Divisadero (Random House Large Print (Hardcover))

published	May 29th 2007 by Random House Large Print Publishing
binding	Hardcover
isbn	0739327321 (isbn13: 9780739327326)
ebook
pages	464
description	From the celebrated author of The English Patient, comes another breathtaking, unforgettable story, this time about a family torn apart by an a...more [close] From the celebrated author of The English Patient, comes another breathtaking, unforgettable story, this time about a family torn apart by an act of violence. Divisadero is a rich and rewarding read, one that Jhumpa Lahiri</i>, in her guest review for Amazon.com (see below), calls "Ondaatje's finest novel to date." --Daphne Durham Guest Reviewer: Jhumpa Lahiri Jhumpa Lahiri was awarded the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, as well as the PEN/Hemingway Award for her mesmerizing debut collection of stories, Interpreter of Maladies. Her poignant and powerful debut novel, The Namesake was adapted by screenwriter Sooni Taraporevala, and released in theaters in 2007. My life always stops for a new book by Michael Ondaatje. I began Divisadero as soon as it came into my possession and over the course of a few evenings was captivated by Ondaatje's finest novel to date. The story is simple, almost mythical, stemming from a family on a California farm that is ruptured just as it is about to begin. Two daughters, Anna and Claire, are raised not just as siblings but with the intense bond of twins, interchangeable, inseparable. Coop, a boy from a neighboring farm, is folded into the girls' lives as a hired hand and quasi-brother. Anna, Claire, and Coop form a triangle that is intimate and interdependent, a triangle that brutally explodes less than thirty pages into the book. We are left with a handful of glass, both narratively and thematically. But Divisadero is a deeply ordered, full-bodied work, and the fragmented characters, severed from their shared past, persevere in relation to one another, illuminating both what it means to belong to a family and what it means to be alone in the world. The notion of twins, of one becoming two, pervades the novel, and so the farm in California is mirrored by a farm in France, the setting for another plot line in the second half of the book and giving us, in a sense, two novels in one. But the stories are not only connected but calibrated by Ondaatje to reveal a haunting pattern of parallels, echoes, and reflections across time and place. Like Nabokov, another master of twinning, Ondaatje's method is deliberate but discreet, and it was only in rereading this beautiful book--which I wanted to do as soon as I finished it--that the intricate play of doubles was revealed. Every sign of the author's genius is here: the searing imagery, the incandescent writing, the calm probing of life's most turbulent and devastating experiences. No one writes as affectingly about passion, about time and memory, about violence--subjects that have shaped Ondaatje's previous novels. But there is a greater muscularity to Divisadero, an intensity born from its restraint. Episodes are boiled down to their essential elements, distilled but dramatic, resulting in a mosaic of profound dignity, with an elegiac quietude that only the greatest of writers can achieve. --Jhumpa Lahiri [close]
date added	05-16-07 edit book

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Tony rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

09/17/07

Read in August, 2007

Hello, I run a literary 'zine called Cherry Bleeds and this was the book of the month for the site...so here's me plagiarizing myself:

I haven't read any other work by Ondaatje or seen "The English Patient". I have to admit, I wasn't terribly interested in reading "Divisadero", but I make sure to read a few best sellers here and there just to keep up with what the public thinks is decent writing.

For the most part, I don't get past page 50. I try to give every book 50 p...more

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David rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

07/30/08

Read in July, 2008

recommended to David by: Catherine

There is not much I can write about Michael Ondaatje's Divisadero without echoing what all the other reviewers have already written: Ondaatje is a craftsman. His writing reveals decades of self-scrutiny, of each year wanting to say more with fewer words.

Divisadero is about love and the loss thereof. Love falls victim to the jealous wrath of a protective father, to drug addiction, to the minor details of our daily lives, and the greater mystery of the entropy of desire:

Lucien and his future wife left the curtained parlour and walked arm in arm for an hour or two along a road banked with poppies and into a marriage that created two daughters. There would be years of compatibility and then bitterness, and who knew when that line was traversed, on what night, at what hour. Over what betrayal. They slipped over this as over a faint rise in the road, like a small vessel crossing the equator unaware, so that in fact their whole universe was now upside down. ...more There is not much I can write about Michael Ondaatje's Divisadero without echoing what all the other reviewers have already written: Ondaatje is a craftsman. His writing reveals decades of self-scrutiny, of each year wanting to say more with fewer words.

Divisadero is about love and the loss thereof. Love falls victim to the jealous wrath of a protective father, to drug addiction, to the minor details of our daily lives, and the greater mystery of the entropy of desire:

Lucien and his future wife left the curtained parlour and walked arm in arm for an hour or two along a road banked with poppies and into a marriage that created two daughters. There would be years of compatibility and then bitterness, and who knew when that line was traversed, on what night, at what hour. Over what betrayal. They slipped over this as over a faint rise in the road, like a small vessel crossing the equator unaware, so that in fact their whole universe was now upside down.

