) to render very real, very nuanced characters. She is great with details, with dialogue, and with pacing, and very subtly handled what was a rather complicated chronological approach in this novel. By the time I finished the book, I cared very, very deeply about the Sai family, and hoped for the best for them, despite their faults. I'll be excited to read whatever Selasi puts out next, but for now I'm glad she's been getting a lot of attention for this one.
August 13, 2014
It's not you, Taiye, it's me.
I don't know why I feel like none of the characters have enough of a personality to seem human, despite being well stocked with anguished personal histories and appropriate mixes of generic and unique traits (except Olu's Asian American wife Ling, who seems particularly ill-served. Her politely racist father, direct from central casting, is at least spared the indignity of being thought 'cute') But perhaps the viewpoint-shifting and relentless interiority sets the bar impossibly high. With all these deepest darkest hearts on display, Selasi is up against the problem... of only having one heart?
But it's me, it's my fault. When Sadie flares up at her mother I'm disgusted and confused; Selasi's explanation of her resentment adds up, but it doesn't feel right to me. Fola, the mother, is adorable (morally faultless), her thoughts poetically rendered, but still seems to sleepwalk. Kweku, the father, gifted with the most story-space to express himself, is generally similarly somnolent. The elder son Olu, for all his inept emoting, lacks substance. Taiwo and Kehinde, damaged, knitted into each other, are the only characters that seem to really live.
It's also mostly my fault that I struggled with what felt like gender-normativity, mostly. Take Ama, Kweku's second wife, described by Olu as a 'village idiot' and by the magic yogi carpenter character as 'used to being told what to do', by Kweku as 'capable of being satisfied' and also, conclusively, as 'a genius'. Selasi thus makes the case for her, through Kweku and later Fola, as unfairly judged, but crucially doesn't give her a voice: she has no right of reply, no subject position. Maybe it's a good tactic though to make the reader do the work?
I could really have done without the enormous excess of physical descriptions (especially the constant judgemental equivocal adjectives like beautiful and pretty) and I would have been much happier to do without any of the sex scenes. My fault. And the abuse... I always wish these scenes were offstage.
It's my fault that I wanted a different book when this one was perfectly good. People and relationships are mashed up, injured by institutional racism and racism-induced inferiority complexes (I ineptly fill in the gaps as to why Fola, perhaps because she is African, seemingly hasn't prepared her children well to cope with anti-blackness in America). Poverty happens with consequences, but lacks its taste. In general the Sais move freely through the world unhindered by monetary obstacles. Staff near-silently assist them. There is nuance, but the people change painfully, while the structures that hurt them slumber in place. There is sense of place, aesthetic; not political, not communal.
Honestly it's well constructed and beautifully written and all. And I enjoyed reading it, on the whole. I just couldn't fall in love.
I don't know why I feel like none of the characters have enough of a personality to seem human, despite being well stocked with anguished personal histories and appropriate mixes of generic and unique traits (except Olu's Asian American wife Ling, who seems particularly ill-served. Her politely racist father, direct from central casting, is at least spared the indignity of being thought 'cute') But perhaps the viewpoint-shifting and relentless interiority sets the bar impossibly high. With all these deepest darkest hearts on display, Selasi is up against the problem... of only having one heart?
But it's me, it's my fault. When Sadie flares up at her mother I'm disgusted and confused; Selasi's explanation of her resentment adds up, but it doesn't feel right to me. Fola, the mother, is adorable (morally faultless), her thoughts poetically rendered, but still seems to sleepwalk. Kweku, the father, gifted with the most story-space to express himself, is generally similarly somnolent. The elder son Olu, for all his inept emoting, lacks substance. Taiwo and Kehinde, damaged, knitted into each other, are the only characters that seem to really live.
It's also mostly my fault that I struggled with what felt like gender-normativity, mostly. Take Ama, Kweku's second wife, described by Olu as a 'village idiot' and by the magic yogi carpenter character as 'used to being told what to do', by Kweku as 'capable of being satisfied' and also, conclusively, as 'a genius'. Selasi thus makes the case for her, through Kweku and later Fola, as unfairly judged, but crucially doesn't give her a voice: she has no right of reply, no subject position. Maybe it's a good tactic though to make the reader do the work?
I could really have done without the enormous excess of physical descriptions (especially the constant judgemental equivocal adjectives like beautiful and pretty) and I would have been much happier to do without any of the sex scenes. My fault. And the abuse... I always wish these scenes were offstage.
It's my fault that I wanted a different book when this one was perfectly good. People and relationships are mashed up, injured by institutional racism and racism-induced inferiority complexes (I ineptly fill in the gaps as to why Fola, perhaps because she is African, seemingly hasn't prepared her children well to cope with anti-blackness in America). Poverty happens with consequences, but lacks its taste. In general the Sais move freely through the world unhindered by monetary obstacles. Staff near-silently assist them. There is nuance, but the people change painfully, while the structures that hurt them slumber in place. There is sense of place, aesthetic; not political, not communal.
Honestly it's well constructed and beautifully written and all. And I enjoyed reading it, on the whole. I just couldn't fall in love.
July 8, 2015
Much as I resisted it to start with, I ended up loving this beautiful novel about a complex African-American family full of secrets, estrangements, and shifting alliances. Despite their disparate settings, the storyline reminded me most of Maggie O鈥橣arrell鈥檚 Instructions for a Heatwave.
With its wise commentary on race and class in America, it also brought to mind one of my absolute favorites, On Beauty by Zadie Smith, whom I think Selasi is destined to join in the top rank of contemporary authors. I particularly loved this aside on what it means to be black: 鈥渁uthentic blackness鈥s far as [Sadie]鈥檚 concerned, confuses identity and musical preference.鈥�
So now back to explain why I struggled through the first 60 or so pages, thinking I was aiming at a two-star review. The writing takes some getting used to. Here鈥檚 an example of Selasi鈥檚 short and often incomplete sentences:
鈥淎n hour outside of the city: the ocean.
Unannounced, unambitious.
Just suddenly there.鈥�
Along with that somewhat clipped phrasing, you鈥檒l also have to become accustomed to some repetition and cyclical chronology: it takes about 70 pages for a central character to die, despite the fact that the very first sentence announces the death. The event is also mythologized in a way that highly irritated me to start with. 鈥淲ho does she think she is? Salman Rushdie?!鈥� I kept grumbling to myself, especially after a few minor hints of magic realism (heartbreak described literally; the mother sensing which one of her children is in trouble based on which quadrant of her belly twinges). The persistent wordplay, including rogue capitalization and hyphenation, also felt a bit too clever. I kept thinking that, although impressive, the book was overwritten.
Here鈥檚 the thing, though: Selasi is so talented she completely gets away with all of it. She has the confidence to expand the few days between a death and a funeral into a decades-long family saga, rife with betrayal and shame. She brazenly reverses a saying through sections headed 鈥淕one鈥� --> 鈥淕oing鈥� --> 鈥淕o.鈥� She keeps piling on the big shockers 鈥� a secret marriage, a murder, eating disorders, wrongful dismissal from work, affairs, divorce, and incest/sexual abuse 鈥� without once resorting to melodrama. She even has the audacity to continue presenting characters鈥� behavior through the viewfinder of an imaginary cameraman (now that I loved). And she immerses you completely in her settings, whether the backseat of a New York taxi, the dusty streets of Ghana and Nigeria, or a dorm bathroom.
Although I probably prefer Zadie Smith鈥檚 writing on balance, I鈥檒l be eager to see what Selasi comes out with next.
With its wise commentary on race and class in America, it also brought to mind one of my absolute favorites, On Beauty by Zadie Smith, whom I think Selasi is destined to join in the top rank of contemporary authors. I particularly loved this aside on what it means to be black: 鈥渁uthentic blackness鈥s far as [Sadie]鈥檚 concerned, confuses identity and musical preference.鈥�
So now back to explain why I struggled through the first 60 or so pages, thinking I was aiming at a two-star review. The writing takes some getting used to. Here鈥檚 an example of Selasi鈥檚 short and often incomplete sentences:
鈥淎n hour outside of the city: the ocean.
