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Something to Tell You
Jamal is middle-aged, though reluctant to admit it. He has an ex-wife, a son he adores, a thriving career as a psychoanalyst and vast reserves of unsatisfied desire. "Secrets are my currency," he says. "I deal in them for a living." And he has some of his own. He is haunted by Ajita, his first love, whom he hasn't seen in decades, and by an act of violence he has never confessed. With great empathy and agility, Kureishi has created an array of unforgettable characters -- a hilarious and eccentric theater director, a covey of charming and defiant outcasts and an ebullient sister who thrives on the fringe. All wrestle with their own limits as human beings; all are plagued by the past until they find it within themselves to forgive. Comic, wise and unfailingly tender, Something to Tell You is Kureishi's best work to date, brilliant and exhilarating.
384 pages, Hardcover
First published February 28, 2008
103 people are currently reading
1679 people want to read
About the author
Hanif Kureishi
131 books1,131 followersHanif Kureishi is the author of novels (including The Buddha of Suburbia, The Black Album and Intimacy), story collections (Love in a Blue Time, Midnight All Day, The Body), plays (including Outskirts, Borderline and Sleep With Me), and screenplays (including My Beautiful Laundrette, My Son the Fanatic and Venus). Among his other publications are the collection of essays Dreaming and Scheming, The Word and the Bomb and the memoir My Ear at His Heart.
Kureishi was born in London to a Pakistani father and an English mother. His father, Rafiushan, was from a wealthy Madras family, most of whose members moved to Pakistan after the Partition of India in 1947. He came to Britain to study law but soon abandoned his studies. After meeting and marrying Kureishi’s mother Audrey, Rafiushan settled in Bromley, where Kureishi was born, and worked at the Pakistan Embassy.
Kureishi attended Bromley Technical High School where David Bowie had also been a pupil and after taking his A levels at a local sixth form college, he spent a year studying philosophy at Lancaster University before dropping out. Later he attended King’s College London and took a degree in philosophy. In 1985 he wrote My Beautiful Laundrette, a screenplay about a gay Pakistani-British boy growing up in 1980’s London for a film directed by Stephen Frears. It won the New York Film Critics Best Screenplay Award and an Academy Award nomination for Best Screenplay.
His book The Buddha of Suburbia (1990) won the Whitbread Award for the best first novel, and was also made into a BBC television series with a soundtrack by David Bowie. The next year, 1991, saw the release of the feature film entitled London Kills Me; a film written and directed Kureishi.
His novel Intimacy (1998) revolved around the story of a man leaving his wife and two young sons after feeling physically and emotionally rejected by his wife. This created certain controversy as Kureishi himself had recently left his wife and two young sons. It is assumed to be at least semi-autobiographical. In 2000/2001 the novel was loosely adapted to a movie Intimacy by Patrice Chéreau, which won two Bears at the Berlin Film Festival: a Golden Bear for Best Film, and a Silver Bear for Best Actress (Kerry Fox). It was controversial for its unreserved sex scenes. The book was translated into Persian by Niki Karimi in 2005.
He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2008 New Year Honours.
Kureishi is married and has a pair of twins and a younger son.
Kureishi was born in London to a Pakistani father and an English mother. His father, Rafiushan, was from a wealthy Madras family, most of whose members moved to Pakistan after the Partition of India in 1947. He came to Britain to study law but soon abandoned his studies. After meeting and marrying Kureishi’s mother Audrey, Rafiushan settled in Bromley, where Kureishi was born, and worked at the Pakistan Embassy.
Kureishi attended Bromley Technical High School where David Bowie had also been a pupil and after taking his A levels at a local sixth form college, he spent a year studying philosophy at Lancaster University before dropping out. Later he attended King’s College London and took a degree in philosophy. In 1985 he wrote My Beautiful Laundrette, a screenplay about a gay Pakistani-British boy growing up in 1980’s London for a film directed by Stephen Frears. It won the New York Film Critics Best Screenplay Award and an Academy Award nomination for Best Screenplay.
His book The Buddha of Suburbia (1990) won the Whitbread Award for the best first novel, and was also made into a BBC television series with a soundtrack by David Bowie. The next year, 1991, saw the release of the feature film entitled London Kills Me; a film written and directed Kureishi.
His novel Intimacy (1998) revolved around the story of a man leaving his wife and two young sons after feeling physically and emotionally rejected by his wife. This created certain controversy as Kureishi himself had recently left his wife and two young sons. It is assumed to be at least semi-autobiographical. In 2000/2001 the novel was loosely adapted to a movie Intimacy by Patrice Chéreau, which won two Bears at the Berlin Film Festival: a Golden Bear for Best Film, and a Silver Bear for Best Actress (Kerry Fox). It was controversial for its unreserved sex scenes. The book was translated into Persian by Niki Karimi in 2005.
He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2008 New Year Honours.
Kureishi is married and has a pair of twins and a younger son.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 219 reviews
August 17, 2020
Technically Hanif Kureishi is a British author, but he’s a ‘novelist of Pakistani and English descent’ according to his Wikipedia page, which is good enough for me (because authorial nationality is a headache I haven’t began to bash my head up against). Also because his name crops up pretty regularly in discussions of Pakistani literature, so I was already halfway through his book when I realized he was British. At which point I thought, “I’ve read too much of this crap to not review this now.”
And here we are.
Of all the Pakistani books I’ve reviewed, only this book came close to creating the level of blahness that Uzma Aslam Khan’s Thinner than Skin inspired in me. Not that Kureishi doesn’t write well. He’s a good enough writer, passably entertaining, sometimes. But he’s a writer wasted on his subject matter.
The problem could be that Kureishi took on too much in one go. London in the 70's, young love, drugs, sex, murder and guilt, race and religion, all crop up here and there, but the really interesting nuggets, the smart, incisive commentary on the society gets lost under all the other garbage. This is mainly because Kureishi’s protagonist, a middle-aged divorcee with a cushiony job, is the equivalent of the uncle at parties who cracks inappropriate jokes, scratches his belly, and stares lecherously at all the girls. Not only is Jamal the psychoanalyst boring and uninspired, he’s also wholly self-absorbed and whiny in the most grating kind of way.
It occurred to me that I wanted my wife to be a whore, and my whores to be my partners.
In fact, pretty much all the other characters in this story – the vanished love interest, the wild single-mother sibling, the theatre director best friend – are more interesting than our own Jamal, and that’s not saying much since all these characters can easily come off as too zany, too melodramatic, too hard an effort on Kureishi’s part to create ‘complex’ characters. All their lives seem inconsequential and tiresome, an error of huge proportions in a book which rests solely on its characters’ activities. Because the actual ‘mystery’, the back story to Jamal’s current problem, a crime he committed and got away for, fizzles away into nothingness. In fact, for a back story that has Jamal wrecked in guilt throughout the book, it winds up being the most anti-climatic ending ever.
