Literature as history

Guest review by Shavia Westmoreland, an English Major at Hampton University in the US.

Title: Song of Solomon
Author: Toni Morrison
Publisher: Penguin Books, (1987, 337 pages)
Price:  (Please check Amazon.com for prices of different editions)

Literature can be the eyes into history.  Song of Solomon by Nobel Peace Prize winner Toni Morrison is no exception. This novel explores the history of 1970’s America and beyond through the eyes of common characters from the time period. The story is centered on Milkman Dead, the son of wealthy landlord Macon Dead Jr. and mother Ruth Foster, also of a wealthy background.  Milkman grows up in an urban town in Michigan, living a privileged, and consequently, unfulfilled life with his family and best friend Guitar Bains. One day he is informed by his father that his aunt Pilate holds a treasure of gold, which sends him on a journey into the southern United States and self-discovery. Along the novel’s exploration of Milkman’s journey and his life experiences, the reader is exposed to numerous areas of history and philosophy such as the slavery and civil rights, women’s independence, the force of ancestral history, the power of wealth and respect on human decisions, and the process of self-realization.

With beautiful usage of language, motifs, symbolism, and themes, Song of Solomon engages the mind with questions of the impact of heritage and the past on the individuals of the present. Targeted at no particular age or background, Song of Solomon is a novel to be read a multiple of times, providing new messages and questions with every single turn of the page.

A copy of Song of Solomon will be available soon at the Lincoln Corner at KL Library, on 1 Jalan Raja. The Lincoln Corner collection is constantly refurbished, so please send any recommendations for new acquisition (fiction or non-fiction) to IRCKualaLumpur@state.gov.

Winsome

Title: King of the Sea
Author: Dina Zaman
Publisher: Silverfish Books (2012)
Price: RM30.00

by guest reviewer Quek Sue Yian. (This is her first book review.)

King of the Sea is Dina Zaman's second book of short stories, bringing together a collection of whimsical and seemingly personal experiences of kampong life. She paints an idyllic, almost romantic backdrop, giving a sense of the immutability of village life; with one generation rolling into another, with little to change it. However, as each little story unfolds she proceeds, and one can sense her enjoyment in doing so, to dot each story with idiosyncratic characters to juxtapose them with the serenity of village life, with often hilarious, sometimes creepy results. Masbabu, the first story in this collection, is about an outlandish out-of-towner who descends upon a quiet village and ensues to cause sexual havoc.  From there the tone is set, and you are swept into village life and drawn into close proximity with the colourful characters. In The Translator, a simple school teacher goes mad for Hollywood and sends the village on a madcap translated fantasy of film.

The imagery Dina conjures is lyrical, with surrealism akin to South American writers. Reminiscent of the House of Spirits and having almost a fable quality, her stories tell of people who try to fly, who want to be angels, girls turning into chickens, men walking out from the sea, people marrying fairies.

But typical of Dina, these are more than just charming, fun little stories. She writes with quiet, gentle prose that often belies depth of thought and social commentary. She gently mocks hypocrites in Nah the Masseur when Nah accuses her ardent seducer that it’s only a matter of lust. He replies at least it will be legal. Again, in Man of the Jungle, she gently mocks the courtship ritual: “If a man liked a woman, all he had to do was to present the bank passbook to his prospective in-laws, reiterate his honourable intentions and marry his love within three months of courtship.” And, “One young village girl had caught the eye of the assistant district officer, and was now engaged to be married. It was progress.”

Dina writes so subtlety that you could almost miss the gentle barbs, such as going to the “surau to nap for a bit.” In Alia, she mentions that only good and pious girls were allowed to go on camping trips but yet these same pious good girls were superstitious and did not have enough compassion or care to search for the missing girl. In Masbabu, she describes the women wearing kembans which is almost a nod to P.Ramlee films - a time when people were less judgemental and moral-policing had not began.

In fact, Islam and superstition is one of the more prominent themes in this collection of stories. Dina masterly flits between faith, Islam and superstition stemming from old folktales and possibly a shaman past. The boundaries between superstition and religion; between reality and the soft spaces of folklore are blurred in these tranquil, sometimes lyrical, often funny, tiny portraits of village life.