Unannounced, unambitious.
Just suddenly there.鈥�
Along with that somewhat clipped phrasing, you鈥檒l also have to become accustomed to some repetition and cyclical chronology: it takes about 70 pages for a central character to die, despite the fact that the very first sentence announces the death. The event is also mythologized in a way that highly irritated me to start with. 鈥淲ho does she think she is? Salman Rushdie?!鈥� I kept grumbling to myself, especially after a few minor hints of magic realism (heartbreak described literally; the mother sensing which one of her children is in trouble based on which quadrant of her belly twinges). The persistent wordplay, including rogue capitalization and hyphenation, also felt a bit too clever. I kept thinking that, although impressive, the book was overwritten.
Here鈥檚 the thing, though: Selasi is so talented she completely gets away with all of it. She has the confidence to expand the few days between a death and a funeral into a decades-long family saga, rife with betrayal and shame. She brazenly reverses a saying through sections headed 鈥淕one鈥� --> 鈥淕oing鈥� --> 鈥淕o.鈥� She keeps piling on the big shockers 鈥� a secret marriage, a murder, eating disorders, wrongful dismissal from work, affairs, divorce, and incest/sexual abuse 鈥� without once resorting to melodrama. She even has the audacity to continue presenting characters鈥� behavior through the viewfinder of an imaginary cameraman (now that I loved). And she immerses you completely in her settings, whether the backseat of a New York taxi, the dusty streets of Ghana and Nigeria, or a dorm bathroom.
Although I probably prefer Zadie Smith鈥檚 writing on balance, I鈥檒l be eager to see what Selasi comes out with next.
September 4, 2019
袣褉邪褋懈胁芯, 懈薪褌褉芯胁械褉褌薪芯, 谢械泻芯 蟹邪写褍褕邪胁邪褖芯 褔械褌懈胁芯, 屑薪芯谐芯 锌谢褗褌薪芯 锌懈褋邪薪械, 薪褟泻芯懈 锌邪褋邪卸懈 斜褟褏邪 锌褉芯褋褌芯 斜褉懈谢褟薪褌薪懈, 屑薪芯谐芯 懈薪褌懈屑薪邪, 泻邪屑械褉薪邪 懈 屑械谢邪薪褏芯谢懈褔薪邪 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟.
April 10, 2018
鈥滽weku morre descal莽o num domingo antes do nascer do Sol, com os chinelos no ch茫o, junto 脿 entrada da porta do quarto, como dois c茫es. Neste preciso momento est谩 a meio caminho entre a sala envidra莽ada e o jardim a pensar se h谩 de voltar atr谩s para os ir buscar. N茫o vai voltar.鈥�
Estas s茫o as primeiras linhas de 鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� (2013) 鈥� romance estreia da escritora Taiye Selasi (n. 1979), nascida em Londres, Inglaterra, criada no Massachusetts, EUA; vive actualmente em Roma, It谩lia. A sua m茫e nasceu em Inglaterra, foi criada na Nig茅ria e vive actualmente no Gana. O seu pai nasceu na zona da Costa do Ouro, antes uma col贸nia brit芒nica, hoje o Gana, e viveu mais de trinta anos na Ar谩bia Saudita.
鈥滸hana Must Go鈥� 茅 o t铆tulo original 鈥� associado a um per铆odo nos anos 80 em que a Nig茅ria imp么s a expuls茫o de todos os imigrantes indocumentados, numa medida que afectou principalmente os cidad茫os ganases.
Kweku Sai, um brilhante cirurgi茫o gan锚s que emigrou para os Estados Unidos da Am茅rica e a sua primeira mulher Fol谩sad茅 Savage (Fol谩), que abandonou Lagos, na Nig茅ria e partiu para a Pensilv芒nia s茫o a g茅nese do romance constru铆do por Taiye Telasi com recurso 脿s mem贸rias e 脿s lembran莽as das personagens 鈥� quer no passado, quer no presente; incluindo as dos seus quatro filhos.
No final h谩 um reencontro 鈥� n茫o um desfecho 鈥� familiar, desdobrando-se esta hist贸ria em m煤ltiplos fragmentos em m煤ltiplas hist贸rias, com in煤meras revela莽玫es, quase sempre dram谩ticas, que permitem termos a percep莽茫o das motiva莽玫es, da perspic谩cia, da intelig锚ncia e da tenacidade de todos os intervenientes.
鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� 茅 um not谩vel romance de estreia de Taiye Selasi com uma escrita ousada e po茅tica, num relato profundo e emocional sobre pessoas que sofrem in煤meras transforma莽玫es f铆sicas e psicol贸gicas, consequ锚ncia de viv锚ncias assentes em v铆nculos e la莽os de amor, mas, igualmente, em rela莽玫es infligidas pela dor e pela incompreens茫o.
鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� 茅 igualmente uma obra que debate a quest茫o primordial da aus锚ncia de ra铆zes sociol贸gicas nas gera莽玫es de imigrantes provenientes de 脕frica e que se instalaram nos Estados Unidos da Am茅rica.
鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� n茫o 茅 um livro de leitura f谩cil. Ambicioso no contexto e diversificado na vertente geogr谩fica 鈥� Gana, Nig茅ria, Estados Unidos da Am茅rica; re煤ne uma hist贸ria comovente de uma fam铆lia fragmentada, resgatando maravilhosamente a resolu莽茫o dos segredos e das mentiras do passado.
Apesar de n茫o se debru莽ar excessivamente no sofrimento das personagens, preferindo antes particularizar a experi锚ncia da imigra莽茫o africana, Taiye Selasi, enquadra quest玫es dolorosas como o abuso sexual na inf芒ncia, a bulimia e a neglic锚ncia parental; indagando sobre a descrimina莽茫o social e econ贸mica, sobre as conquistas e os fracassos, sobre as quest玫es raciais, o preto e o branco, o preto e o negro.
H谩 sempre a possibilidade de um recome莽o鈥�
Nota: A edi莽茫o portuguesa apresenta o t铆tulo 鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� - n茫o o consigo associar com a obra liter谩ria.
Taiye Selasi (n. 1979)
Taiye Selasi na TED
Estas s茫o as primeiras linhas de 鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� (2013) 鈥� romance estreia da escritora Taiye Selasi (n. 1979), nascida em Londres, Inglaterra, criada no Massachusetts, EUA; vive actualmente em Roma, It谩lia. A sua m茫e nasceu em Inglaterra, foi criada na Nig茅ria e vive actualmente no Gana. O seu pai nasceu na zona da Costa do Ouro, antes uma col贸nia brit芒nica, hoje o Gana, e viveu mais de trinta anos na Ar谩bia Saudita.
鈥滸hana Must Go鈥� 茅 o t铆tulo original 鈥� associado a um per铆odo nos anos 80 em que a Nig茅ria imp么s a expuls茫o de todos os imigrantes indocumentados, numa medida que afectou principalmente os cidad茫os ganases.
Kweku Sai, um brilhante cirurgi茫o gan锚s que emigrou para os Estados Unidos da Am茅rica e a sua primeira mulher Fol谩sad茅 Savage (Fol谩), que abandonou Lagos, na Nig茅ria e partiu para a Pensilv芒nia s茫o a g茅nese do romance constru铆do por Taiye Telasi com recurso 脿s mem贸rias e 脿s lembran莽as das personagens 鈥� quer no passado, quer no presente; incluindo as dos seus quatro filhos.
No final h谩 um reencontro 鈥� n茫o um desfecho 鈥� familiar, desdobrando-se esta hist贸ria em m煤ltiplos fragmentos em m煤ltiplas hist贸rias, com in煤meras revela莽玫es, quase sempre dram谩ticas, que permitem termos a percep莽茫o das motiva莽玫es, da perspic谩cia, da intelig锚ncia e da tenacidade de todos os intervenientes.
鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� 茅 um not谩vel romance de estreia de Taiye Selasi com uma escrita ousada e po茅tica, num relato profundo e emocional sobre pessoas que sofrem in煤meras transforma莽玫es f铆sicas e psicol贸gicas, consequ锚ncia de viv锚ncias assentes em v铆nculos e la莽os de amor, mas, igualmente, em rela莽玫es infligidas pela dor e pela incompreens茫o.
鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� 茅 igualmente uma obra que debate a quest茫o primordial da aus锚ncia de ra铆zes sociol贸gicas nas gera莽玫es de imigrantes provenientes de 脕frica e que se instalaram nos Estados Unidos da Am茅rica.
鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� n茫o 茅 um livro de leitura f谩cil. Ambicioso no contexto e diversificado na vertente geogr谩fica 鈥� Gana, Nig茅ria, Estados Unidos da Am茅rica; re煤ne uma hist贸ria comovente de uma fam铆lia fragmentada, resgatando maravilhosamente a resolu莽茫o dos segredos e das mentiras do passado.
Apesar de n茫o se debru莽ar excessivamente no sofrimento das personagens, preferindo antes particularizar a experi锚ncia da imigra莽茫o africana, Taiye Selasi, enquadra quest玫es dolorosas como o abuso sexual na inf芒ncia, a bulimia e a neglic锚ncia parental; indagando sobre a descrimina莽茫o social e econ贸mica, sobre as conquistas e os fracassos, sobre as quest玫es raciais, o preto e o branco, o preto e o negro.
H谩 sempre a possibilidade de um recome莽o鈥�
Nota: A edi莽茫o portuguesa apresenta o t铆tulo 鈥滱 Beleza das Coisas Fr谩geis鈥� - n茫o o consigo associar com a obra liter谩ria.
Taiye Selasi (n. 1979)
Taiye Selasi na TED
April 20, 2013
You guys. I literally - like, actually, physically, inexplicably - had to stop myself from taking a bite of this book. My desire to devour it, to internalize it and at the same time, to curl up in it and be surrounded by it, was that strong.
So, Kweku, the father of four, brilliant surgeon, loving husband, and then - none of those things, abandoning the roles without actually leaving them behind in his heart. Sixteen years after he left Boston and his family behind, he dies suddenly, leaving his ex-wife and children with too many things unsaid. They have continents of mis- and non-communication within them, for a group that started out so solidly as a nuclear family - but Kweku's leaving burned deep scars into them all.
But, whatever. A plot device - this long-delayed bringing back together of once-close family members, complete with sad revelations and falling into old patterns and tears (and tears) and joinings. It's good stuff, undoubtedly, and Selasi balances each of the five survivors with delicacy, weaving their stories just tightly enough to hold while still seeing their individual, lovely shades.
The magic is in the writing. Follow the ways color-attuned and monochromatic sensibilities speak about each character. Delve into the truths about identity and self-perception and heritage. Admire the use of dialogue and the silences within dialogue. See the emotions transparent in the empathic guts of the Sai family. Discover the terrifying beauty of Selasi's writing, and after you've read it and re-read it, come back and tell me how damn right I am.
(But if it's a library book, don't actually chew on the novel. It's bad form.)
April 23, 2021
Started out slow, ended too soon. An immigrant family rooted in achievement, breaks. The journey in these novel chronicles the impacts on the parents and their four driven and successful children. All characters fully developed with the weight of the expectations, secrets, emotional baggage and ignored issues. I got pulled in completely by these interesting and engaging characters. Excellent debut novel. The title refers to a time in 1983 when Nigeria expelled Ghanaians with the all too familiar "they are taking our jobs..." meme. Though this bit of history is not a huge part of the novel, the burdens on immigrants to be brilliant in other countries and what happens when they prove to be human is palpable. Trigger warnings: This novel had a worldly feel both with the characterization and the various locales in the story. I will be thinking about this immersive novel for a long time.
4.5ish Stars
Listened to the audiobook. The narration by Adjoa Andoh was fantastic!!
4.5ish Stars
Listened to the audiobook. The narration by Adjoa Andoh was fantastic!!
May 5, 2019
袣薪懈谐邪褌邪 谐褍斜懈 芯褌 褌芯胁邪, 褔械 械 芯斜褋懈锌邪薪邪 褋邪屑芯 褋 褏胁邪谢械斜褋褌胁懈褟 锌芯 泻芯褉懈褑懈褌械 懈 锌褉械写褋褌邪胁械薪邪 褋 芯褌泻褗褋, 泻芯泄褌芯 锌芯-褋泻芯褉芯 芯蟹邪写邪褔邪胁邪, 芯褌泻芯谢泻芯褌芯 写邪 锌褉懈胁谢械褔械.
"Ghana must go" 写邪胁邪 懈薪褎芯褉屑邪褑懈褟 懈 薪邪褋芯泻邪. 袩褉懈 褌邪泻邪胁邪 锌褉芯屑褟薪邪 胁 蟹邪谐谢邪胁懈械, 械写薪邪 泻褉邪褌泻邪 邪薪芯褌邪褑懈褟 斜懈 锌芯屑芯谐薪邪谢邪 锌芯胁械褔械.
袦薪芯谐芯 械屑芯褑懈芯薪邪谢械薪 懈 褏褍斜邪胁 褉邪蟹泻邪蟹 蟹邪 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯, 械屑懈谐褉邪褑懈褟, 泻芯褉械薪懈, 斜谢懈蟹芯褋褌, 褔褍写械褋薪芯 芯胁谢邪写褟薪邪 锌褉芯屑褟薪邪 薪邪 谐谢邪褋芯胁械 懈 谐谢械写薪懈 褌芯褔泻懈, 蟹邪锌芯屑薪褟褖懈 褋械 谢懈褑邪.
效褍写械褏 褋械 泻邪泻 小械谢邪褋懈 屑芯卸械 褌邪泻邪 写邪 胁谢械蟹械 胁 锌褋懈褏芯谢芯谐懈褟褌邪 薪邪 芯褌薪芯褕械薪懈褟 屑械卸写褍 斜谢懈蟹薪邪褑懈, 锌芯褋谢械写薪懈褌械 写褍屑懈 芯褌 斜谢邪谐芯写邪褉薪芯褋褌懈褌械 芯斜褟褋薪懈褏邪 胁褋懈褔泻芯: "懈 薪邪泄-胁械褔械 写-褉 袡械褌褋邪 袣械褏懈薪写械 袗写械斜芯写褍薪写械 袨谢褍斜褍薪屑懈 孝褍邪泻谢懈-校芯褋芯褉薪褍, 屑芯褟 斜谢懈蟹薪邪褔泻邪 懈 屑芯械 褋褗褉褑械."
"Ghana must go" 写邪胁邪 懈薪褎芯褉屑邪褑懈褟 懈 薪邪褋芯泻邪. 袩褉懈 褌邪泻邪胁邪 锌褉芯屑褟薪邪 胁 蟹邪谐谢邪胁懈械, 械写薪邪 泻褉邪褌泻邪 邪薪芯褌邪褑懈褟 斜懈 锌芯屑芯谐薪邪谢邪 锌芯胁械褔械.
袦薪芯谐芯 械屑芯褑懈芯薪邪谢械薪 懈 褏褍斜邪胁 褉邪蟹泻邪蟹 蟹邪 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯, 械屑懈谐褉邪褑懈褟, 泻芯褉械薪懈, 斜谢懈蟹芯褋褌, 褔褍写械褋薪芯 芯胁谢邪写褟薪邪 锌褉芯屑褟薪邪 薪邪 谐谢邪褋芯胁械 懈 谐谢械写薪懈 褌芯褔泻懈, 蟹邪锌芯屑薪褟褖懈 褋械 谢懈褑邪.