There’s also an almost unhealthy obsession with sex running through the whole book. By this point I’ve read and talked about sex enough to know that it’s not the topic itself that made me squeamish, but the treatment of it. Hanif’s characters talk about sex as if to say, ‘Look how cool I am! Admire me for I am liberal and know about prostitutes and whips!” Case in point:
“Perhaps my son would, one day, prefer to be blown by a stranger in a toilet, or perhaps he would like to be spanked while being fellated by a Negro transvestite.”
He’s talking about his son. And here’s another example of his best friend talking about his own son:
“Most nights Sam makes love. At the beginning of the night, in the middle, and just for luck in the morning. I hear it, I overhear it. I can’t escape the fluttering moans.”
Dear god, old man. Get a grip. Take a cold shower. That’s basically what a huge portion of the book feels like: awkward, uncomfortable, and like having a conversation with an older relative who is determined to use the words blow job in every second sentence.
Another constant recurrence, equally irritating, is in the frequent allusions to writers, psychologists, actors, poets, playwrights, etc etc. Baudelaire, Balzac, Freud, Proust, Keats, Coleridge, Kafka, Marx, Emerson, Blake, on and on and on; it’s like Kureishi needs us to know how much he knows and how well read he is. But instead of being impressive, it stumbles headfirst into pretentiousness.
A favourite conversation with Valentin concerned moral absolutes and ideas he’d found in Balzac, Nietzsche, Turgenev and Dostoevsky about nihilism and murder.
Kureishi’s description of Jamal’s two friends, Valentin and Woolf, was so reminiscent of the three idiots you find in H. M. Naqvi’s Home Boy that for a second I had a stark, horrible flashback to the cesspit that was that novel. In a similar vein to Home Boy’s overly descriptive homage to shoe styles and flashy, pretentious conversations, Something to Tell You might well have been the inspiration to Naqvi’s endless drivel.
How I loved being with the unassailable men. Me, the eager little kid, they would patronise as I tried to please them with jokes, tough talk and a swaggering walk. Often Wolf and Valentin spoke in French or German…
I think probably the problem was more to do with the fact that none of the characters held their ground enough for me to care about what was going on in their lives. And once you don’t care about the characters, once you start to forget where your hero’s parents are and what his best friend does and why our protagonist is doing what he’s doing, then the book is a lost cause.
He became a made-up father, a collage assembled from bits of the real one. Each of us had our own notion or fantasy of him, while he stood in the shadows, like Orson Welles in The Third Man, always about to step into our lives—we hoped.
By the time we got to page 30, Jamal mentioned his father living far away in Pakistan and I had to stop and think, “Wait, what was the father’s story again?” Mainly this was because I was bored. In some places a randomly placed exceptionally well written passage or sentence would catch my attention-
People have such power; the force field of their bodies, and the wishes within them, can knock you all over the place.
-but then we would be back to the same old stuff. Even all the discussions about minorities and racial discrimination and the changing social fabric of London, interesting though it was, wasn’t enough to save this book.
Most whites considered Asians to be “inferior,” less intelligent, less everything good. Not that we were called Asian then. Officially, as it were, we were called “immigrants,” I think. Later, for political reasons, we were “blacks.” But we always considered ourselves to be Indians. In Britain we are still called Asians, though we’re no more Asian than the English are European. It was a long time before we became known as Muslims, a new imprimatur, and then for political reasons.
The problem with this book is that our protagonist is a thoroughly unlikable, incredibly boring character. And while thoroughly unlikeable characters can make for great writing (Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind, Amy Dunne from Gone Girl, Dorian Gray from The Picture of Dorian Gray, The Underground Man from Notes from Underground), over here it, very simply put, does not.
Recommendation
There are too many good books out there to waste your time with this one. If you want, maybe check out Buddha of Suburbia since people seem to love that Kureishi book, but definitely give this one a miss.
ORIGINAL REVIEW:
Well I didn't passionately hate it but I didn't like it either. I wouldn't even say it was okay. More on the meh said. Review to come soon.
***
I review Pakistani Fiction, and talk about Pakistani fiction, and want to talk to people who like to talk about fiction (Pakistani and otherwise, take your pick.) To read more reviews or just contact me so you can talk about books, check out my Blog or follow me on Twitter!
And here we are.
Of all the Pakistani books I’ve reviewed, only this book came close to creating the level of blahness that Uzma Aslam Khan’s Thinner than Skin inspired in me. Not that Kureishi doesn’t write well. He’s a good enough writer, passably entertaining, sometimes. But he’s a writer wasted on his subject matter.
The problem could be that Kureishi took on too much in one go. London in the 70's, young love, drugs, sex, murder and guilt, race and religion, all crop up here and there, but the really interesting nuggets, the smart, incisive commentary on the society gets lost under all the other garbage. This is mainly because Kureishi’s protagonist, a middle-aged divorcee with a cushiony job, is the equivalent of the uncle at parties who cracks inappropriate jokes, scratches his belly, and stares lecherously at all the girls. Not only is Jamal the psychoanalyst boring and uninspired, he’s also wholly self-absorbed and whiny in the most grating kind of way.
It occurred to me that I wanted my wife to be a whore, and my whores to be my partners.
In fact, pretty much all the other characters in this story – the vanished love interest, the wild single-mother sibling, the theatre director best friend – are more interesting than our own Jamal, and that’s not saying much since all these characters can easily come off as too zany, too melodramatic, too hard an effort on Kureishi’s part to create ‘complex’ characters. All their lives seem inconsequential and tiresome, an error of huge proportions in a book which rests solely on its characters’ activities. Because the actual ‘mystery’, the back story to Jamal’s current problem, a crime he committed and got away for, fizzles away into nothingness. In fact, for a back story that has Jamal wrecked in guilt throughout the book, it winds up being the most anti-climatic ending ever.
There’s also an almost unhealthy obsession with sex running through the whole book. By this point I’ve read and talked about sex enough to know that it’s not the topic itself that made me squeamish, but the treatment of it. Hanif’s characters talk about sex as if to say, ‘Look how cool I am! Admire me for I am liberal and know about prostitutes and whips!” Case in point:
“Perhaps my son would, one day, prefer to be blown by a stranger in a toilet, or perhaps he would like to be spanked while being fellated by a Negro transvestite.”
He’s talking about his son. And here’s another example of his best friend talking about his own son:
“Most nights Sam makes love. At the beginning of the night, in the middle, and just for luck in the morning. I hear it, I overhear it. I can’t escape the fluttering moans.”