In Alia you find the teacher of the princesses of Islam talking about girls turning into chickens. In Man of the Jungle the village iman is bound by Islam to tell the truth, but yet the truth he relates is a superstition about a man who marries a fairy. This iman found it foolish too that white people, didn’t believe in ghosts and djinns.  People in these stories live side by side with Islam and folklore -- they believe in spells and pray in the Mosques. King of the Sea reflects this world where we are introduced to a wife as a witch in the somber atmosphere of an Islamic funeral.

On a personal level though, I would like to have known why Manja in Masbabu overreacted so to Masbabu - when he "gasped. It was as if he had seen a ghost." This collection left me curious, wanting to have more stories. Why did Manja screech as he leaves the shop? In the way we found out about a young girl's voyeurism during a hot afternoon's Rainstorm and how Mandaks became an angel in a story of the same titled.

It would also have been good to have a glossary at the end – not just for foreign readers but for those unfamiliar with East Coast dialects.

Charming, fun and highly readable, Dina has honed and whittled a collection of concise, funny and at times wonderfully irreverent stories. The serene kampong life reflected by her controlled writing uncovers a hoard of wonderful eccentricities and guarantees to bring a giggle. It makes for easy reading, with snippets of bite-sized nostalgia that can be served up during a busy day. You can enter the idyllic world on a train journey home, at lunch time, or during a furtive break at work.

A world (not French) classic

Title: Pantagruel
Author: Francois Rabelais
Publisher: Hesperus  Press
Price: 43.50
(First published 1552)

I'm not long into the book when I think, "Damn it! This is so James Joyce." I'm thinking Ulysses. Rabelais's influence is unmistakable; and one can be sure that Shakespeare and Cervantes were quite familiar with his work, too. As was Jonathan Swift. It would be difficult for any writer not to be influenced by the style of Rabelais after reading him, although his book was written over 450 years ago, and his works will not fall into the neat modern category called the 'novel'. The influence this bawdy, gross, over-the-top classic satire, involving various bodily parts and functions, has had over the centuries is obvious. Rabelais is often described as 'a major French renaissance writer'. This is an unfortunate Anglophone put-down, one that has lead to profound ignorance of his works amongst those who read in English. Rebelais was a major world writer. Period. He was, and, is a hugely important writer. And -- think of it -- he wrote at a time when writers were tortured, strangled and burnt in public places in Paris for translating Plato, or quoting Socrates. (Pantagruel by Hesperus Press is only one part of the 1,000 odd page Penguin volume called Gargantua and Pantagruel.)

Francois Rabelais was a Franciscan monk, turned Benedictine, who studied law and graduated as a doctor in 1530, rejecting his monastic life for a career in medicine. He lectured in medicine around Europe, and wrote stories based on folklore, of an imaginary world of giants, comic characters and situations. He mocked education, imperialism, monastic ideals, judiciary, language ... everything. He led a dangerous life, even if he had the patronage of a king and two cardinals.

Excerpts from Pantagruel:

1. On imperialism: ... books now published are printed correctly and elegantly, printing having been invented in my lifetime by divine inspiration just as – conversely – artillery was invented at the instigation of the devil. (Gargantua’s letter to Pentagruel, Chapter 8.)

2. On society: ... as you know the people of Paris are noted for their stupidity (natural stupidity both sharp and flat) ...

3. On education: In response to the way a scholar from Paris speaks, Pantagruel says, “He’s really talking through his arse, what does he mean?" to which his friend replies, "... my lord, This young fellow is trying to ape the way they talk in Paris ..."

4. On the legal fraternity: read the lawsuit between Sir Kissarse and Sir Fartsniff. It is hilarious.

Whether you buy classics to read for enjoyment, to educate yourself, to enjoy the use of language, to impress friends or to decorate your bookshelf, Francois Rabelais should be an essential part of it.

The American dream

Title: The Great Gatsby
Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
Publisher: Scribner (1995, PB, 216 pages)
Price: (Please check Amazon.com for prices of different editions)

The traditional dream of American authors has been to write the Great American Novel, to reconcile within one work the sprawling energies, contradictions and aspirations of a nation that, to take a phrase from Walt Whitman, contains multitudes.  Not a few authors have managed to present an artistic vision of America with lasting aesthetic power; one of the best examples is F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby.  Gatsby has arguably the strongest claim to be the definitive “Great American Novel” because it takes as its subject the American dream – an idea that, more than any other, lies at the heart of what it means to be American.