效褍写械褏 褋械 泻邪泻 小械谢邪褋懈 屑芯卸械 褌邪泻邪 写邪 胁谢械蟹械 胁 锌褋懈褏芯谢芯谐懈褟褌邪 薪邪 芯褌薪芯褕械薪懈褟 屑械卸写褍 斜谢懈蟹薪邪褑懈, 锌芯褋谢械写薪懈褌械 写褍屑懈 芯褌 斜谢邪谐芯写邪褉薪芯褋褌懈褌械 芯斜褟褋薪懈褏邪 胁褋懈褔泻芯: "懈 薪邪泄-胁械褔械 写-褉 袡械褌褋邪 袣械褏懈薪写械 袗写械斜芯写褍薪写械 袨谢褍斜褍薪屑懈 孝褍邪泻谢懈-校芯褋芯褉薪褍, 屑芯褟 斜谢懈蟹薪邪褔泻邪 懈 屑芯械 褋褗褉褑械."
May 6, 2013
I had difficulty following her writing style. Each time I started to read, it took me at least 30 minutes to get into her rhythm. It's a story about a man from Ghana who marries a woman from Lagos. He pursues his medical degree, and she puts her Law school on hold to have a baby. They have 4 children, his wife stays home, and he tries to be the best Dr. It's a story of estrangement and secrets that families have. The Dr abandons the family when he is faced with the humiliation of being fired (unjustly). He comes back a week later and the wife took the children and began a new life. He moves back to Ghana and dies an early death. The family gathers to bury him and secrets unfold, family members are more understood, the family knits back together. Interesting story鈥�..I just didn't like her writing style.
May 12, 2013
what i liked most in this book, what kept me electrified from the first sentence, is the language. i loved the language. wow. poetic passages with not a shred of tiresomeness. originality of vision. beautiful.
in the last third, the story got in the way. truth be told, i was all about kweku. his tragedy, told almost indirectly, through his kids' stories, through the flashbacks he's having as he's dying, is powerful and delicate and so poignant. a brilliant man, an accomplished man, an african living in america: you know he doesn't stand a chance. you know the land of opportunity will chew him and spit him out.
the twins' story robs the limelight in a way that is not to advantage, in my opinion. maybe it belonged in another book?
but i read it breathlessly till the end, and if you like language half as much as i do, read this extraordinary book as well.
in the last third, the story got in the way. truth be told, i was all about kweku. his tragedy, told almost indirectly, through his kids' stories, through the flashbacks he's having as he's dying, is powerful and delicate and so poignant. a brilliant man, an accomplished man, an african living in america: you know he doesn't stand a chance. you know the land of opportunity will chew him and spit him out.
the twins' story robs the limelight in a way that is not to advantage, in my opinion. maybe it belonged in another book?
but i read it breathlessly till the end, and if you like language half as much as i do, read this extraordinary book as well.
October 12, 2022
[3.45] Beautifully written with characters I wanted to get to know, this was almost a 4 star novel for me but the pacing and structure was just too uneven. As soon as I got involved, I was jerked back to the past or to another family member and had to figure out where I was again.
March 29, 2013
If this novel was used in a word association game, my first words would be Zadie Smith's WHITE TEETH. Both debut novels exhibit raw talent and beauty. Both women handle serious topics such as race, class, gender, ambition, social status with tremendous ease. Both novels, however, are incredibly overwritten, dripping with prose that should have been left on the cutting room floor. I'm thinking here of the description of Kweku's death and how Selasi goes in super slo-mo to describe every detail of our patriarch's fall. Beautiful, beautiful stuff but perhaps we don't need all of it. Selasi, like Smith, will settle down as a writer, and I can't wait to read more from her.
I'm thinking now of something Selasi writes towards the end of the novel. She says relationships forces us to look at our own mortality. Essentially, the arch of our life is mimicked by the arch of our love. The exciting beginning. The somber end. And the habits in between. I'm guessing this is why people find both joy and struggle in relationships because of how it amplifies the rising and falling action of the business of life. I'm also thinking this is why there are so many 6-months-and-quit relationships. No one wants to come face to face with the monotony of their life, especially within the construct of love, a construct most of us only understand through saccharine love songs and movies. There are few movies or songs about walking the dog, paying bills, going grocery shopping, etc.
(Ironically enough, my girlfriend is telling me I should quit this and follow her to bed. So I will end here. )
oh.
there is also the nagging question of: what is the title really about?
it is been hardwired for most africans that to achieve success, one must leave. i suppose this is the common narrative for all humans...
but i don't think as extreme as africans. to get a quality education, you must leave your CONTINENT. at least that is the conventional wisdom. it is definitely the thought with my parents who immigrated here looking for the pot of gold (gold= stability, kids who spoke perfect English with no Igbo accent). the problem with that is that africans have learned that the best thing to do in tough times is to exit. ghanians are seen as a threat..so they must exit. within this model can there ever be compromise? can there ever be real love?
I'm thinking now of something Selasi writes towards the end of the novel. She says relationships forces us to look at our own mortality. Essentially, the arch of our life is mimicked by the arch of our love. The exciting beginning. The somber end. And the habits in between. I'm guessing this is why people find both joy and struggle in relationships because of how it amplifies the rising and falling action of the business of life. I'm also thinking this is why there are so many 6-months-and-quit relationships. No one wants to come face to face with the monotony of their life, especially within the construct of love, a construct most of us only understand through saccharine love songs and movies. There are few movies or songs about walking the dog, paying bills, going grocery shopping, etc.
(Ironically enough, my girlfriend is telling me I should quit this and follow her to bed. So I will end here. )
oh.
there is also the nagging question of: what is the title really about?
it is been hardwired for most africans that to achieve success, one must leave. i suppose this is the common narrative for all humans...
but i don't think as extreme as africans. to get a quality education, you must leave your CONTINENT. at least that is the conventional wisdom. it is definitely the thought with my parents who immigrated here looking for the pot of gold (gold= stability, kids who spoke perfect English with no Igbo accent). the problem with that is that africans have learned that the best thing to do in tough times is to exit. ghanians are seen as a threat..so they must exit. within this model can there ever be compromise? can there ever be real love?
December 26, 2018
袧邪锌褍褋泻邪薪械褌芯 薪邪 褋胁械褌邪 薪邪 械写懈薪 芯褌写邪胁薪邪 薪邪锌褍褋薪邪谢 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯褌芯 褋懈 斜邪褖邪 械 锌芯胁芯写 薪邪锌褍褋薪邪褌懈褌械 写邪 褋械 褋褗斜械褉邪褌 芯褌薪芯胁芯.
袘褉懈谢褟薪褌薪芯 薪邪锌懈褋邪薪 褉芯屑邪薪 蟹邪 褉邪蟹锌邪写邪 懈 芯锌懈褌邪 蟹邪 褋褗斜懈褉邪薪械 薪邪 械写薪芯 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯. 袣薪懈谐邪 褋 褉懈褌褗屑, 锌褍谢褋. 袞懈胁邪 泻薪懈谐邪, 褋 褍褋械褌 泻褗屑 写械褌邪泄谢懈褌械, 褋褗褋 褋懈谢薪芯 锌褋懈褏芯谢芯谐懈褔械褋泻邪 芯斜芯褋薪芯胁泻邪 蟹邪 褋褗褖薪芯褋褌褌邪 薪邪 胁褋械泻懈 芯褌 锌械褉褋芯薪邪卸懈褌械.
袘械蟹泻褉邪泄薪芯 械屑芯褑懈芯薪邪谢薪邪 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟, 锌芯薪械 蟹邪 屑械薪.