Much of the novel takes place in the parts of California that even most Californians don't visit: Petaluma, Grass Valley, Santa Maria, Lake Tahoe. I have strong memories of all four places and Ondaatje's descriptions are not only apt; they also manage to capture the aesthetic of the 'other California', far from the bleached hair and blonde sand of Southern California and the cosmopolitanism of the Bay Area. I can only assume that his descriptions of provincial France are equally percipient.

There is also, it turns out, a link between this novel and Brazil. On the acknowledgements page of the book facing the back cover, Ondaajte writes:

The song 'Um Favor' (partially described on page 73) by Lupicinio Rodrigues in essence began this book.

Here is that partial description from page 73:

All of the world there must be people like us, Anna had said then, wounded in some way by falling in love - seemingly the most natural of acts.

He told her there was a song he no longer performed that had to do with all of that. It was about a woman who had risen from their bed in the middle of the night and left him. He would hear evidence of her in villages in the north, bust she would be gone by the time the rumour of her presence reached him. A song of endless searching, sung by this man who until then had seldom revealed himself. His tough fingers would tug the heart out of his guitar. He'd sing this song to those who had grown up with his music over the years, who were familiar with his skill at avoiding the limelight. He knew his reputation for shyness and guile, but now he conceded his scarred self to his friends. 'If any of you on your journeys see her - shout to me, whistle ...' he sang, and it became a habit for audiences to shout and whistle in response to those lines. There was nowhere for him to hide in such a song that had all of its doors and windows open, so that he could walk out of it artlessly, the antiphonal responses blending with him as though he were no longer on the stage.

And a related quote from Divisadero, originally muttered by Nietzche:

We have art so that we shall not be destroyed by the truth.

For your listening pleasure, here is Lupicinio Rodrigues' 'Um Favor'. (Right click, save as)....less

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Emily rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

06/12/08

bookshelves: fiction

Read in June, 2008

For those who have not read an Ondaatje book before, "Divisadero" may not be a good first start. A newer reader may be expecting a plot that rises and crashes as much as the one developed in "The English Patient," which Ondaatje became known best for after the success of the film version. (And even if you haven't watched the movie 10 times over like some of us, you get it: War, lust, affair, secrets, heartbreak, the end.)

But for those who have eaten, lived and breathed hi...more For those who have not read an Ondaatje book before, "Divisadero" may not be a good first start. A newer reader may be expecting a plot that rises and crashes as much as the one developed in "The English Patient," which Ondaatje became known best for after the success of the film version. (And even if you haven't watched the movie 10 times over like some of us, you get it: War, lust, affair, secrets, heartbreak, the end.)

But for those who have eaten, lived and breathed his words relentlessly since that wonderfully told story, "Divisadero" is a welcome return to what Ondaatje brings beneath plot: an endless exploration through history and language, and an intimacy with characters unsure of their situations.

I couldn't turn three pages of "Divisadero" without learning a new word or anecdote or strategy to a different way of life. I'm convinced the man must read every book in the library to have such a catalog of knowledge. Did you know there's a word the old poets used for when a person calls their lover by a different name? How did people break down a rough field's terrain to turn it into rich soil before the days of Miracle Grow, Home Depots and pesticides? Ondaatje drops the answers and details to little bits without speaking above the reader or losing his characters in his explanations.

In reading "Divisadero," we walk through the different lives of a farmhand, a gambler, a gypsy and a writer. We learn not only about their trade, but also their fears and secrets, information casually unfolded much like a new friendship. For all that Ondaatje reveals about his characters, you almost feel as if he's trying to not reveal too much - he's holding a hand up to the camera at points, closing a door before too much air comes in. Their details fall underneath a loosely woven plot which is also detached, and has holes in it. This may be frustrating for those looking for a resolution - one demonstrated by actions and conclusions made by characters and narrators - but once you get past the untraditional structure, it feels very much like real life. These are lives like many of ours; even in good circumstances, our relationships and identity are divided by past and distance and conflict. We won't always know what brought us to here or there, or what made so-and-so act like that, or how to bring everyone back together after an almost unforgiveable act. So we piece our stories together, as Ondaatje has his characters do here, with photographs and stories and memory, or the absence thereof. ...less

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Ryan rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

06/25/07

bookshelves: fiction

Read in June, 2007

This might bear more fruit on a second reading, but as it is right now I would consider this a lesser Ondaatje than the brilliance displayed in Anil's Ghost and Booker Prize winner The English Patient. The first two-thirds of the text spans the young lives of a mixed family in Northern California and Nevada--the trio of sisters Anna and Claire with adopted farmhand (and John Grady C...more

