Its Joever

 Hi everyone, since this is the last blog post I will justify the updated tier list for all the books I have read in this course. I included it in my last post (I thought the last one was the last blog post for some reason). Note that this list is very biased and was solely based on how much I enjoyed the book.

S : The Time of the Doves

A : Money To Burn, The Shrouded Woman

B :  Agostino , Death With Interruptions, Mad Toy, Faces In The Crowd

C : The Trenchcoat, Deep Rivers

D : 

...

Z: Combray

Combray:

Wasn’t really a fan,  usually when the plot is uninteresting, interesting characters and how each character interacts with each other can usually make up for a mediocre\non-existent story but I found neither to be the case in this one. The only character I kinda wanted to learn more about was Mr. Swann but even then I wasn't really inclined to.  Also, I found the writing style to be difficult but not in a good way, if a novel challenges you by making you think more in that it forces you to connect what you are reading with someone you have read previously, I don’t necessarily think it's a bad thing but in this novel, the sentences just end up being very dense and boring to me. But, I can see that if someone enjoys dense sentences and likes very vivid descriptions they could enjoy this novel a lot more than I did.

The Trenchcoat:

This one was hard to read (and not very satisfying) and since I lacked the context necessary to understand it completely. The novel's themes were pretty interesting though, as it touched on dealing with boredom, loneliness, and unending suspicion caused by living under a surveillance state. Also, the ending left me with more questions but honestly, I am not sure that I care if they get answered or not. I could see how someone could like this one though just was not for me.

Deep rivers:

I wanted to like this one, the troubles in identity that Ernesto faces make you feel for him by him having connections to two worlds but not belonging to either. But overall I was not really able to get really immersed in the book, especially in the first part where Ernesto and his father wander in the jungle or something for what felt like 100 pages, but after reaching the catholic school I enjoyed it a lot more since the characters there had lots of depth to them.

Agostino:

Honestly, apart from being a hard read (In a different way from the rest), I found myself invested in the novel until the end where I was like “that's it?” but maybe the ending was unsatisfying on purpose like the conclusion that Agostino reaches in the end with the ending line being “But he wasn’t a man and many unhappy days would pass before he became one”.

Death with Interruptions:

The idea behind this one was very interesting and the fact that Death was an actual character was cool and not just some heartless entity that only knows how to kill, but rather is very human and capable of showing emotions and goes as far as being empathetic to humans. I also liked how the book goes into great detail describing what would happen to society if death were to end and some of the things were so outlandish (such as the funeral business somewhat revolting) that it gave it some sort of realism to what was happening politically in the country as our politics in our world are also very absurd. I only just thought of this now but it’s pretty ironic that Death’s job is to kill people for all of eternity, unable to die herself, and one of the main points of the novel is to explore the consequence of the suspension of death (poor death).

Mad Toy:

I liked this one as it explores the journey that Silvio goes through from his time committing robberies with his two friends to his attempts to change and do the right thing despite everything going wrong for him and reaching new lows each time. I found myself rooting for him and wanted everything to turn out well for him because of everything he went through.

Faces in the Crowd:

Faces in the Crowd was probably the hardest read we had in the class but once you are able to connect the multiple subplots it becomes immensely rewarding and I can’t say I have read anything like this before.

Money To Burn:

I don't really have much to say about this one, but lots of actions =  fired dopamine receptors

The Shrouded Woman:

The Shrouded Woman deals with memories similar to Combray, but I liked the way Anna Maria looked back at her life compared to how the narrator in Proust's novel does. I read Proust’s novel as an old man with lots of regrets who spends his time thinking about his childhood when he was much happier. I don't know there's just something sad about spending all your time longing for the past and contemplating what you could've done that I didn’t like. In this novel, Anna Maria looks back at her life but comes to terms with everything that happened to her, and while the novel is sad in nature you realize how lonely and mistreated she was but in the end, even though I wouldn't call it a “good ending”, there is some notion of closure which I liked.