袘褉懈谢褟薪褌薪芯 薪邪锌懈褋邪薪 褉芯屑邪薪 蟹邪 褉邪蟹锌邪写邪 懈 芯锌懈褌邪 蟹邪 褋褗斜懈褉邪薪械 薪邪 械写薪芯 褋械屑械泄褋褌胁芯. 袣薪懈谐邪 褋 褉懈褌褗屑, 锌褍谢褋. 袞懈胁邪 泻薪懈谐邪, 褋 褍褋械褌 泻褗屑 写械褌邪泄谢懈褌械, 褋褗褋 褋懈谢薪芯 锌褋懈褏芯谢芯谐懈褔械褋泻邪 芯斜芯褋薪芯胁泻邪 蟹邪 褋褗褖薪芯褋褌褌邪 薪邪 胁褋械泻懈 芯褌 锌械褉褋芯薪邪卸懈褌械.
袘械蟹泻褉邪泄薪芯 械屑芯褑懈芯薪邪谢薪邪 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟, 锌芯薪械 蟹邪 屑械薪.
March 7, 2013
Absolutely terrific. A stunning debut. This is a family tale, told with such realism the prose just sings off the page. She describes one character thusly, "Ama isn't a fighter. She comes to breakfast without weapons and to bed in the evening undressed and unarmed." Damn! This is the kind of writing you will be treated to when you read this novel. The story evolves in a circular manner, which keeps things tense and exciting.
The novel opens with the death of Kweku Sai, a father, husband and renowned surgeon. We learn of this man's life and his children through looking back, but not in a linear way, but in a orbitual way, with the prose always shining. Kweku and his first wife have four children, who are given complexity and depth by Ms. Selasi's brilliant writing. Kweku has struggled hard to reach the heights of his profession, hailing from Ghana, to succeed in America, the often untold immigrant story, vividly on display here. His dutiful and beautiful wife Fola has borne him four children and has been a loyal partner. The family suddenly unravels due to a very unfortunate event. Or rather Kweku's response to this event. The domino effects of Kweku's decision will affect wife and children.
The fallout is quite disruptive and leads to a splintering of the family. The author skillfully weaves the differing perspectives of how this situation has impacted wife and children, over a number of years and numerous places. The children's stories are captivating and unforgettable, leaving an impression long after you've finished the book. Essentially, the novel seeks to answer the question of how does a family repair and recover, is it even possible? Was family ever a reality?
I think the book description sums it up best, "What is revealed in their coming together is the story of how they came apart..."
This is simply a great book, I guarantee you will find this novel on many top ten novel lists. Trust me!
The novel opens with the death of Kweku Sai, a father, husband and renowned surgeon. We learn of this man's life and his children through looking back, but not in a linear way, but in a orbitual way, with the prose always shining. Kweku and his first wife have four children, who are given complexity and depth by Ms. Selasi's brilliant writing. Kweku has struggled hard to reach the heights of his profession, hailing from Ghana, to succeed in America, the often untold immigrant story, vividly on display here. His dutiful and beautiful wife Fola has borne him four children and has been a loyal partner. The family suddenly unravels due to a very unfortunate event. Or rather Kweku's response to this event. The domino effects of Kweku's decision will affect wife and children.
The fallout is quite disruptive and leads to a splintering of the family. The author skillfully weaves the differing perspectives of how this situation has impacted wife and children, over a number of years and numerous places. The children's stories are captivating and unforgettable, leaving an impression long after you've finished the book. Essentially, the novel seeks to answer the question of how does a family repair and recover, is it even possible? Was family ever a reality?
I think the book description sums it up best, "What is revealed in their coming together is the story of how they came apart..."
This is simply a great book, I guarantee you will find this novel on many top ten novel lists. Trust me!
January 19, 2016
La bellezza delle cose fragili 猫 un romanzo scritto bene e che si legge con piacere, ma che non mantiene del tutto n茅 le sue promesse, n茅 le sue premesse.
L鈥檃utrice, Taiye Selasi, chiede ai suoi lettori di condividere la storia di una famiglia che si disgrega, si spezza e si perde, a partire dal giorno in cui Kweku Sai decide di abbandonare sua moglie e i suoi quattro figli. Lo fa in un impulso del momento, ma non lo fa per capriccio. Lo fa perch茅 si sente un uomo spezzato, vinto, giocato dall鈥檌mprevedibilit脿 della vita e talmente sopraffatto dalle circostanze da non riuscire a credere che le persone che ama avrebbero compreso il suo stato d鈥檃nimo.
In un certo senso, s矛, quella di Kweku 猫 una fuga e un atto di codardia. Ma anche la sua famiglia reagisce allo stesso modo. In particolare Fola, la moglie, che a sua volta scappa, generando una reazione a catena, che si arrester脿 solo molti anni dopo, quando il dolore avr脿 lasciato un segno pesante su tutti.
La prima parte 猫 davvero bella, intensa, piena e riuscitissima. Nella seconda parte, la narrazione si fa pi霉 irrisolta e ingiustificata, pur restando, in linea di massima, a un buon livello. E nella terza parte fanno capolino alcuni episodi di scarsa efficacia narrativa, che inficiano un po鈥� l鈥檌nsieme.
Come romanzo d鈥檈sordio 猫 sicuramente pi霉 che notevole. Ma il cerchio non si chiude del tutto. E lo si sente.
L鈥檃utrice, Taiye Selasi, chiede ai suoi lettori di condividere la storia di una famiglia che si disgrega, si spezza e si perde, a partire dal giorno in cui Kweku Sai decide di abbandonare sua moglie e i suoi quattro figli. Lo fa in un impulso del momento, ma non lo fa per capriccio. Lo fa perch茅 si sente un uomo spezzato, vinto, giocato dall鈥檌mprevedibilit脿 della vita e talmente sopraffatto dalle circostanze da non riuscire a credere che le persone che ama avrebbero compreso il suo stato d鈥檃nimo.
In un certo senso, s矛, quella di Kweku 猫 una fuga e un atto di codardia. Ma anche la sua famiglia reagisce allo stesso modo. In particolare Fola, la moglie, che a sua volta scappa, generando una reazione a catena, che si arrester脿 solo molti anni dopo, quando il dolore avr脿 lasciato un segno pesante su tutti.
La prima parte 猫 davvero bella, intensa, piena e riuscitissima. Nella seconda parte, la narrazione si fa pi霉 irrisolta e ingiustificata, pur restando, in linea di massima, a un buon livello. E nella terza parte fanno capolino alcuni episodi di scarsa efficacia narrativa, che inficiano un po鈥� l鈥檌nsieme.
Come romanzo d鈥檈sordio 猫 sicuramente pi霉 che notevole. Ma il cerchio non si chiude del tutto. E lo si sente.
June 8, 2021
鈥淐ome si misurava il successo (in dollari? in base al numero dei diplomi incorniciati?) e quand鈥櫭� che raggiungeva un livello sufficiente?鈥�
Kweku, abile chirurgo, 猫 tornato in Ghana dove una mattina, inaspettatamente, la morte lo attende. Lo stimato medico, nonostante tutto il suo sapere non riesce ad intervenire a quelli che sono evidenti sintomi di un infarto.
E' troppo distratto.
Troppo impegnato a ricordare.
鈥滾o sa 鈥� mentre se ne sta fermo l铆 con addosso la canottiera e i pantaloni alla MC Hammer, appoggiato con la spalla alla porta scorrevole, aperta per met脿, scivolando sempre pi煤 nelle sue riflessioni, nei suoi ricordi e in altre cose che cominciano con ri- (rimpianto, rimorso, risentimento, rivalutazione) 鈥� che sta morendo.
Lui lo sa.
Ma non ci fa caso.
