Name: Selma Lagerlof
Year Won: 1909
Read: "The Saga of Gosta Berling"
Original Language: Swedish
Reason: "in appreciation of the lofty idealism, vivid imagination and spiritual perception that characterize her writings"
About: The Saga of Gosta Berling follows Gosta Berling, a defrocked (for drinking, mostly) minister throughout the small Swedish town of Ekeby as he falls in love with random women (including a countess), and has adventures.
It's beautifully written, with wonderful turns of phrases. Also, while it's set in more or less modern times (for Lagerlof), there's a lot of magic in it. It's borderline magical realism and feels almost like one stepped into another world. It's lovely and intriguing and it's not hard to see how it became wildly popular.
It also won Lagerlof the first Nobel literature laureate awarded to a woman.
What I Liked: It's fun. There are a lot of adventures in the town, lots of wonderfully colorful characters, and tons of great descriptions. This is one of those reads that's just enjoyable, with rarely a chapter that isn't deeply entertaining.
What I Disliked: There's not a lot of plot to this book, other than "Gosta comes into town, has affairs with a few women, and eventually gets married". This isn't a terrible thing, but it also kept me from being glued to the book, eager to see what happens next. (Because in most cases, it doesn't much matter.) Certain scenes would grip me, but then they'd be over and, while the next one would also grip me, I didn't desperately want to make it to the next bit.
Should it have won a Nobel: Probably. It's a beautifully written book and is well worth reading. It holds up well even today.
Next up: The Blue Bird by Maurice Maeterlinck (Again, Paul von Heyse isn't in my local library)
Monday, November 25, 2019
Monday, November 18, 2019
Kim
So...with Kipling I feel a lot of things. His politics aren't popular today for good reason. He was an unabashed imperialist and a lot of his work is pretty...odd to read in the modern era, to put it lightly. He's also the first Nobel Laureate on this list that I'd heard of prior to beginning this project. Who hasn't heard of "The Jungle Book", "If", "Gunga Din", "The White Man's Burden", "Just So Stories", etc. etc. Kipling is a legend. He's just...a highly problematic legend.
Name: Rudyard Kipling
Year Won: 1907
Read: "Kim"
Original Language: English
Reason: "in consideration of the power of observation, originality of imagination, virility of ideas and remarkable talent for narration that characterize the creations of this world-famous author"
About: Let me start with the very important proviso that Kipling wrote a *lot* and a *lot* what he wrote is good. I've read a number of his works that aren't Kim because it's hard to escape Kipling in the modern, English speaking world. He's foundational. But Kim is considered his masterpiece, so there we go.
Kim follows Kimball O'Hara, a poor Irish orphan (queue some not particularly PC bits about his mother dying in birth with him and his father dying of drink) who runs around India. At some point, he decides to become a chela (disciple) to a lama who is searching for nirvana and follows him happily. Everyone assumes that he's Indian because he speaks the language natively (note that Kipling's first language was an Indian language) and dresses and acts locally, until he finds the goal he's been seeking - the Red Bull - aka his father's regiment.
At this point, everyone wants to treat him like a white boy and he's sent off to school. Kim does not much like school, but eventually leaves and becomes useful for foreign intelligence as he can pass as Indian. (FWIW, while modern readers seem to find this preposterous, I don't. Language, dress and behavior is generally a far greater signal to ethnicity and race than physical looks are.) Anyway, Kim travels with the lama some more, and eventually enlightenment is reached. It's quite...meaningful.
What I Liked: It's a great novel. It's short, it's fun, and it describes a vibrant India that you want to dig your toes in and exist in far beyond the 300 pages that it fills up. Also, this is only *one* of Kipling's works. As noted above, he's created a plethora of classics.
What I Disliked: It is hard to avoid the colonialism. One could argue "oh, but that was a different time" except that Kipling was criticized for it during his time, so...it really is an issue. There are stereotypes all over, some positive, some negative, but...they're all there. some probably were even created due to this book. Yay.
Should it have won a Nobel: Probably. I feel that in this case, a lot depends on what someone wants a Nobel to mean. If the goal is to be, "an upcoming author who espouses ideas we want perpetuated" then hell, no. Kipling shouldn't have gotten one. If it's more for great writing that will continued to be read (and have movies made of it) a hundred years from now, Kipling is perpetual. It's a bit sad that it's the most nationalistic, imperialist author on this list who is the best remembered, but history is rarely socially correct.
Next up: The Saga of Gösta Berling by Selma Lagerlöf (Again, Rudolf Christoph Eucken isn't in my local library)
Name: Rudyard Kipling
Year Won: 1907
Read: "Kim"
Original Language: English
Reason: "in consideration of the power of observation, originality of imagination, virility of ideas and remarkable talent for narration that characterize the creations of this world-famous author"
About: Let me start with the very important proviso that Kipling wrote a *lot* and a *lot* what he wrote is good. I've read a number of his works that aren't Kim because it's hard to escape Kipling in the modern, English speaking world. He's foundational. But Kim is considered his masterpiece, so there we go.
Kim follows Kimball O'Hara, a poor Irish orphan (queue some not particularly PC bits about his mother dying in birth with him and his father dying of drink) who runs around India. At some point, he decides to become a chela (disciple) to a lama who is searching for nirvana and follows him happily. Everyone assumes that he's Indian because he speaks the language natively (note that Kipling's first language was an Indian language) and dresses and acts locally, until he finds the goal he's been seeking - the Red Bull - aka his father's regiment.