The Time of the Doves:

I really liked the story in this novel, (I will also refrain from talking about Quimet). The story kept me interested for the first half because of the characters but suddenly the novel turns itself upside down and you witness how cruel war can be as it affects all the characters you have grown attached to. In the end, I was happy for Natalia because she chose to let go of her past and things seem to be looking up for her.

From taking this course I have read more books in the past three months than I have read since I was in elementary school up until before this course. For me, the hardest part about reading is choosing which book to read so I am glad that this course forces you to choose from two choices most weeks. Overall, I enjoyed most of the books I read this semester and while I haven't gained a newfound love for reading I will definitely consider reading more.

My question for everyone :

What are some of your favorite courses/electives you have taken at UBC (other than this one of course), I'm looking for some interesting classes to take so I don't end up only just taking CPSC and Math classes for my entire degree.

Reflection : Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli

 I don’t want to say I disliked this book as it would make it seem like I can’t recognize or understand innovative/experimental literature (For the record I cannot) but I have mixed feelings about this one. There were multiple things I did like about it though, some of the shorter paragraphs were very effective in shaping your perspective on what to make out of what you are reading, like the line “All novels lack something or someone. In this novel there’s no one. No one except a ghost that I used to see sometimes in the subway” (69). Also, the fact that I wasn’t sure when/if a subplot would be brought up again made the lines that ended a paragraph that much more impactful, like when the author (I think?) is talking about the (potentially fake) deterioration of her marriage “It was a single gesture that broke me—that finished breaking me: his cry of joy when he had closed the front door” (80). 

The main thing I did not like was that some of the subplots were in the same locations (New York, Philadelphia), and since both the author and Owen write as an occupation it was very hard to tell which person was experiencing the events or whose thoughts we are reading. It is possible that the author relates to Owen and some of the other characters in some ways and that could contribute to the similarities between the multiple plots and what the different characters say. This quote in particular stuck out to me,  “It was a perfect story that begged an ending, which I would perhaps have written that very night if another story hadn’t completely distracted my attention” (116). Even though this is presumably Owen speaking, I can’t help but wonder if the author struggles with the same thing as she creates a novel with many plots, unable to solely focus on a single one. “But what the hell am I going to write? I know I want it to be a novel set both in Mexico, in an old house in the capital, and in the New York of my youth. All the characters are dead, but they don’t know it” (142), or maybe like in this quote from Owen, it is a more stylistic choice and the author would rather create a story that focuses on multiple people and different timelines. 

I also liked the sort of feeling of melancholic yearning or "Saudade" (I learned this Portuguese word from a youtube video recently lol) that is present throughout the novel, like the multiple characters are all reminiscing over a time that is long gone. Like Owen and his time in New York, and maybe even the author herself who felt free at one point in her life who left her apartment open to multiple people, and who lived a very chaotic lifestyle. I guess this also relates to the connection between the author and the characters she writes about in that they are connected in multiple ways. In some ways, the yearning for the past felt somewhat similar to the narrator in Combray (except I really disliked that novel).

Since this book is the last one we read together as a class so I made a tier list for the books I chose to read (I realize that the ratings may be a little inflated):

S : The Time of the Doves

A : Money To Burn, The Shrouded Woman

B :  Death With Interruptions, Mad Toy, Faces in the Crowd

C : The Trenchcoat, Deep Rivers, Agostino

D : 

E:

...

Z: Combray

My question for everyone: Now that we have reached the last book in this class, which was your favorite? (Or maybe if you want to you can make a tier list as well :) )

Reflection : Death with Interruptions by Jose Saramago

Death with Interruptions by Jose Saramago, was a fun one. The style of writing was very different, sentences were long and separated by commas which made it hard to follow at some points as you had to figure out who was talking mostly based on context. Also, the author would address the reader midway through to try to explain potential plot holes or inconsistencies with logic in the book, like the first family that decided to bring their relatives across the border owns (I think it was a horse and a cart ?)  but they were said to be poor so it is unlikely that they could own these things??? It felt like the author was pre-firing and silencing the people who would point out inconsistencies before they could even finish the book, showing that he was one step ahead of the people who believed they could outsmart the novel. I also realized while reading like what was said in the lecture video, that the way that Death writes her letters is similar to the way that the author uses punctuation and that the whole thing with the grammarian critiquing Death’s writing and Death's snarky reply to him was probably Saramago getting back at his critics once again.