Si tratta di conoscenza e non di cognizione. Un pensiero che si confonde fra gli altri. E che non si pu貌 nemmeno chiamare 芦pensiero禄. Un rumore che viaggia nell鈥檃cqua e gli arriva attutito, rallentato. Un鈥檌mmagine che prende forma in lontananza, uscendo fuori dallo spazio vuoto che la circonda. Una bolla che comincia piano piano a salire verso la coscienza, ma a dieci, quindici minuti di distanza dalla consapevolezza, in ritardo sulla tabella di marcia, mentre intanto tutti i fatti vengono sistemati in posizione verticale e gli assistenti di volo preparano la cabina per l鈥檃tterraggio. Una donna. La voce di una donna. L鈥檃more di una donna. L鈥檃more per lei, l鈥檃more che viene da lei, una donna, due donne. La madre e l鈥檃mata, dove tutto inizia e tutto finisce, come aveva sempre sospettato. (Ma torneremo su questo a breve).
E intanto lui 猫 fermo sulla soglia, ammaliato dal giardino.
Come ha fatto a sfuggirgli tutto questo?鈥�
Dagli ultimi respiri di Kweku si dipana la storia della famiglia San.
Lui ghanese.
Fola, la moglie nigeriana:
鈥滷ol谩 Sad茅 Savage in fuga da una guerra. Kweku Sai in fuga da una pace in grado di uccidere. Due barche alla deriva, che infine spinte dalle correnti arrivano in Pennsylvania (芦Pennsyl-comesichiama禄) fra tutti i posti possibili, a morire di freddo, vivi, innamorati. Orfani, fuggiaschi, a piede libero nella storia del mondo, entrambi provenienti da paesi che avevano visto la loro ultima gloria nel diciottesimo secolo 鈥� ma orgogliosi (pieni di coraggio e di speranza), straripanti e senza un soldo.鈥�
La storia 猫 quella che potrebbe essere di tanti africani che si ritrovano a studiare e a diventare professionisti nelle grandi citt脿 occidentali. Spezzati, divisi nella loro identit脿 cercano un'affermazione di successo che li conforti, che li ripaghi e risarcisca delle polvere del passato.
Kweku lo vuole e lo pretende da se stesso e dai suoi figli. I fallimenti non sono previsti e quando accadono fanno precipitare tutto.
Questa 猫 la storia di una famiglia che si sfalda.
Unioni che si slegano.
Due genitori e quattro figli che formavano un'unit脿 (鈥漊na Famiglia di Successo, uno sforzo in cui tutti e sei erano impegnati, tutti, che si battevano per l鈥檕biettivo comune, ancora non raggiunto. 鈥�) diventano sei esistenze chiuse nella propria solitudine.
鈥淕hana must go鈥� 猫 il titolo originale che ripete lo slogan che negli anni '80 accompagnava le deportazioni dei ghanesi dalla Nigeria.
Il richiamo 猫 a quelle esistenze che cercano una collocazione ed intanto si muovono tra geografie e culture differenti.
In italiano il titolo 猫 correlato alla fotografia come spiega la Selasi (che 猫 per l'appunto anche fotografa)in un'intervista:
芦 Da bambina io e mia sorella eravamo spesso in viaggio.
Mia nonna viveva in Spagna, il mio patrigno in Svizzera dove passavo molto tempo. Durante i voli, nelle attese, ma anche durante le gite, ero sempre con la testa fra le pagine di un libro, al di fuori della realt脿. Un giorno mia madre, preoccupata, mi sgrid貌 e io cominciai ad alzare il naso e guardarmi intorno, solo lo feci attraverso una lente, quella della macchina fotografica. Volevo fermare la bellezza nelle cose, nella natura, nelle persone.
Sono attenta ai particolari, all'istante, come ora la luce che cade sul tuo braccio e illumina i cerchi d'oro che ti adornano il braccio禄.
In un articolo (鈥淏ye Bye Barbar鈥�) l'autrice ha coniato il termine 鈥淎蹿谤辞辫辞濒颈迟补苍鈥� dicendo:
芦Siamo Afropolitan. Non cittadini ma africani del mondo禄 e riferendosi cos矛 a chi come lei ha condotto e conduce una vita tra le maggiori citt脿 occidentali e l'Africa.
鈥淟a bellezza delle cose fragili鈥� 猫 il felice esordio di che racconta una storia afropolitan (e lo fa molto bene!) sia per le dinamiche transnazionali dei suoi protagonisti sia per le modalit脿 narrative.
Il malessere disturbante delle relazioni famigliari, tema caro al romanzo americano (difficile non pensare a Franzen ed a "Le correzioni") varca le frontiere...
Kweku, abile chirurgo, 猫 tornato in Ghana dove una mattina, inaspettatamente, la morte lo attende. Lo stimato medico, nonostante tutto il suo sapere non riesce ad intervenire a quelli che sono evidenti sintomi di un infarto.
E' troppo distratto.
Troppo impegnato a ricordare.
鈥滾o sa 鈥� mentre se ne sta fermo l铆 con addosso la canottiera e i pantaloni alla MC Hammer, appoggiato con la spalla alla porta scorrevole, aperta per met脿, scivolando sempre pi煤 nelle sue riflessioni, nei suoi ricordi e in altre cose che cominciano con ri- (rimpianto, rimorso, risentimento, rivalutazione) 鈥� che sta morendo.
Lui lo sa.
Ma non ci fa caso.
Si tratta di conoscenza e non di cognizione. Un pensiero che si confonde fra gli altri. E che non si pu貌 nemmeno chiamare 芦pensiero禄. Un rumore che viaggia nell鈥檃cqua e gli arriva attutito, rallentato. Un鈥檌mmagine che prende forma in lontananza, uscendo fuori dallo spazio vuoto che la circonda. Una bolla che comincia piano piano a salire verso la coscienza, ma a dieci, quindici minuti di distanza dalla consapevolezza, in ritardo sulla tabella di marcia, mentre intanto tutti i fatti vengono sistemati in posizione verticale e gli assistenti di volo preparano la cabina per l鈥檃tterraggio. Una donna. La voce di una donna. L鈥檃more di una donna. L鈥檃more per lei, l鈥檃more che viene da lei, una donna, due donne. La madre e l鈥檃mata, dove tutto inizia e tutto finisce, come aveva sempre sospettato. (Ma torneremo su questo a breve).
E intanto lui 猫 fermo sulla soglia, ammaliato dal giardino.
Come ha fatto a sfuggirgli tutto questo?鈥�
Dagli ultimi respiri di Kweku si dipana la storia della famiglia San.
Lui ghanese.
Fola, la moglie nigeriana:
鈥滷ol谩 Sad茅 Savage in fuga da una guerra. Kweku Sai in fuga da una pace in grado di uccidere. Due barche alla deriva, che infine spinte dalle correnti arrivano in Pennsylvania (芦Pennsyl-comesichiama禄) fra tutti i posti possibili, a morire di freddo, vivi, innamorati. Orfani, fuggiaschi, a piede libero nella storia del mondo, entrambi provenienti da paesi che avevano visto la loro ultima gloria nel diciottesimo secolo 鈥� ma orgogliosi (pieni di coraggio e di speranza), straripanti e senza un soldo.鈥�
La storia 猫 quella che potrebbe essere di tanti africani che si ritrovano a studiare e a diventare professionisti nelle grandi citt脿 occidentali. Spezzati, divisi nella loro identit脿 cercano un'affermazione di successo che li conforti, che li ripaghi e risarcisca delle polvere del passato.
Kweku lo vuole e lo pretende da se stesso e dai suoi figli. I fallimenti non sono previsti e quando accadono fanno precipitare tutto.
Questa 猫 la storia di una famiglia che si sfalda.
Unioni che si slegano.
Due genitori e quattro figli che formavano un'unit脿 (鈥漊na Famiglia di Successo, uno sforzo in cui tutti e sei erano impegnati, tutti, che si battevano per l鈥檕biettivo comune, ancora non raggiunto. 鈥�) diventano sei esistenze chiuse nella propria solitudine.
鈥淕hana must go鈥� 猫 il titolo originale che ripete lo slogan che negli anni '80 accompagnava le deportazioni dei ghanesi dalla Nigeria.
Il richiamo 猫 a quelle esistenze che cercano una collocazione ed intanto si muovono tra geografie e culture differenti.