Dear god, old man. Get a grip. Take a cold shower. That’s basically what a huge portion of the book feels like: awkward, uncomfortable, and like having a conversation with an older relative who is determined to use the words blow job in every second sentence.
Another constant recurrence, equally irritating, is in the frequent allusions to writers, psychologists, actors, poets, playwrights, etc etc. Baudelaire, Balzac, Freud, Proust, Keats, Coleridge, Kafka, Marx, Emerson, Blake, on and on and on; it’s like Kureishi needs us to know how much he knows and how well read he is. But instead of being impressive, it stumbles headfirst into pretentiousness.
A favourite conversation with Valentin concerned moral absolutes and ideas he’d found in Balzac, Nietzsche, Turgenev and Dostoevsky about nihilism and murder.
Kureishi’s description of Jamal’s two friends, Valentin and Woolf, was so reminiscent of the three idiots you find in H. M. Naqvi’s Home Boy that for a second I had a stark, horrible flashback to the cesspit that was that novel. In a similar vein to Home Boy’s overly descriptive homage to shoe styles and flashy, pretentious conversations, Something to Tell You might well have been the inspiration to Naqvi’s endless drivel.
How I loved being with the unassailable men. Me, the eager little kid, they would patronise as I tried to please them with jokes, tough talk and a swaggering walk. Often Wolf and Valentin spoke in French or German…
I think probably the problem was more to do with the fact that none of the characters held their ground enough for me to care about what was going on in their lives. And once you don’t care about the characters, once you start to forget where your hero’s parents are and what his best friend does and why our protagonist is doing what he’s doing, then the book is a lost cause.
He became a made-up father, a collage assembled from bits of the real one. Each of us had our own notion or fantasy of him, while he stood in the shadows, like Orson Welles in The Third Man, always about to step into our lives—we hoped.
By the time we got to page 30, Jamal mentioned his father living far away in Pakistan and I had to stop and think, “Wait, what was the father’s story again?” Mainly this was because I was bored. In some places a randomly placed exceptionally well written passage or sentence would catch my attention-
People have such power; the force field of their bodies, and the wishes within them, can knock you all over the place.
-but then we would be back to the same old stuff. Even all the discussions about minorities and racial discrimination and the changing social fabric of London, interesting though it was, wasn’t enough to save this book.
Most whites considered Asians to be “inferior,” less intelligent, less everything good. Not that we were called Asian then. Officially, as it were, we were called “immigrants,” I think. Later, for political reasons, we were “blacks.” But we always considered ourselves to be Indians. In Britain we are still called Asians, though we’re no more Asian than the English are European. It was a long time before we became known as Muslims, a new imprimatur, and then for political reasons.
The problem with this book is that our protagonist is a thoroughly unlikable, incredibly boring character. And while thoroughly unlikeable characters can make for great writing (Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind, Amy Dunne from Gone Girl, Dorian Gray from The Picture of Dorian Gray, The Underground Man from Notes from Underground), over here it, very simply put, does not.
Recommendation
There are too many good books out there to waste your time with this one. If you want, maybe check out Buddha of Suburbia since people seem to love that Kureishi book, but definitely give this one a miss.
ORIGINAL REVIEW:
Well I didn't passionately hate it but I didn't like it either. I wouldn't even say it was okay. More on the meh said. Review to come soon.
***
I review Pakistani Fiction, and talk about Pakistani fiction, and want to talk to people who like to talk about fiction (Pakistani and otherwise, take your pick.) To read more reviews or just contact me so you can talk about books, check out my Blog or follow me on Twitter!
February 5, 2017
It took me 20 days to battle through this book and I wish I hadn't bothered. It was such a huge let down. Intimacy was so powerful, fearless and beautiful, that I couldn't wait to get stuck into this. It just totally failed to deliver.
Kureishi tries to shoehorn so many themes into ths novel (immigration, race, parenthood, growing old, sex, drugs, london in the 70s, guilt, love) that it's not surprising it feels unfinished, wishy-washy and rambling. Nothing is explored fully and it left me feeling thoroughly unsatisfied.
The plethora of improbable characters seemed largely pointless. Many appeared to be present only to further Jamal's self-indulgent whining, or for random sexual expolits. There are a few neat little observations that i enjoyed but it mostly seemed like a lot of people doing stuff, completely unconnected to each other or the plot. Such insane characters need a little explanation and this was lacking. The relationship betwen Jamal and his son could have been a powerful antidote to the drugs, sex, murder and divorce, but it just made me cringe. The constant name-dropping was an endless irritation and made me put it down and walk away on more than one occasion.
I feel like this book was simply Kureishi jumping up and down, waving desperately and shouting "Hey, I'm still cool! Look how I can write about prostitutes, facial piercings and butt plugs! Look at my zany characters, loose morals and casual drug use!"
Everything I loved about Intimacy was missing here, and it will be a while before I can forgive him and pick up another of his books.
Kureishi tries to shoehorn so many themes into ths novel (immigration, race, parenthood, growing old, sex, drugs, london in the 70s, guilt, love) that it's not surprising it feels unfinished, wishy-washy and rambling. Nothing is explored fully and it left me feeling thoroughly unsatisfied.
The plethora of improbable characters seemed largely pointless. Many appeared to be present only to further Jamal's self-indulgent whining, or for random sexual expolits. There are a few neat little observations that i enjoyed but it mostly seemed like a lot of people doing stuff, completely unconnected to each other or the plot. Such insane characters need a little explanation and this was lacking. The relationship betwen Jamal and his son could have been a powerful antidote to the drugs, sex, murder and divorce, but it just made me cringe. The constant name-dropping was an endless irritation and made me put it down and walk away on more than one occasion.
I feel like this book was simply Kureishi jumping up and down, waving desperately and shouting "Hey, I'm still cool! Look how I can write about prostitutes, facial piercings and butt plugs! Look at my zany characters, loose morals and casual drug use!"
Everything I loved about Intimacy was missing here, and it will be a while before I can forgive him and pick up another of his books.
June 23, 2023
Surprisingly enough I enjoyed this book. The middle-aged psychologist who is the main character is a bit of a lost soul. He has a son whom he obviously adores, an ex-wife whom he perhaps still loves, a sister who excels at breaking boundaries and professional life that might very well be in serious peril because of a violent act that he was involved in as a teenager. And on top of that his old girlfriend, perhaps even a love of his life makes a sudden reentrance. By all means a complicated situation.
It is this kind of a book that keeps chatting away for a five-hundred pages without much significant taking place. Jamal is a talker, (or should I say, a thinker) who is doing his best to uphold all the relationships in his life, despite them occasionally interfering with each other, and I don't really mind keeping him company for a while. On the other hand I am not quite sure if I emerge at the end of it any wiser, or enriched. But it was kind of nice while it lasted.