For a book that focuses a lot on death, I found it to be quite funny. Like the fact that one of the major problems that the government has to face is dealing with the people who are in charge of funerals because they are mad that they lost their only source of revenue with the government's solution being to make it obligatory to hold burials and create coffins for all the animals that died. While that sounds pretty absurd it also kinda reminds me of ancient Egypt which I thought was cool.  Also, death as an entity was not what I would have expected it to be like. Instead of the grim reaper that you imagine, which is cold, and calculated and only takes people to the land of the dead, the one presented in the novel is much more human-like and is capable of being frustrated or tired, and that even death is not free from the nightmare of bureaucracy.

I also found the idea of how Death would affect the government and society as a whole to be interesting. In theory, the prevention of death would mean that old values should never really die since those that hold them don't die either, but the novel offers a different perspective on this. The Church and Christianity, upon which society at the time based its sense of morality would cease to exist since death is fundamental to religion, and as the Cardinal says “without resurrection, there is no church” (10).

My question for everyone,

Did the novel change your perspective on eternal life?

Reflection : Money to Burn by Ricardo Piglia

 When I was reading the book, the events seemed very farfetched, so I was surprised that at the end of the novel, in the epilogue to find out that these events had actually happened and this wasn’t a work of fiction. I thought that the way of communicating the deaths of characters who were killed as if it were from a news report was more of a stylistic choice rather than the fact that it was probably the way that the author himself was able to adapt the story from the actual events. However, learning that the novel was not fiction has not really taken away from the experience I had when reading it, I felt like the changes in giving the characters more depth (by potentially having invented things) benefited the story since we already know the characters are not good people but now they can also be interesting (and still bad of course).

I also sometimes question whether the “true crime” genre should even be a thing, on one hand, they usually succeed in showing us how depraved and messed up the individuals who commit these kinds of acts are but they also show dramatic reenactments of real people being killed whose families may still be coping from the loss. Even though I know the genre can offer more than just entertainment, something feels wrong about being invested in a story like this and consuming this kind of media for enjoyment. The novel sort of explores this, where spectators are gathered around the house that is under siege by the police or watching the events unfold through one of the news broadcasts. Are some of them watching because they are directly affected by the events of the robbery, or do they treat it as some sort of drama (Maybe some do both)?    

I also found it quite bizarre that the bystanders and news reporters viewed the burning of the stolen money to be a more deplorable and disgusting act than all of the murders the robbers had committed. I guess you could argue that by burning the money it shows that the members of the gang had killed all those people for essentially nothing, but I mean they were already trapped and facing certain death so it makes sense that they did not want anyone from the police to get any of the money. It also seems like the citizens are unaware of how corrupt the police and the government are, “If they agreed with the police to hand it over to a charitable foundation, everything would have gone differently for them” (170) they believe that the police somehow lack the same greed and motivations that the robbers have when the Argentine police officers were directly involved in the robbery and had also cooperated with the perpetrators.

My question for everyone:
What are your thoughts on the “true crime” genre? Do you view it (favourably/indifferently/ unfavourably)?

Reflection: The Trenchcoat by Manea

 I found myself a bit confused when reading this one, as it was often hard to tell who was speaking at times when reading the novel. The author would also often use nicknames referring to some characters, alternating from calling a character “the kid”, “the guileless one” and the wasp”, or in other cases I was unsure that “Bazil” and “Vasile” where the same character or not.