In italiano il titolo 猫 correlato alla fotografia come spiega la Selasi (che 猫 per l'appunto anche fotografa)in un'intervista:
芦 Da bambina io e mia sorella eravamo spesso in viaggio.
Mia nonna viveva in Spagna, il mio patrigno in Svizzera dove passavo molto tempo. Durante i voli, nelle attese, ma anche durante le gite, ero sempre con la testa fra le pagine di un libro, al di fuori della realt脿. Un giorno mia madre, preoccupata, mi sgrid貌 e io cominciai ad alzare il naso e guardarmi intorno, solo lo feci attraverso una lente, quella della macchina fotografica. Volevo fermare la bellezza nelle cose, nella natura, nelle persone.
Sono attenta ai particolari, all'istante, come ora la luce che cade sul tuo braccio e illumina i cerchi d'oro che ti adornano il braccio禄.
In un articolo (鈥淏ye Bye Barbar鈥�) l'autrice ha coniato il termine 鈥淎蹿谤辞辫辞濒颈迟补苍鈥� dicendo:
芦Siamo Afropolitan. Non cittadini ma africani del mondo禄 e riferendosi cos矛 a chi come lei ha condotto e conduce una vita tra le maggiori citt脿 occidentali e l'Africa.
鈥淟a bellezza delle cose fragili鈥� 猫 il felice esordio di che racconta una storia afropolitan (e lo fa molto bene!) sia per le dinamiche transnazionali dei suoi protagonisti sia per le modalit脿 narrative.
Il malessere disturbante delle relazioni famigliari, tema caro al romanzo americano (difficile non pensare a Franzen ed a "Le correzioni") varca le frontiere...
March 29, 2013
So often this book read like a long prose poem. This paragraph tells of Olu, the eldest son who has followed in his father's footsteps and become a doctor, sitting in his obsessively white New York bedroom after just learning that his long absent father has died at the age of 57 in Ghana.
"He sits in his scrubs with the shirt in the dark, with the moon making ice of the floor and the walls, and thinks maybe she's right, all this white is oppressive, apathetic; a bedroom shouldn't be an OR. In the sunlight it's gorgeous, hard angles and harder the light crashing billiantly against its own shade, to an eerie effect, white on white, like an echo, the sun staring at its reflection. Not now. Now it is lonely and cold in the darkness, a cold and dark light. With the snow falling onto itself out the window as noiseless as hopelessness, more white on white. "
Personally, I was carried away with the writing style of Taiye Selasi. More than once I needed to reread a passage to further understand what was just said, or to bathe in the beauty of her word choice. At times, and other reviewers also mention this, new passages do not clearly reveal the narrator, but considering this is a first novel and that Selasi has such a unique writing style, I was able to look at this less as a fault and more as an adjustment I needed make as I read.
Each narrator is unique, not in voice but in how they relate to their family and society. They have all been traumatized, as it turns out, not only by their father's leaving (going) the family, but by their places in society and how they do not fit in. This is all revealed as the book goes along. They go along in life, and come to make of it as they do. The words go, going, gone, come, etc. appear very often throughout the book. But I remember only once seeing the word "am". They are unable to function in a normal (present) matter. The whole family does not belong - they are immigrants in a class between. Below their professional peers. It is also the singling out/scapegoating of their father, pressured to do a failed surgery that should never have been performed, that is his undoing. And, the family's undoing. He is forced to "go".
This was a very painful book for me to read. I cried often while I read it. But I would read it again. I fine piece of world literature. An author to watch. Book clubs that do not shy away from difficult subjects should consider this.
"He sits in his scrubs with the shirt in the dark, with the moon making ice of the floor and the walls, and thinks maybe she's right, all this white is oppressive, apathetic; a bedroom shouldn't be an OR. In the sunlight it's gorgeous, hard angles and harder the light crashing billiantly against its own shade, to an eerie effect, white on white, like an echo, the sun staring at its reflection. Not now. Now it is lonely and cold in the darkness, a cold and dark light. With the snow falling onto itself out the window as noiseless as hopelessness, more white on white. "
Personally, I was carried away with the writing style of Taiye Selasi. More than once I needed to reread a passage to further understand what was just said, or to bathe in the beauty of her word choice. At times, and other reviewers also mention this, new passages do not clearly reveal the narrator, but considering this is a first novel and that Selasi has such a unique writing style, I was able to look at this less as a fault and more as an adjustment I needed make as I read.
Each narrator is unique, not in voice but in how they relate to their family and society. They have all been traumatized, as it turns out, not only by their father's leaving (going) the family, but by their places in society and how they do not fit in. This is all revealed as the book goes along. They go along in life, and come to make of it as they do. The words go, going, gone, come, etc. appear very often throughout the book. But I remember only once seeing the word "am". They are unable to function in a normal (present) matter. The whole family does not belong - they are immigrants in a class between. Below their professional peers. It is also the singling out/scapegoating of their father, pressured to do a failed surgery that should never have been performed, that is his undoing. And, the family's undoing. He is forced to "go".
This was a very painful book for me to read. I cried often while I read it. But I would read it again. I fine piece of world literature. An author to watch. Book clubs that do not shy away from difficult subjects should consider this.
May 27, 2019
鈥淭hey were doers and thinkers and lovers and seekers and givers, but dreamers, most dangerously of all.
They were dreamer-women.
Very dangerous women.鈥�
What a surprising, enchanting, confusing book. Through highs and lows, birth to burial, we watch a family form and fall to pieces and come together again, disassembled but whole.
Ghana Must Go and high had a rough start. You cannot put commas, semicolons, colons and dashes in a single sentence and not expect me to hold my head in despair. The first couple of chapters had me considering to shut this book and never look at it again. And then, suddenly, it flowed. The dam was broken and I devoured the colourful prose and the lives it told.
I loved this short and multifaceted family saga, loved the characters, felt for them and hurt with them. It was an emotional read and I never wanted to shut this book again until that one scene that led me to take one star away from my final rating. .
Overall, a fascinating story with a fascinating narrative structure.
They were dreamer-women.
Very dangerous women.鈥�
What a surprising, enchanting, confusing book. Through highs and lows, birth to burial, we watch a family form and fall to pieces and come together again, disassembled but whole.
Ghana Must Go and high had a rough start. You cannot put commas, semicolons, colons and dashes in a single sentence and not expect me to hold my head in despair. The first couple of chapters had me considering to shut this book and never look at it again. And then, suddenly, it flowed. The dam was broken and I devoured the colourful prose and the lives it told.
I loved this short and multifaceted family saga, loved the characters, felt for them and hurt with them. It was an emotional read and I never wanted to shut this book again until that one scene that led me to take one star away from my final rating. .
Overall, a fascinating story with a fascinating narrative structure.
April 20, 2015
Che cos'猫 la bellezza? E' l'Africa e le sue leggende, 猫 una famiglia che si ritrova, che si riunisce dopo la scomparsa di uno dei suoi membri.
Taiye Selasi, con una scrittura moderna, ci guida con tatto e sensibilit脿, nel mondo della famiglia Sai, mostrandoci i mille modi in cui una famiglia pu貌 disgregarsi, spezzarsi e alla fine, essere insieme, uniti, ognuno con le proprie fragilit脿, le proprie insicurezze e il proprio senso di inadeguatezza.
La scrittrice lascia spazio a ognuno dei personaggi, che pagina dopo pagina, impariamo a conoscere, capire ed amare.
Elizabeth Gilbert ha detto che "Questo libro contiene il mondo intero" ed 猫 vero. Qui c'猫 tutto: amore, affetto, vita, dolcezza, dolore, perdita, fragilit脿, bellezza. Una bellezza che appartiene al mondo, agli esseri umani e a chi ha il piacere di leggere queste pagine.