It is this kind of a book that keeps chatting away for a five-hundred pages without much significant taking place. Jamal is a talker, (or should I say, a thinker) who is doing his best to uphold all the relationships in his life, despite them occasionally interfering with each other, and I don't really mind keeping him company for a while. On the other hand I am not quite sure if I emerge at the end of it any wiser, or enriched. But it was kind of nice while it lasted.
September 25, 2018
I started out wondering about the low ratings this book has on Goodreads, Kureishi's writing caught me as easily as ever and the character's and situations were both unusual and intriguing as always. But the book has a flaw in that it is probably around 200 pages too long. Variations on a theme makes you wonder what Jamal really had time for in his youth and surely, we would have gotten the point even without a couple of the back stories. Parts of this book are riveting reading, unfortunately the strongest and most engaging part comes to a bit of a let down at the end - which feels more like 'it's time to stop writing' than a resolution. Kureishi is one of the authors I really adore in the shorter format (see Intimacy and Love In A Blue Time) and this is way too rambling for my taste. So I ended up rewarding this a measly 3 stars myself, I woul dstill recommend it, but with a big portion of caveat lector thrown in.
April 2, 2019
So disappointed by this. I tried and tried to get into it (not such a big deal as it is rather well written), but just couldn't engage. After 100 or so pages I realised I wasn't enjoying it and had to abandon.
It just wasn't going anywhere. I also hated all the characters.
It just wasn't going anywhere. I also hated all the characters.
October 19, 2016
When I first heard that Hanif Kureishi had a new novel out, I could barely contain myself, but oh how I should have. What a shame. Hip and irreverent cousin Hanif has turned into self indulgent, rambling, and slightly creepy uncle Hanif.
This pointless and pretentious story full of a myriad of uninteresting, indistinguishable, and sometimes even implausible characters doing things you could care less about to with less interesting consequences is undoubtedly the product of a horribly-bourgeois, spiritually bankrupt, hedonistic man on the doorstep of dusty decrepitness desperately determined to cling tightly to some sort of cultural relevance and coolness. It's just pathetic. Hanif, please grow up gracefully or just let it go. Everyone loses their golden touch some time.
This pointless and pretentious story full of a myriad of uninteresting, indistinguishable, and sometimes even implausible characters doing things you could care less about to with less interesting consequences is undoubtedly the product of a horribly-bourgeois, spiritually bankrupt, hedonistic man on the doorstep of dusty decrepitness desperately determined to cling tightly to some sort of cultural relevance and coolness. It's just pathetic. Hanif, please grow up gracefully or just let it go. Everyone loses their golden touch some time.
May 24, 2017
3.5 stars. Journalist Charles Taylor calls this novel "carnal and carnivalesque," and I agree that's it's both, perhaps more successful at the latter than the former, which is a tad wearying by the end. It's a sprawling yet oddly claustrophobic high-octane tear through a quite particular slice of London's creative classes, and the tangled and guilt-laden relationships therein, with pauses along the way to contemplate modern life in the shadow of international terrorism, creativity, and family ties. I loved the masterful writing, quite funny in parts, and the playful wrestling with psychoanalytic and philosophical ideas, though at times the cleverness created off notes and I had short bouts of exasperation and impatience. I think the underlying ruminations on later middle age finally carried me through, along with my interest in this motley group of characters.
March 2, 2020
I tried really hard with this book but it just wasn’t for me. It felt like having read all that... for ‘that?!’ It felt like there must be some really meaningful message in there, but I guess it flew right over my head.
Two stars, not one, because I honestly feel I didn’t « get it ».
Two stars, not one, because I honestly feel I didn’t « get it ».
September 23, 2012
Saturated in Freudian material, thought, understanding, interpretation, word-play, fathers and sons, father murder, sexual perversity, a sort of polymorphous perversity coming at you all the time. Hanif Kureishi clearly has also acquainted himself with Lacan.
This is a confessional sort of novel, classless but about being of Pakistani origins in modern London. Very honest about human behaviour and so cutting out a lot of pretentious stuff that creeps into novels. Here people behave as Freud would have said people behave: selfish, guided by the desire for pleasure and the avoidance of pain; cruel, dishonest, violent. Love is not pure. Every relationship is fraternally murderous in it's nature. It describes a godless, this-is-all-there-is mindset, materialistic, psychotherapy the nearest thing to a spiritual outlet. Maybe it's a literary cliche for a novelist to write as a psychoanalyst, how many writers really understand the subject? But this narrator, Jamal, is a psychoanalyst, one never doubts it. He speaks, thinks, is, psychoanalysis. Not just that but the tricks of the unconscious pervade the narrative.
This is a confessional sort of novel, classless but about being of Pakistani origins in modern London. Very honest about human behaviour and so cutting out a lot of pretentious stuff that creeps into novels. Here people behave as Freud would have said people behave: selfish, guided by the desire for pleasure and the avoidance of pain; cruel, dishonest, violent. Love is not pure. Every relationship is fraternally murderous in it's nature. It describes a godless, this-is-all-there-is mindset, materialistic, psychotherapy the nearest thing to a spiritual outlet. Maybe it's a literary cliche for a novelist to write as a psychoanalyst, how many writers really understand the subject? But this narrator, Jamal, is a psychoanalyst, one never doubts it. He speaks, thinks, is, psychoanalysis. Not just that but the tricks of the unconscious pervade the narrative.
September 8, 2019
عزيزي جمال، ثمة ما أقول لك..
حاولت عدم السقوط في الشرك المغري للابتذال ولكنني لم أستطع مقاومة استخدام عنوان الرواية في بداية حديثي.
مقيت أنت يا جمال. سلبي وأناني وتستحق أن تعاني من متلازمة المحتال ولكنك لسبب ما لا تفعل، لأن الحياة ليست عادلة أبدًا. أكره ترقيعك للأمور استجداءًا ليوم آخر من ال " كل شيء على ما يرام"، أفعل ذلك دائمًا وأكره أن أرى آخرين يسلكون نفس المسلك ولكنك وضعتها أمامي بأسوء الطرق الممكنة. أرجو وآمل وأعتقد أن حياتك ستستمر في كونها دائرة من الأحداث التي تعكر صفو مزاجك اللعين والترقيعات الهشة التي ترتجلها لمحاربة تلك الأحداث.
حاولت عدم السقوط في الشرك المغري للابتذال ولكنني لم أستطع مقاومة استخدام عنوان الرواية في بداية حديثي.