The novel follows two couples in Romania under a totalitarian regime, who are going to get together at the home of Bazil and Dina Beldeanu,  who seem to have connections within the regime. 

The couples feel uneasy enjoying the luxurious meals that were prepared while the rest of the country is without food or electricity.  Even though the atmosphere is light, we feel the inauthenticity as if the host is performing for the guests, where each question, mannerism, and even the way he says goodbye is rehearsed. By the end of the night, the guests felt like they had a good time and that the get-together succeeded in allowing them to remember how to have fun and acted as a break from the monotonousness cycle of everyday life, even if it was just for a short while (or maybe it was just the alcohol talking).  

However, after it is over, the couples seem to be reluctant to even give a phone call to their hosts to thank them, and it is as if they don’t want to maintain a friendship with the Beldeanus. I believe that both couples distrust the Beldeanus, echoing the common sentiment at the time where the feeling that anyone could be an informant watching for your every move. It also does not help that Bazil is a party member and even though he attempts to try and separate himself from them by saying that “there are lots of people who get us mixed up with them. Especially these last few years, people figure everyone’s a snitch, on the payroll of the secret police”, the distrust still remains. One of the couples eventually calls them to thank them, seemingly marking the conclusion of their relationship. But then, Dina mentions that someone has left a raincoat at their home. Something that would otherwise be considered an insignificant event, causes Dina to become suspicious and she starts trying to meet with both couples.

At first, I thought the raincoat was something that Dina made up so she could have an excuse to talk with them once again because maybe she secretly wanted to keep these people in her life as she seemed to be somewhat lonely and discontent with the boredom in her life. After that, I thought that maybe she used the raincoat as a way for her to have a way to start a conversation with “the kid” who is an old childhood friend of hers, as she admits that she has wanted the possibility to have a conversation with him for a long time.

At the end of the novel, Ionna sees Dina and her childhood friend “the kid” together both wearing a raincoat where Ionna learns from her husband Ali, that Dina and “the kid” go on walks together every week. Ionna refuses to believe that “the kid” who is supposed to have an apparent hatred for Dina would suddenly start going on walks with her without having an ulterior motive causing Ionna to go into a fit of rage and start questioning everything.

To me, it seems like maybe Ionna is unable to accept that “the kid” and Dina are just rekindling their old friendship as a way to help with the boredom that is present in both of their lives. Her attempts to analyze and further try to come up with theories for the reason why both of them were wearing raincoats show how distrustful she is and a tendency to assume the worst in people (which I guess is sort of justified considering the period in which she lives).

Personally, I was not sure what the trenchcoat was supposed to represent, the fact that it is described as something that is constantly changing and that the characters would often mix up by either calling it a trenchcoat or a raincoat, I just wasn't really sure what to make out of it. I guess the fact that it causes Dina anxiety could represent the feeling that someone could always be watching and the mental struggle that is associated with that feeling. Or maybe we are all like Ionna trying to find meaning in something that could just be a coincidence and ultimately doesn't mean anything.

My question for everyone:

What do you think the trenchcoat represents?

Reflection - The Time Of The Doves by Mercè Rodoreda

 The Time Of The Doves was probably my favourite book we have read so far in this class. The book covers some dark topics and is not a particularly happy one and shows a resilient protagonist who is brought to her breaking point, who is then able to overcome it and have hope at the end of the novel.

At first, you start to feel bad for Natalia as her boyfriend Quimet doesn’t really care about her and is very manipulative, but then you remember that she kinda did leave her fiance for him. It was kinda obvious from one of their early encounters that Quimet isn’t a very considerate person, as Quimet was an hour late to the scheduled time and did not even apologize and said the most egregious line to her “if I wanted to be his wife I had to start by liking everything he liked” (22). Even after they get married Quimet always seems preoccupied with something else, like making the dovecote, raising the doves, and going out on adventures with his friends. There are several more incidents of Quimet gaslighting and being manipulative, but if I keep talking about everything bad he has done throughout the novel it would probably span a couple more pages.  It starts to get to the point where it is quite funny to think about how many bad traits he has and you start to question why Natalia even chooses him.  It might be from the fact that Natalia says that her mother had never told her about men and she is somehow ignorant about what a good person is or that her parent's relationship was not a particularly healthy one either and she does not know what a healthy relationship looks like yet. Or maybe perhaps that society at that time expected women to just get married no matter how unhappy they were and were expected to just endure through it for the rest of their lives. 