At this point, everyone wants to treat him like a white boy and he's sent off to school. Kim does not much like school, but eventually leaves and becomes useful for foreign intelligence as he can pass as Indian. (FWIW, while modern readers seem to find this preposterous, I don't. Language, dress and behavior is generally a far greater signal to ethnicity and race than physical looks are.) Anyway, Kim travels with the lama some more, and eventually enlightenment is reached. It's quite...meaningful.
What I Liked: It's a great novel. It's short, it's fun, and it describes a vibrant India that you want to dig your toes in and exist in far beyond the 300 pages that it fills up. Also, this is only *one* of Kipling's works. As noted above, he's created a plethora of classics.
What I Disliked: It is hard to avoid the colonialism. One could argue "oh, but that was a different time" except that Kipling was criticized for it during his time, so...it really is an issue. There are stereotypes all over, some positive, some negative, but...they're all there. some probably were even created due to this book. Yay.
Should it have won a Nobel: Probably. I feel that in this case, a lot depends on what someone wants a Nobel to mean. If the goal is to be, "an upcoming author who espouses ideas we want perpetuated" then hell, no. Kipling shouldn't have gotten one. If it's more for great writing that will continued to be read (and have movies made of it) a hundred years from now, Kipling is perpetual. It's a bit sad that it's the most nationalistic, imperialist author on this list who is the best remembered, but history is rarely socially correct.
Next up: The Saga of Gösta Berling by Selma Lagerlöf (Again, Rudolf Christoph Eucken isn't in my local library)
Sunday, November 3, 2019
With Fire and Sword
I feel like with this novel, I finally found the book I was searching for with this project, which is to say a book that I never would have thought to read had it not won a Nobel prize but which ended up being really, really good.
Name: Henryk Sienkiewicz
Year Won: 1905
Read: "With Fire and Sword"
Original Language: Polish
Reason: "because of his outstanding merits as an epic writer"
About: "With Fire and Sword" is (an approximately 1200 page) the first of three books that form a trilogy set in the Khmelnytsky Uprising. It follows a number of characters, notably Pan Yan (a great hero who ends up married to a beautiful princess who seems to be kidnapped a lot by nefarious characters) through wars, heroics, and adventures. There's adventure. There are heroics. There are dark, miserable scenes (such as the one in which peasants are freed, but refuse to flee, instead kneeling while waiting for the executioner's blow). There's humor (especially from the giant who wishes to behead three men in a blow, but can only get two at a time as they won't line up right). There's romance. There's politics. This epic has it all.
What I Liked: The ability of Sienkiewicz to create a scene is unparalleled. The opening list a number of omens that make the spine tingle. Some of the war scenes make me feel like I was right there. The humor makes me smile. There's so much in this novel that's vivid, brilliant, and creative that I can't recount it all. I'm writing this as I finish the first book, but could easily see reading more. This is the work of a master author.
What I Disliked: There's not much of a plot, per se, at least a plot that goes from point A to B to C. This makes it sometimes a bit hard to follow and to feel more like reading a number of brilliant interrelated scenes than following a story that makes me eager to read onto the next page.
Should it have won a Nobel: Yes. Many times yes. This deserves to be in the epic cannon along with "War and Peace". It's a really, really good book. In many ways, I liked this better than "War and Peace" (as it's funnier and has more light hearted moments - as well as Sienkiewicz does a better job describing things than Tolstoy does). The only way I can fault it is that there isn't a hugely coherent through plot the way there is in the best of novels.
Next up: Rudyard Kipling (as before, Giosuè Carducci isn't in my local library)
Name: Henryk Sienkiewicz
Year Won: 1905
Read: "With Fire and Sword"
Original Language: Polish
Reason: "because of his outstanding merits as an epic writer"
About: "With Fire and Sword" is (an approximately 1200 page) the first of three books that form a trilogy set in the Khmelnytsky Uprising. It follows a number of characters, notably Pan Yan (a great hero who ends up married to a beautiful princess who seems to be kidnapped a lot by nefarious characters) through wars, heroics, and adventures. There's adventure. There are heroics. There are dark, miserable scenes (such as the one in which peasants are freed, but refuse to flee, instead kneeling while waiting for the executioner's blow). There's humor (especially from the giant who wishes to behead three men in a blow, but can only get two at a time as they won't line up right). There's romance. There's politics. This epic has it all.
What I Liked: The ability of Sienkiewicz to create a scene is unparalleled. The opening list a number of omens that make the spine tingle. Some of the war scenes make me feel like I was right there. The humor makes me smile. There's so much in this novel that's vivid, brilliant, and creative that I can't recount it all. I'm writing this as I finish the first book, but could easily see reading more. This is the work of a master author.
What I Disliked: There's not much of a plot, per se, at least a plot that goes from point A to B to C. This makes it sometimes a bit hard to follow and to feel more like reading a number of brilliant interrelated scenes than following a story that makes me eager to read onto the next page.
Should it have won a Nobel: Yes. Many times yes. This deserves to be in the epic cannon along with "War and Peace". It's a really, really good book. In many ways, I liked this better than "War and Peace" (as it's funnier and has more light hearted moments - as well as Sienkiewicz does a better job describing things than Tolstoy does). The only way I can fault it is that there isn't a hugely coherent through plot the way there is in the best of novels.
Next up: Rudyard Kipling (as before, Giosuè Carducci isn't in my local library)
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