مقيت أنت يا جمال. سلبي وأناني وتستحق أن تعاني من متلازمة المحتال ولكنك لسبب ما لا تفعل، لأن الحياة ليست عادلة أبدًا. أكره ترقيعك للأمور استجداءًا ليوم آخر من ال " كل شيء على ما يرام"، أفعل ذلك دائمًا وأكره أن أرى آخرين يسلكون نفس المسلك ولكنك وضعتها أمامي بأسوء الطرق الممكنة. أرجو وآمل وأعتقد أن حياتك ستستمر في كونها دائرة من الأحداث التي تعكر صفو مزاجك اللعين والترقيعات الهشة التي ترتجلها لمحاربة تلك الأحداث.
Read
September 17, 2008Hanif Kureishi’s latest novel Something to Tell You follows the first person musings of Jamal Karim, a psychoanalyst who is in the late stages of mid-life. Jamal has a secret, and seems to have reached a point where the secret has reached its nexus, and he either must face it, or collapse. The language of the book is confident, and often rich, reflecting the insular nature of the protagonist, and the setting is full of the vibrancy of the period in which this book moves: from Jamal’s past in the mid-1970s to today. There is a tremendous amount of detail, and a living record of the trends, books, theories, and gadgets that make up the modern world as we knew, and know it, and it’s reasonably fast-paced, despite the paralysis that takes over the narrator. But throughout the book is an unsettling superficiality which jars with the fact that the narrative itself gets forward motion from the thoughts and recollections of Jamal.
As with Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty, or John Irving’s Until I Find You, the novel is weighed down by an almost constant and in a way, irrelevant, plethora of namedropping. From the psychoanalysts who inspire Jamal: "Freud, Lacan, Laing", to book titles sprinkled at random through the text, authors ("Sade, Beardley, Hugh Hefner"), albums, performers ("Roy Orbison, Dusty Springfield"), and political rulers are all listed, with little reason other than to demonstrate popular culture. Worse though are the real life characters that keep popping into the story - Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Kate Moss, Tom Stoppard, Marianne Faithfull, or Eric Cantona, an ex-Manchester United football player, and a range of other "names" are all woven into the storyline, having lunch, therapy, or being introduced to people.
It’s easy to imagine that Kureishi’s intent here was to provide a sense of the era, and the immediate colour that these characters conjure, but instead these dropped-in names turns the book into a compendium of the times and detracts from both the character development and the fictive dream. Each time it happens: “Tom Stoppard, an acquantainence of Henry’s, had suggested Henry might enjoy Mick.” (153) it drags the reader out of an already thin story and further dilutes the believability, since each of the mentioned celebrities are full scale complex characters in real life but cardboard cutouts in this novel.
Jamal talks us through the story, and provides analyses of what he sees, but we never feel it, either from Jamal, or from the supporting characters, who, like Jamal, come across as superficial, unpleasant, and self-obsessed. There’s Miriam, Jamal’s wild single mother sister, who introduces his theatre director friend Henry to group sex.
Then there’s Ajita, his long lost love, who has her own secret. Ajita breezes into his life at University and provides a catalyst for the murder that destroys Jamal’s life. But neither Ajita, nor the murder that she inspires, has enough force to drive the narrative. She never says anything of substance and instead is characterised by her designer clothing, her beauty, and the good sex Jamal had with her. Next there’s Henry, his colourful, larger-than-life friend who couples with his sister. Henry speaks in grand platitudes almost all the time, in a way that is as unbelievable as the sex life he develops, which is described in more detail than is required.
Something to Tell You just ends, one feels, when Kureishi tires of writing, without any real denouement or sense of motion for the reader. Unfortunately, and despite the clear interest that Kureishi takes in conveying the decadence of London between the '70s and the '90s, most readers will tire of Jamal’s paralysis and voyeuristic recount long before that point. Which is a shame, because Kureishi certainly has a way with words and there are times when the narrative voice is actually powerful, such as in the opening page: “I’m into a place where language can’t go, or where it stops – the ‘indescribable’.
Unfortunately, in this novel, little is shown and almost everything is described, in such superficial, tedious details, that the reader never develops empathy. There are a whole range of topics raised that could have been explored: sexual abuse; sexual freedom versus repression; migration and return; how we come to terms with the past, but all of these are unexplored in any depth, and certainly sit at the outside of Jamal’s naval gazing, which mostly focuses on his organ size, and why he can’t commit to anything.
Read Something to Tell You as a kind of fictionalized memoir or social commentary of the cultural events of West London as it moves through the '70s to the present day, and it will be reasonably amusing, especially if it brings back any personal memories. But try to read it as a cohesive piece of fiction, and the endless first person self-references of the narrator simply aren’t enough to make this novel work.
Listen to me read the first page of Something to Tell You at:
http://www.seenreading.com/readers-re...
(that's my hand too!)
As with Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty, or John Irving’s Until I Find You, the novel is weighed down by an almost constant and in a way, irrelevant, plethora of namedropping. From the psychoanalysts who inspire Jamal: "Freud, Lacan, Laing", to book titles sprinkled at random through the text, authors ("Sade, Beardley, Hugh Hefner"), albums, performers ("Roy Orbison, Dusty Springfield"), and political rulers are all listed, with little reason other than to demonstrate popular culture. Worse though are the real life characters that keep popping into the story - Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Kate Moss, Tom Stoppard, Marianne Faithfull, or Eric Cantona, an ex-Manchester United football player, and a range of other "names" are all woven into the storyline, having lunch, therapy, or being introduced to people.
It’s easy to imagine that Kureishi’s intent here was to provide a sense of the era, and the immediate colour that these characters conjure, but instead these dropped-in names turns the book into a compendium of the times and detracts from both the character development and the fictive dream. Each time it happens: “Tom Stoppard, an acquantainence of Henry’s, had suggested Henry might enjoy Mick.” (153) it drags the reader out of an already thin story and further dilutes the believability, since each of the mentioned celebrities are full scale complex characters in real life but cardboard cutouts in this novel.
Jamal talks us through the story, and provides analyses of what he sees, but we never feel it, either from Jamal, or from the supporting characters, who, like Jamal, come across as superficial, unpleasant, and self-obsessed. There’s Miriam, Jamal’s wild single mother sister, who introduces his theatre director friend Henry to group sex.
Then there’s Ajita, his long lost love, who has her own secret. Ajita breezes into his life at University and provides a catalyst for the murder that destroys Jamal’s life. But neither Ajita, nor the murder that she inspires, has enough force to drive the narrative. She never says anything of substance and instead is characterised by her designer clothing, her beauty, and the good sex Jamal had with her. Next there’s Henry, his colourful, larger-than-life friend who couples with his sister. Henry speaks in grand platitudes almost all the time, in a way that is as unbelievable as the sex life he develops, which is described in more detail than is required.