Life gets worse for Natalia as Quimet’s shop starts getting less work and she is forced to find a job, all while having to care for her two children. On top of this Quimet’s passion project now has invaded their home and there are just doves that live with them. She finally reaches her breaking point and starts trying to make sure the doves' chicks will never hatch by repeatedly shaking them.

As if life could not get any worse, a civil war commences, and Quimet goes to the front lines. Quimet sometimes returns from the front lines to their home for a bit before going back to fight, and Natalia is left wondering each time he leaves if he is ever going to come back. After she receives news that Quimet and Cintet have died in the war, it is hard not to feel her grief alongside her. Even though Quimet was not a very good person, it is still sad to see someone's life taken away, especially for reasons outside of their control and the fact that they are leaving a family behind. 

Things start to look up for Natalia and her family after finally getting a job that saves them from almost dying of starvation. Her boss an older man named Antoni eventually proposes to her and she accepts not really knowing why does. I was concerned that this second marriage would be a repeat of her first one, where she would be stuck and unhappy. However, it seems like Antoni loves their family and is a good person, after realizing this, Natalia seems happy at last after having gone through so much.

My Question for Everyone: 

When Natalia feels like there is no other option, she devises a plan to murder her children and then herself, but she is eventually given a job saving her family from starvation and her plan is no longer needed. Did the fact that tried to go through with this plan change your opinion of her? Or did you already have a negative opinion of her before this point?

Reflection - Deep Rivers by José María Arguedas

 Deep Rivers by José María Arguedas gives a violent and ugly depiction of life while at the same immersing you in the beauty of the world and the natural world. The author spends significant time creating a detailed depiction of the vivid Peruvian landscape and of the different cities and towns that the protagonist Ernesto and his father travel through. He also goes into great detail describing the rich culture of the Quechua people and their love for the natural world, often including poems and songs written in Quechua.  The novel also includes words in the Quechua language when Ernesto is speaking rather than translating them, which I thought was a cool addition. 

The novel focuses on Ernesto’s struggle with identity as he was raised by the Quechua people but is a descendant of settlers (Western side). This struggle becomes apparent when Ernesto is forced to attend a Catholic school and leave his old life behind. Even though the other students and the priests considered him mostly as one of their own because of the way he looks, they often still call him the name “stranger” because of his different upbringing.  

Some of Ernesto’s classmates also make him question what is correct and make him question if the new society he is forced into is really for him. He despises the mistreatment of the indigenous people, when the indigenous people have an uprising and steal salt as an act of rebellion, Ernesto celebrates and chants with them in the streets. Ernesto finds actively himself routing against the colonizers, in a conversation with his friend Antero, he states that he thinks that the Indigenous people's revenge is justified and that “A man who weeps because they’ve been slapping his face for no reason at all can become angrier than a bull that hears a dynamite explosion, that feels the condor’s beak on his neck”, his friend replies that “The Indians must be kept down” and that “You can’t understand because you are not a land-owner” showing the disconnect between Ernesto and the views of the people around him.

Overall, I enjoyed the book but I wouldn't put it among my favorites that we have read in class so far. It did take quite a bit of time to get into it as the first third of the novel is pretty slow and I had not really connected with any of the characters yet. When the story starts focusing more on Ernesto and his time at the catholic school I was able to get more invested in the story and characters.

My question:

One part I thought was interesting is that I didn't find any definite reasons why Ernesto’s dad hates Ernesto’s uncle, the Old Man so much. What do you think the reason is?