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Duc rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

08/15/08

bookshelves: the-best

Read in August, 2008

This book could have been two books. I felt that it was rushed to the end a bit. The pace picked up and became less poetic when it should have been more poetic as the later part of the book concentrates on Lucien the poet.
I was not disappointed. After The English Patient and In the Skin of the Lion, I read Anil's Ghost. That book wasn't as poetic. Divisadero is poetic but also high in concept without the accoutrement that goes with high conception. It begins with understanding the title ...more This book could have been two books. I felt that it was rushed to the end a bit. The pace picked up and became less poetic when it should have been more poetic as the later part of the book concentrates on Lucien the poet.
I was not disappointed. After The English Patient and In the Skin of the Lion, I read Anil's Ghost. That book wasn't as poetic. Divisadero is poetic but also high in concept without the accoutrement that goes with high conception. It begins with understanding the title of the novel. In the Skin of the Lion is also a title that suggests the craft of story telling but in Divisadero the suggestion of the craft of the story telling is carried out. In other words, it's not just a decoration but a device to tell a story. To witness this craft in action is quiet exciting. To explain a little bit what 'In the Skin of the Lion' means. It is a line taken from Gilgamesh. I imagine a group of people sitting around a fire at night and the skin of the lion is passed around from one person to the next. When you wear the skin, you have the podium, the floor, and it's your time to tell your story, to dazzle your audience. That's the craft of story telling. Divisadero, is a division of time, connection, and distance. It is through this perspective of distance that one can see clearer what has happen to those events that change one's life. It is as if one must assume the lion's perspective, be protected in this lion skin to tell this story and make sense of the Violence that Ann when through which tore the make-shift family apart. The high conception comes in the notion that the past and present can be entered through imagination and memory, the tools of a story teller. For Ann, she enters the skin of the lion in France, far away from her family back in California. She enters the story of Lucien the poet. It is from this safe place protected by the distance which is her lion skin to tell a story that is somewhat similar to her past circumstance.
...less

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Beli_grrl rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

09/15/07

I was wishing for this one that there was a 3.5 stars. I liked it a little more than just "liked it" but a little less than "really liked it."

This author is good. His prose is grand but not pretentious. He certainly knows a lot of history and geography, too. I just wished there was more to the story itself.

The story begins with a small, cobbled-together family living on a farm in Petaluma. You see the tragedy that befalls them and the strange and terrible things tha...more

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Mark rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

09/27/07

bookshelves: recent-faves

Read in September, 2007

This book is full of the wisdom of a writer who is both a poet and a novelist. Divisadero: the divisions between our lives and the lives of others, and even between our most secret lives inside of us too secret to admit to ourselves. Divisadero: the connections between the divisions that cause us to yearn for the comfort of togetherness, of intimacy. On a palimpsest of a novel painted over by centuries of division and that longing for togetherness, Ondaatje brushes words that will stay with me ...more

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Cricket added it (review of isbn 0307266354)

07/25/07

Divisadero was a great summer read— absolutely absorbing. It weaves together stories of four character’s lives—three of them are adult siblings of sorts that grow up in California and are then dispersed & one of them is a writer in France in the 1900s. The novel is oddly set-up in that the characters that he develops in the first half of the book do not really show up again in the second half of the book. Instead what echoes and ties the novel together are the characters’ dilemmas, u...more

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William rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

10/18/07

Read in October, 2007

This is where i learned that sometimes we enter art to hide within it.

Michael Ondaatje has the most fantastic of writing styles; wonderfully evocative, strikingly rich, with seemingly never ending depths. His ability to cover multiple generations in locations around the world at the same time is stunning, with Divisadero being one of his most ambitious novels to date.

Ondaatje's trademarks as detailed above are all present here. It's a brilliantly written novel, with the splinterin...more

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Sara rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

08/07/07

Read in August, 2007

recommends it for: Sandy

Another outstanding offering from one of my favorite authors. The narrative travels back and forth in time, forging links between the past and the present. Ondaatje gives clues in the content as to the critical themes. "All over the world there must be people like us. . .wounded in some way by falling in love--seemingly the most natural of acts." "We live permananetly in the reoccurence of our own stories, whatever story we tell." ". . .what is most untrustowrthy ab...more

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Susanne rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

06/20/08

Read in June, 2008

A Lush Mosaic of Lyrical Love and Lament

DIVISADERO grabs the reader from the very beginning and the multi-layered, page turning plot reveals that the connections in time, both present and past, continually circle our lives to mold and shape us.
We are ever haunted by these flowing and ebbing moments.