Something to Tell You just ends, one feels, when Kureishi tires of writing, without any real denouement or sense of motion for the reader. Unfortunately, and despite the clear interest that Kureishi takes in conveying the decadence of London between the '70s and the '90s, most readers will tire of Jamal’s paralysis and voyeuristic recount long before that point. Which is a shame, because Kureishi certainly has a way with words and there are times when the narrative voice is actually powerful, such as in the opening page: “I’m into a place where language can’t go, or where it stops – the ‘indescribable’.
Unfortunately, in this novel, little is shown and almost everything is described, in such superficial, tedious details, that the reader never develops empathy. There are a whole range of topics raised that could have been explored: sexual abuse; sexual freedom versus repression; migration and return; how we come to terms with the past, but all of these are unexplored in any depth, and certainly sit at the outside of Jamal’s naval gazing, which mostly focuses on his organ size, and why he can’t commit to anything.
Read Something to Tell You as a kind of fictionalized memoir or social commentary of the cultural events of West London as it moves through the '70s to the present day, and it will be reasonably amusing, especially if it brings back any personal memories. But try to read it as a cohesive piece of fiction, and the endless first person self-references of the narrator simply aren’t enough to make this novel work.
Listen to me read the first page of Something to Tell You at:
http://www.seenreading.com/readers-re...
(that's my hand too!)
April 19, 2014
If psychoanalysis is about cutting to the heart of things, as I truly believe it is, then Hanif Kureishi promises a lot with this tale, narrated by a psychoanalyst in his fifties whose past catches up with him—an ingenious spin on the return of the repressed. Inspired by the analytic process, Kureishi aims 'to live without illusions. I want to look at reality straight. Without hiding. No more bullshit.' Still, there is a lot of it in this book. I was surprised, disappointed even, that the narrative seems to be less concerned with telling it straight than with the superfluous, the extremes and excesses of human behaviour.
There are many highly quotable snippets about psychoanalysis, which are quite amusing if you have an interest in the subject, but Kureishi cites Lacan and the Other as he would the Rolling Stones. I found the celebrity name-dropping annoying and very much disliked the final few chapters, verging on the vulgar. I was tempted to remove a star throughout these crude (and boring) sections. But ultimately I can appreciate Kureishi’s sympathy for the deviant and his forgiving view of love and sexuality. His mixing of high & low culture, the London way, is irresistible. *** Three and a half stars for that.
There are many highly quotable snippets about psychoanalysis, which are quite amusing if you have an interest in the subject, but Kureishi cites Lacan and the Other as he would the Rolling Stones. I found the celebrity name-dropping annoying and very much disliked the final few chapters, verging on the vulgar. I was tempted to remove a star throughout these crude (and boring) sections. But ultimately I can appreciate Kureishi’s sympathy for the deviant and his forgiving view of love and sexuality. His mixing of high & low culture, the London way, is irresistible. *** Three and a half stars for that.
September 27, 2010
Maybe its because I read the black album 10 years too late, maybe its the subject matter which is closer to my reality. But this is my Kureishi favourite. I love it for all the usual reasons - the raw, sharp wit, the contemporary subject, the characters and all their flaws and failures, with or without redepmtpion. This one left me with the good feeling that life can be as bizarre, anguishing, disconnected, and yet that all the strangeness can be oddly normal and homely.
Read
April 4, 2014Lots of lapsed Muslims squirt semen on one another amid punk rockers and champagne socialists right as London lost its swing. Yes, it's a Hanif Kureishi novel. And a pretty good one. Like the Buddha of Suburbia, it is, at the very least, wildly entertaining and witty. Not a masterpiece, and with a bit of a limp-dick ending, but about as ideal a beach read as I could imagine. Even if it made me terrified of how I'll feel about sex when I'm 50.
August 10, 2020
avevi qualcosa da dirmi, ma 'sto qualcosa in fondo non era poi così interessante.
December 13, 2023
- A near-great pervy book i had read in age. sadly that its ABUNDANT subplots simply disintegrated what “good” and what “fine” proportion of this book. Whyyyyy !? BTW, from his versatile career path, Kureishi also wrote a number of screenplays upon his materials. perhaps that was a truthful form on this particular story.
- This title was definitely among on my 2023’s disappointed read. i would rather read badly written works than overcooked quality pieces!
- This title was definitely among on my 2023’s disappointed read. i would rather read badly written works than overcooked quality pieces!
November 4, 2020
Is it me getting too old for Hanif Kureishi’s books? Or is it his books becoming too boring?
It took me ages to finish this book about a gang of implausible characters who got stuck in a story that I desperately wanted to be as gripping as The Buddha of Suburbia. Sadly, it wasn’t.
It took me ages to finish this book about a gang of implausible characters who got stuck in a story that I desperately wanted to be as gripping as The Buddha of Suburbia. Sadly, it wasn’t.
June 1, 2024
fucking finally finished this boring book, concept is okay i guess, execution is horrible
February 11, 2017
Duboka depresija i potraga za smislom, HANIF KUREISHI "Nešto da ti kažem"
(14 August 2010 )
Dok sam otpočinjala čitati ovaj roman učinio mi se malo drugačijim, ali sa svakom novom stranicom prepoznavala sam detalje iz ranijih knjiga, „Bude“, „Intime“, ali i one memoarsko-biografske „Osluškujući njegovu dušu“. I ma koliko da mi je teško pisati esej o Kureishiju (neizrecivo teže nego o Murakamiju npr.), prisiljavam sebe da to spoznanje nakon čitanja ne ostavim unutra. Da nađem način da ga približim onima koji ga još nisu čitali, ili onima koji ga nisu razumjeli. Ne usuđujem se, pak, reći da ja jesam u potpunosti. Hanif Kureishi, dijete Pakistanca i Engleskinje (što je itekako obilježilo njegov identitet, tj. potragu za njim, odrastanje mladost i cijeli život), pisac, čovjek. I opet se nađem u ćorsokaku i pitam se kojim sam putem trebala poći i šta sam to htjela napisati? Pa se vratim na raskrsnicu od nekoliko puteva, a ni za jedan nisam sigurna da nije ćorsokak i da opet neću zastati. Ako očekujete avanturu i zaplet, rasplet i happy and, onda Kureishi i nije baš idealan izbor za vas. Happy and ne postoji u realnom životu, a njegove su knjige upravo to. U njima samo postoji nada i put kojim se nastavlja potraga za srećom i smislom. Ako očekujete idealne likove, ili pak moralne puritance, onda Kureishi ponovo nije izbor za vas. Njegovi su likovi samo ljudi, grešni, i često izgubljeni, skloni eksperimentisanju drogama, seksualnošću... I iako u tom pogledu imam čvrsto izgrađene stavove kad je u pitanju moj život i moj lični izbor, nisam u stanju da se zgražam niti da mu sudim. Ne mogu suditi nekome ko piše tako iskreno i virtuozno. Ne mogu suditi nekome čijoj se iskrenosti i smislu za humor nadasve divim... „Nešto da ti kažem“ knjiga je nakon koje sam šutjela i potonula na dno sebe, manje nego nakon Austerovog „Izuma samoće“, više nego nakon Murakamijeve „Norveške šume“... Murakami daje Nadu. Kureishi daje nadu. Auster kao da kaže: „Živimo, a smrt je neizbježno tu.