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Jeffrey's Reviews > The Memoirs of Elias Canetti: The Tongue Set Free/The Torch in My Ear/The Play of the Eyes
The Memoirs of Elias Canetti: The Tongue Set Free/The Torch in My Ear/The Play of the Eyes
by
by
Autobiography, when written well, is thrilling. If an author understands their craft and knows how to present their journey, there is a surprising unfolding of the realizations that life brings.
But this effect is even more intense when the author writes so well that he can credible make a claim of beginning the book with a scene from when he was two years old!
Of course Canetti could be making the whole business up, but the wealth of details by which he colors his events and the ensuing realizations etched with the acid derived from memory create a remarkable picture. This ephiphany about his mother, from when he was about eleven years old and living in Zürich, illustrates a critical realization he has about not just her nature and his own, but the nature of the world:
It was no wonder that at such moments, feeling myself her mute equal, I loved her the most. She was certain that she had once again concealed her distrust from me; I perceived both things: her ruthless acumen and her magnanminity. At the time I didn’t know what vastness is, but I felt it: being able to comprise so many and such conflicting things, knowing that seeming incompatibles can all be valid at once, being able to feel that without perishing of fear, having to name that and think about it, the true glory of human nature—that was really what I learned from her.
This takes patience, but my patience was rewarded. Canetti's scenes of his life and insights in Europe, children, teachers... just about anything imaginable, are remarkable. I highly recommend this book
But this effect is even more intense when the author writes so well that he can credible make a claim of beginning the book with a scene from when he was two years old!
Of course Canetti could be making the whole business up, but the wealth of details by which he colors his events and the ensuing realizations etched with the acid derived from memory create a remarkable picture. This ephiphany about his mother, from when he was about eleven years old and living in Zürich, illustrates a critical realization he has about not just her nature and his own, but the nature of the world:
It was no wonder that at such moments, feeling myself her mute equal, I loved her the most. She was certain that she had once again concealed her distrust from me; I perceived both things: her ruthless acumen and her magnanminity. At the time I didn’t know what vastness is, but I felt it: being able to comprise so many and such conflicting things, knowing that seeming incompatibles can all be valid at once, being able to feel that without perishing of fear, having to name that and think about it, the true glory of human nature—that was really what I learned from her.
This takes patience, but my patience was rewarded. Canetti's scenes of his life and insights in Europe, children, teachers... just about anything imaginable, are remarkable. I highly recommend this book
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Reading Progress
Finished Reading
December 6, 2013
– Shelved