Reading Ondaatje’s rich prose is like sitting down to a gourmand’s feast and slowly working through the pleasurable, excellently prepared, courses. It’s as if a ‘courtesan of words...more

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Kristin rated it:

(review of isbn 0307279324)

08/17/08

Read in August, 2008

<i> Divisadero <i> is the first book I've read by Michael Ondaatje. I was inspired to pick up one of his novels after reading his conversations with Walter Murch on the art of film editing. It was fascinating to read about Ondaatje's writing process, and his passion for literature, and then actually see how this all plays out in one of his novels.

Ondaatje has said he has taken up to seven years to write a novel, and I can understand why after reading <i> Divisadero <i&g...more

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Serenity rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

07/04/08

Read in July, 2008

I just finished reading this book. I found it beautiful, haunting, and while at first I was dissatisfied with the loose and ultimately unresolved nature of the novel, I later decided to accept it and consequently appreciated it much more. Ondaatje is a poet as well as a novelist, and he lets poetry infuse his fiction richly. In this work, I feel that he has taken it one step further and stripped the events in the book to their essence, as in a poem. Read in that way, it no longer matters whet...more

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antonia rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

07/02/07

bookshelves: currently-reading

recommends it for: liz maples, emma, angela

Have really just started this but it's blowing me away. I bought the book based on hearing Ondaatje read this passage on NPR:

Now and then our father embraced us as any father would. This happened only if you were able to catch him in that no-man's land between tiredness and sleep, when he seemed wayward to himself. I joined him on the old covered sofa, and I would lie like a slim dog in his arms, imitating his state of weariness--too much sun perhaps, or too hard a day's work.
Clair...more

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Krissy rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

07/09/08

Has a copy to sell/swap — Read in July, 2008

Ondaatje spent a lot of time threading meaning through every facet of this plot, and he sometimes points it out to you quite blatantly.For instance, he says of Coop: "There is a great history of people being given the wrong book, at some key moment in their lives" I jotted these down as they made me smile or pause, but they don't really hit on what makes this a meaningful read.

What did was the shaping of the plot around the long-lasting effects of lost relationships and quick traum...more

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Mary-anne rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

08/21/07

Read in July, 2007

Sensuous. Intimate. Hollow. Spare. You just know you are reading a poet's novel when you find yourself lingering over the language. This book is so beautifully crafted that I savoured it from cover to cover, and then began by second read the moment I finished it.

It's two stories in one, set in different times and places, but expertly woven together - by threads. I don't want to give away too much (because I went into this story blind and feel that you will enjoy it more if you have the...more

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Gail rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

01/21/08

Read in July, 2007

From Publishers Weekly
Ondaatje's oddly structured but emotionally riveting fifth novel opens in the Northern California of the 1970s. Anna, who is 16 and whose mother died in childbirth, has formed a serene makeshift family with her same-age adopted sister, Claire, and a taciturn farmhand, Coop, 20. But when the girls' father, otherwise a ghostly presence, finds Anna having sex with Coop and beats him brutally, Coop leaves the farm, drawing on a cardsharp's skills to make an itinerant living a...more

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Judy added it (review of isbn 0307266354)

08/22/07

I hope to read this soon ...

In the 1970s in northern California, near Gold Rush country, a father and his teenage daughters, Anna and Claire, work their farm with the help of Coop, an enigmatic young man who makes his home with them. Theirs is a makeshift family, until it is riven by an incident of violence — of both hand and heart — that sets fire to the rest of their lives.

Divisadero takes us from the city of San Francisco to the raucous backrooms of Nevada’s casinos, and eventua...more

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Anne rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

07/10/07

Read in June, 2007

I knew almost immediately that I would fall in love with this book--the lyrical writing stays with you long after you've shut the book to leave the train, go to bed. I think of the "wet lime trees" and the boy as eager as a hound "hoping for everything." The book celebrates the written word and in this age of text messages, poor grammar, and short attention spans, this book reminds me that the written word has existed for centuries, long before IPODs and the like. It will ...more

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Tracy O rated it:

(review of isbn 0307266354)

05/22/08

recommended to Tracy O by: Ann
recommends it for: Everyone, but Especially Those With a Romantic Bent to the Soul

WOW. Ann gave me this book and it completely blew me away. When I read blurbs and descriptions of the book it sounded kind of dusty (California history, chapparel, etc.) and overwrought and even though I loved the English Patient and The Cinnamon Peelers Wife (poetry), I read some of his books (In the Skin of the Lion, The Real Life of Billy the Kid, etc.) and didn't like them very much. But, this book is simply amazing and if you don't read it you will have really missed something. First, t...more