“ i nada ponire. Čak iako vjerujemo u život poslije smrti. Znam da sam nakon „Izuma samoće“danima padala na dno sebe... ali, vratimo se Kureishiju! Na površini ovog romana je priča o ubistvu, griži savjesti (kao Dostojevski), prihvatanju samog sebe, o ljubavi, prijateljstvu, umjetnosti... o drogama, sexu, potrazi za identitetom, za smislom. Ispod površine to je priča o samo jednom, o čovjeku. Likovi u romanu traže i pate. Džamal, Mirjam, Henri, Džozefina, Ađita, Mustak, Volf i Valentin (u kojima prepoznajem Kureishijeve prijatelje Georgija i Briana iz „Osluškujući njegovu dušu“). Jedino je Rafi, dvanaestogodišnjak, Džamalov sin, samim tim što je još dijete pošteđen bolne spoznaje o životu koja pritšće sve odrasle likove. Rafi mi je subjektivno najdraži lik u romanu, a njegov odnos sa ocem najemotivniji i najljepši diskurs. Ljepši i od onog o ljubavi. Džamal Kan, psihoterapeut, vraća se unazad trideset godina i prisjeća svoje najveće ljubavi, Ađite, te kobne greške zbog koje ju je izgubio. Ali, da li bi njegov život išao u istom smjeru, da nije bilo tako? Da li bi postao terapeut i osluškivao ljudske duše? U knjizi se isprepliću sadašnjost i prošlost, umjetnost i politika, ljubav i mržnja koji su, spoznat ćemo, gotovo pa jedan te isti osjećaj. Frojd i Čehov, Tačerica i Toni Bler pominju se nerijetko, a Mik Džeger je i sam jedan od, istina sporednih sudionika radnje. Homoseksualci, prostitutke, emigranti, buržuji, radnička klasa... duboka depresija i čista realnost... Traganje za smislom, i borba u prihvatanju sebe i opraštanju samom sebi. Čak je i ubistvo, koje u trenutku pruža nagovještaj da se ipak radi o još jednoj iole komercijalnoj priči, realnost, jer nije počinjeno ni pištoljem, niti nožem, nego je srčani udar nastupio nakon zastrašivanja. Sve je u ovom romanu, iako fikcija, vrlo realno. Sve miriše na Kureishijev život, na njegovo djetinjstvo u predgrađu, i pomalo traumatično odrastanje uz nadimak Paki. Na konstantno iščitavanje knjiga, ali i na, nasuprot nama „knjiškim moljcima“, konstantno iskušavanje i kušanje života, da bi nam, neupitnom iskrenošću prenio svoja iskustva na stranicama svojih romana, priča i memoara. Iako mu zamjeram što se nije dublje pozabavio islamom, (jer islam nije „imati samo jednu knjigu“ kako je negdje „između redova“ nabacio) "dižem mu kapu" na iskrenosti, virtuoznosti pisanja i na humoru, koji nam je u ovom životu punom duboke depresije itekako potreban!
Salute, Kureishi!
(14 August 2010 )
Dok sam otpočinjala čitati ovaj roman učinio mi se malo drugačijim, ali sa svakom novom stranicom prepoznavala sam detalje iz ranijih knjiga, „Bude“, „Intime“, ali i one memoarsko-biografske „Osluškujući njegovu dušu“. I ma koliko da mi je teško pisati esej o Kureishiju (neizrecivo teže nego o Murakamiju npr.), prisiljavam sebe da to spoznanje nakon čitanja ne ostavim unutra. Da nađem način da ga približim onima koji ga još nisu čitali, ili onima koji ga nisu razumjeli. Ne usuđujem se, pak, reći da ja jesam u potpunosti. Hanif Kureishi, dijete Pakistanca i Engleskinje (što je itekako obilježilo njegov identitet, tj. potragu za njim, odrastanje mladost i cijeli život), pisac, čovjek. I opet se nađem u ćorsokaku i pitam se kojim sam putem trebala poći i šta sam to htjela napisati? Pa se vratim na raskrsnicu od nekoliko puteva, a ni za jedan nisam sigurna da nije ćorsokak i da opet neću zastati. Ako očekujete avanturu i zaplet, rasplet i happy and, onda Kureishi i nije baš idealan izbor za vas. Happy and ne postoji u realnom životu, a njegove su knjige upravo to. U njima samo postoji nada i put kojim se nastavlja potraga za srećom i smislom. Ako očekujete idealne likove, ili pak moralne puritance, onda Kureishi ponovo nije izbor za vas. Njegovi su likovi samo ljudi, grešni, i često izgubljeni, skloni eksperimentisanju drogama, seksualnošću... I iako u tom pogledu imam čvrsto izgrađene stavove kad je u pitanju moj život i moj lični izbor, nisam u stanju da se zgražam niti da mu sudim. Ne mogu suditi nekome ko piše tako iskreno i virtuozno. Ne mogu suditi nekome čijoj se iskrenosti i smislu za humor nadasve divim... „Nešto da ti kažem“ knjiga je nakon koje sam šutjela i potonula na dno sebe, manje nego nakon Austerovog „Izuma samoće“, više nego nakon Murakamijeve „Norveške šume“... Murakami daje Nadu. Kureishi daje nadu. Auster kao da kaže: „Živimo, a smrt je neizbježno tu.“ i nada ponire. Čak iako vjerujemo u život poslije smrti. Znam da sam nakon „Izuma samoće“danima padala na dno sebe... ali, vratimo se Kureishiju! Na površini ovog romana je priča o ubistvu, griži savjesti (kao Dostojevski), prihvatanju samog sebe, o ljubavi, prijateljstvu, umjetnosti... o drogama, sexu, potrazi za identitetom, za smislom. Ispod površine to je priča o samo jednom, o čovjeku. Likovi u romanu traže i pate. Džamal, Mirjam, Henri, Džozefina, Ađita, Mustak, Volf i Valentin (u kojima prepoznajem Kureishijeve prijatelje Georgija i Briana iz „Osluškujući njegovu dušu“). Jedino je Rafi, dvanaestogodišnjak, Džamalov sin, samim tim što je još dijete pošteđen bolne spoznaje o životu koja pritšće sve odrasle likove. Rafi mi je subjektivno najdraži lik u romanu, a njegov odnos sa ocem najemotivniji i najljepši diskurs. Ljepši i od onog o ljubavi. Džamal Kan, psihoterapeut, vraća se unazad trideset godina i prisjeća svoje najveće ljubavi, Ađite, te kobne greške zbog koje ju je izgubio. Ali, da li bi njegov život išao u istom smjeru, da nije bilo tako? Da li bi postao terapeut i osluškivao ljudske duše? U knjizi se isprepliću sadašnjost i prošlost, umjetnost i politika, ljubav i mržnja koji su, spoznat ćemo, gotovo pa jedan te isti osjećaj. Frojd i Čehov, Tačerica i Toni Bler pominju se nerijetko, a Mik Džeger je i sam jedan od, istina sporednih sudionika radnje. Homoseksualci, prostitutke, emigranti, buržuji, radnička klasa... duboka depresija i čista realnost... Traganje za smislom, i borba u prihvatanju sebe i opraštanju samom sebi. Čak je i ubistvo, koje u trenutku pruža nagovještaj da se ipak radi o još jednoj iole komercijalnoj priči, realnost, jer nije počinjeno ni pištoljem, niti nožem, nego je srčani udar nastupio nakon zastrašivanja. Sve je u ovom romanu, iako fikcija, vrlo realno. Sve miriše na Kureishijev život, na njegovo djetinjstvo u predgrađu, i pomalo traumatično odrastanje uz nadimak Paki. Na konstantno iščitavanje knjiga, ali i na, nasuprot nama „knjiškim moljcima“, konstantno iskušavanje i kušanje života, da bi nam, neupitnom iskrenošću prenio svoja iskustva na stranicama svojih romana, priča i memoara. Iako mu zamjeram što se nije dublje pozabavio islamom, (jer islam nije „imati samo jednu knjigu“ kako je negdje „između redova“ nabacio) "dižem mu kapu" na iskrenosti, virtuoznosti pisanja i na humoru, koji nam je u ovom životu punom duboke depresije itekako potreban!