Taiye Selasi, con una scrittura moderna, ci guida con tatto e sensibilit脿, nel mondo della famiglia Sai, mostrandoci i mille modi in cui una famiglia pu貌 disgregarsi, spezzarsi e alla fine, essere insieme, uniti, ognuno con le proprie fragilit脿, le proprie insicurezze e il proprio senso di inadeguatezza.
La scrittrice lascia spazio a ognuno dei personaggi, che pagina dopo pagina, impariamo a conoscere, capire ed amare.
Elizabeth Gilbert ha detto che "Questo libro contiene il mondo intero" ed 猫 vero. Qui c'猫 tutto: amore, affetto, vita, dolcezza, dolore, perdita, fragilit脿, bellezza. Una bellezza che appartiene al mondo, agli esseri umani e a chi ha il piacere di leggere queste pagine.
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November 27, 2018袩褉芯褔械褌芯褏 锌芯谢芯胁懈薪邪褌邪, 懈屑邪褏 泄 谐芯谢褟屑 屑械褉邪泻, 蟹邪褖芯褌芯 械 褔邪褋褌 芯褌 "袨褌胁褗写"; 谐褍斜褟 芯斜邪褔械 泻邪泻褗胁褌芯 懈 写邪 懈薪褌械褉械褋 写邪 褟 写芯胁褗褉褕邪. 小械谢邪褋懈 锌懈褕械 谢懈褌械褉邪褌褍褉薪芯, 褔械褌懈胁薪芯, 谐谢邪写泻芯, 褋邪屑芯 褔械 褌械屑锌芯褌芯 懈 懈褋褌芯褉懈褟褌邪 (胁 写褗谢斜芯泻懈褟 泄 褋屑懈褋褗谢) 屑懈 褋械 谐褍斜褟褌... 袠屑邪 斜褉懈谢褟薪褌薪懈 屑械褌邪褎芯褉懈 胁 褉芯屑邪薪邪, 薪芯 蟹邪 屑械薪 械 锌褉械泻邪谢械薪芯 胁褉械屑械芯褌薪械屑邪褖芯 写邪 锌褉芯褔械褌邪 350 褋褌褉邪薪懈褑懈 蟹邪褉邪写懈 褏褍斜邪胁懈褌械 褋褉邪胁薪械薪懈褟. 袩芯褔褌懈 薪邪 胁褋褟泻邪 褋褌褉邪薪懈褑邪 芯斜邪褔械 屑芯卸械 写邪 褋械 褋褉械褖薪邪褌 谐芯褌懈薪懈 懈蟹褉械褔械薪懈褟.
"孝褟 褋锌懈 泻邪褌芯 泻芯泻芯褋芯胁 芯褉械褏. 袩芯褏褗褉泻胁邪 褋谢邪写泻芯, 泻邪褌芯 锌芯 薪芯褌懈, 懈 褖械 褋褗薪褍胁邪 蟹邪褏邪褉薪懈 锌械褌谢械褌邪 懈 效邪泄泻芯胁褋泻懈".
袨褎芯褉屑谢械薪懈械褌芯 械 芯褌谢懈褔薪芯, 写胁褍谢懈褑械胁邪 谐谢邪薪褑 泻芯褉懈褑邪; 薪芯 胁 褌芯胁邪 芯褌薪芯褕械薪懈械 袞邪薪械褌 45 褋邪 胁懈薪邪谐懈 锌褉械褑懈蟹薪懈 懈 锌械褉褎械泻褌薪懈.
"孝褟 褋锌懈 泻邪褌芯 泻芯泻芯褋芯胁 芯褉械褏. 袩芯褏褗褉泻胁邪 褋谢邪写泻芯, 泻邪褌芯 锌芯 薪芯褌懈, 懈 褖械 褋褗薪褍胁邪 蟹邪褏邪褉薪懈 锌械褌谢械褌邪 懈 效邪泄泻芯胁褋泻懈".
袨褎芯褉屑谢械薪懈械褌芯 械 芯褌谢懈褔薪芯, 写胁褍谢懈褑械胁邪 谐谢邪薪褑 泻芯褉懈褑邪; 薪芯 胁 褌芯胁邪 芯褌薪芯褕械薪懈械 袞邪薪械褌 45 褋邪 胁懈薪邪谐懈 锌褉械褑懈蟹薪懈 懈 锌械褉褎械泻褌薪懈.
July 6, 2014
There's a lot of short sentences. For dramatic effect. And a lot of people crying. Hugging their knees. Tears. Coursing down their cheeks. Inner pain. Families hurting.
Oh dear. Another reviewer summed this up quite well suggesting that the author is a typical product of US creative writing courses. Americanah is so much better as a narrative of African diaspora dynamics in the US and their struggles with identity
Oh dear. Another reviewer summed this up quite well suggesting that the author is a typical product of US creative writing courses. Americanah is so much better as a narrative of African diaspora dynamics in the US and their struggles with identity
January 3, 2017
Ultimately, I grew weary of the repetitive storytelling that was still happening 100 pages in. The minute details of the man's death were hardly interesting the first time around.
September 27, 2021
Gostei bastante deste livro, pela hist贸ria e pela realidade abordada (a imigra莽茫o africana nos EUA concretizada no trajeto de uma fam铆lia ao longo de duas d茅cadas), que parece refletir a viv锚ncia da autora. Taiye Selasi nasceu em Londres e cresceu nos EUA. A sua m茫e nasceu em Inglaterra, cresceu na Nig茅ria e vive atualmente no Gana; o pai nasceu na Costa do Ouro, cresceu no Gana e viveu a maior parte da vida na Ar谩bia Saudita.
Em rela莽茫o 脿 escrita senti-me um pouco dividida. Se, por um lado, apreciei a din芒mica criada pela narrativa fragmentada que traduz a fragmenta莽茫o da pr贸pria fam铆lia Sai, por outro, fiquei com a sensa莽茫o de uma lacuna no trabalho de edi莽茫o. O come莽o (que 茅 desafiante at茅 se conseguir encaixar as pe莽as) entusiasmou-me, a meio senti-me algo enfadada por sentir que havia ali prosa desnecess谩ria, e depois voltei a gostar muito no final.
Tamb茅m n茫o amei a tradu莽茫o, come莽ando pelo t铆tulo que, pelo que "investiguei", foi copiado da tradu莽茫o italiana. Embora a frase esteja presente no texto, n茫o creio que reflita a obra (na verdade, soa-me um pouco a legenda de imagem fofa de Instagram) e quem escolheu este t铆tulo n茫o entendeu certamente a inten莽茫o subjacente ao t铆tulo original. "Ghana Must Go" 茅 uma mala de di谩spora. 脡 o nome dado na Nig茅ria aos sacos axadrezados que frequentemente acompanham os viajantes africanos e n茫o s贸 (nos EUA s茫o conhecidos como "Chinatown bag" e no Gana como "saco nacional"). E este nome tem uma hist贸ria: em 1983, na sequ锚ncia de uma crise social e politica, o l铆der nigeriano Shehu Shagari deu ordem de expuls茫o a cerca de 2 milh玫es de imigrantes sem documenta莽茫o regularizada, maioritariamente ganeses.
(Ghana-must-go-bags)
Genial. Ele ri. Ela ri, Porque 茅 que te deixei?
芦Eu tamb茅m te deixei禄 Ela inala o cheiro de uma familiaridade esquecida. Pressiona as solas contra as suas faces, ligeiramente h煤midas 芦Fizemos o que sab铆amos fazer. Era s贸 o que sab铆amos fazer. Darmo-nos ao abandono.禄
Foi isso?
芦脡ramos imigrantes. Os imigrantes s茫o-no porque se foram embora de algum lado.禄
A explica莽茫o n茫o pode ser essa.
芦颁辞产补谤诲别蝉.禄
础尘谩惫补尘辞-苍辞蝉.
芦Am谩vamo-nos, mas sem perder essa condi莽茫o禄.
N茫o pod铆amos ter aprendido? A n茫o partir?
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