The novel’s characters and themes are drawn from fundamental notions of American identity.  The eponymous Jay Gatsby is a wealthy but mysterious figure in a fictionalized Long Island, New York community.  Gatsby, both less and more than what he appears to be, is that quintessentially New World creature -- the self-made man.  He embodies the economic and social mobility at the core of the American identity, rising from humble circumstances to success through desire and intelligence and hard work.

As Gatsby is gradually revealed to us, we learn he’s driven by the romanticized ideal of Daisy Buchanan, a woman he loved and lost years ago.  Having intermingled memories of Daisy with notions of success and happiness, Gatsby devotes himself to material success as a means of winning her back.  Gatsby tells the story of the climax and tragic results of these efforts.

Fitzgerald’s presentation of the American dream is laced with ironies.  Gatsby’s fortune is derived from crime; his dreams are romantic illusions that end in tragedy; his pathetic funeral suggests the ultimate futility of his life.  Yet to Gatsby it did not seem so.  One of the novel’s most affecting passages finds him staring across the distance at a green light on Daisy’s dock, which represents not only her but the American dream. Striving to reach it gives Gatsby’s life meaning by providing an outlet for his energy and offering hope, a fantasy that in the end proves more satisfying than its realization.

Fitzgerald famously claimed that “there are no second acts in American lives.”  Given that most of his adult life was spent in decline, this view is perhaps unsurprising.  But it may be wrong.  No one in America who is born poor, or who fails, needs feel that his condition is permanent.  The idea of the America dream is rooted in possibility, endless invention and re-invention.  This quality, this freedom from history and the burdens of the old world, has for generations inspired countless millions to seek their own second act, or third act, or fourth.  Fitzgerald is not wrong to suggest the darkness that lurks around the edges of  the American dream – doing so gives the novel integrity and power – but the shading is best seen as an accent, serving to set off the essential brilliance of the dream itself rather than giving it a sinister cast.

Fitzgerald’s prose is simple and direct, but with moments of lyricism.  I particularly commend to readers the last few paragraphs of the book for their beautiful summation of its ideas.

A copy of The Great Gatsby is also available for loan at the Lincoln Corner at KL Library, on 1 Jalan Raja. The Lincoln Corner collection is constantly refurbished, please send any recommendations for new acquisition (fiction or non-fiction) to IRCKualaLumpur@state.gov.

Guest reviewer
Adam Zerbinopoulos.

King of the Sea

Title: King of the Sea
Author: Dina Zaman
Publisher: Silverfish Books (2012)
Price: RM30.00


King of The Sea (a collection of short stories) took Dina Zaman (the author of I Am Muslim) about 13 years to complete. The stories began as part of her project  she was a masters student at Lancaster University in 1993, inspired by her homesickness,  and her longing for the ‘ Terengganu air’.

She explores themes of love, grief, loss and longing, and the magic in our lives. A young boy, grieving for his late father, meets a ghost who tells him that he is the king of the sea.  Alia, a missing child, comes back as a chicken to bewildered parents. A daughter witnesses an  affair by her unfaithful mother, but she is not sure if she was hallucinating. A young man arrives on an island, and marries a jungle spirit, a bunian. Hell breaks lose in a small village when a brash modern city woman decides to live there. A teacher who longs for a more glamorous life, literally, disappears into a movie screen.

Dina Zaman, a survivor from the I Am Muslim tsunami, has been writing in the Malaysian media for over 17 years. Her first book, a collection of short stories, night & day, which was  part of the Black & White series, was published by Rhino Press in 1997. She has had her works of  fiction, and non-fiction, published  in many journals and periodicals, locally and regionally. She is currently studying saints, and other holy men and women, and their impact on Malaysia for her next book Holy Men, Holy Women under the API Fellowship 2012-2013 programme that she has just been awarded.

Silverfish Books -- special offer

Dina Zaman's dynamic duo gift pack

When I am Muslim was published in 2007, it became a media sensation, not just for its controversial points of view, but also due to the author's uncanny blend of humour and pathos. Those who loved that will love King of the Sea, even if this is a work of fiction and the former was not. Buy Dina Zaman's latest, King of the Sea, and her best selling, I am Muslim, (two books) for 30% off (online and in-store). Offer valid until 30 April 2012

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