Rich, surreal and picaresque, The Railway introduces us to the people of the small town of Gilas, Uzbekistan on the ancient Silk Route. This...
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reviews
Feb 10, 2012
Carol
rated it: 
Some aspects of this book I liked, but it was very scattered, jumping around in time and from character to character, which made it extremely difficult to follow. It doesn't really have a plot. Since I knew nothing about Central Asia I did learn a lot from it. I was surprised at the wild mix of cultures and languages, the huge migrations due to exile, war, political upheavals. The book is funny in a farsical, satirical way. The crazy changes that the Russians imposed are so sad they are funn
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Apr 23, 2010
Baklavahalva
rated it: 
Yes, it's extremely postcolonial magical-realist, which means you can expect tears to destroy cinema carpets, people to be able to remove shadows, enormous penises to bring down a fence, and similar things, while the characters invoke Communist leaders and Allah. Everyone's fighting for their own personal interest, absolutely willing to have their adversaries, whether politicians, musicians, or bazaar sellers, sent to Gulag. Almost everybody at some point in this book gets sent to a labor camp
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Mar 01, 2010
Harry
rated it:
Having set myself the modest enough goal for 2010 of reading a few more books for the Read The World challenge than I did in 2009… I’m already behind schedule. We’re into March and I’ve only just finished my first. Ho-hum.
The Railway (translated by Robert Chandler) is my book from Uzbekistan. I was slightly peeved when I received the book to read in the author bio that Hamid Ismailov was actually born in Kirghizstan, but his Uzbek credentials appear to be otherwise impeccable. His pa More...
The Railway (translated by Robert Chandler) is my book from Uzbekistan. I was slightly peeved when I received the book to read in the author bio that Hamid Ismailov was actually born in Kirghizstan, but his Uzbek credentials appear to be otherwise impeccable. His pa More...
May 02, 2009
CarolineFromConcord
rated it: 
Magical realism in Uzbekistan. Very strange novel. I didn't understand half of it, but I decided that as long as I understood some of it, I was ahead of where I had been before. The footnotes helped. I learned a few interesting things about Central Asia, which is a hodgepodge of nationalities. Just for example, when Koreans migrated into the Soviet Union during the famine of the 1920s, Stalin rounded them up and sent them to Central Asia. He was afraid they would be too friendly with the Japanes
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