Salute, Kureishi!
February 9, 2015
Finished, omg! Finally.
I have to admit, I felt somewhat let down by Hanif Kureishi over this one. I usually adore his work, his style, his characters. This just dragged on and on, pretending the overuse of flashbacks substitutes actual plot or character development that happens in the moment and therefore matters. And then the whole big story (that mostly starts after the midpoint of the book) is over something so stupid. It's one of those stories that we all know from daytime television, where the only thing the characters have to do to solve it all, is to talk to each other, and no amount of fancy political commentary or literary style can mask that. I know in real life this happens, people don't discuss the one thing they have to talk about and they ruin their lives over it, but it is SUCH an odious plot to read a really long book about.
None of that is helped in any way by the main character. Hugely hated him and pretty much everybody else in the book (with minor exceptions that was mostly made up by character moments not whole characters). And it's funny, I only recently wrote an essay about what we can learn from characters we don't like... here I learned that I don't like sexist assholes who do speed while complaining they don't have money for alimony payments and who say that really, Freud was right and the whole feminist movement comes down to penis envy. Insert a very, very big laugh. Not.
He also has a son... a kid, who's a real asshole of a kid from where I stand and you can see why in the way his father is with him. Soooo cringy.
And omg holy batman the dialogs. What the hell happened here? Almost every time the elderly asshole male lead talks to a woman, the woman talks to him like... well, like I imagine we would in a man's fantasy? They do nothing but praise him in the weirdest way, beg him for attention, throw themselves at him over and over. Did I mention all the praise?
Also, I have no idea why Kureishi had to do this because he handled this way better in other books I read, but he did this huge pet peeve of mine, where literary writers seem to think that the only way to treat sex in literature is to make it grotesque and unsettling and to describe it just so that it's all really disgusting. Now, sometimes it is. Totally. But I am just so, so tired of this trope, especially in a long book that really didn't have any other bright spots to focus on.
Instead we get celebrity name dropping next to serious comments on racism, next to butt plugs and gimp suits. We get a girl who's big scary secret is... wait for it, yes it's the thing that it always is when men write pretty girls with secrets: she was raped.
I have to admit, I felt somewhat let down by Hanif Kureishi over this one. I usually adore his work, his style, his characters. This just dragged on and on, pretending the overuse of flashbacks substitutes actual plot or character development that happens in the moment and therefore matters. And then the whole big story (that mostly starts after the midpoint of the book) is over something so stupid. It's one of those stories that we all know from daytime television, where the only thing the characters have to do to solve it all, is to talk to each other, and no amount of fancy political commentary or literary style can mask that. I know in real life this happens, people don't discuss the one thing they have to talk about and they ruin their lives over it, but it is SUCH an odious plot to read a really long book about.
None of that is helped in any way by the main character. Hugely hated him and pretty much everybody else in the book (with minor exceptions that was mostly made up by character moments not whole characters). And it's funny, I only recently wrote an essay about what we can learn from characters we don't like... here I learned that I don't like sexist assholes who do speed while complaining they don't have money for alimony payments and who say that really, Freud was right and the whole feminist movement comes down to penis envy. Insert a very, very big laugh. Not.
He also has a son... a kid, who's a real asshole of a kid from where I stand and you can see why in the way his father is with him. Soooo cringy.
And omg holy batman the dialogs. What the hell happened here? Almost every time the elderly asshole male lead talks to a woman, the woman talks to him like... well, like I imagine we would in a man's fantasy? They do nothing but praise him in the weirdest way, beg him for attention, throw themselves at him over and over. Did I mention all the praise?
Also, I have no idea why Kureishi had to do this because he handled this way better in other books I read, but he did this huge pet peeve of mine, where literary writers seem to think that the only way to treat sex in literature is to make it grotesque and unsettling and to describe it just so that it's all really disgusting. Now, sometimes it is. Totally. But I am just so, so tired of this trope, especially in a long book that really didn't have any other bright spots to focus on.
Instead we get celebrity name dropping next to serious comments on racism, next to butt plugs and gimp suits. We get a girl who's big scary secret is... wait for it, yes it's the thing that it always is when men write pretty girls with secrets: she was raped.
December 23, 2008
i bought this because i quite like nahif kureishi. i know i have written in other reviews about my weird issues reading fictional accounts of sexual activities, & it still squicks me out when kureishi does it (& he does it A LOT), but he seems to bring a little dignity to it, so i tolerate it better. the protaganist of this tale in a bristish psychotherapist if indian descent. he is divorced & has a 13-year-old son who lives with his mother & is getting way into american rap music. his best friends is a larger-than-life theatre producer with scads of money & plenty of flights of fancy pertaining to his theatrical legacy, accompnied by plunging descents into depression. during one of these depressive spells, the therapist inadvertently sets in motion a romance between the theatre producer & the therapist's aging anarchist sister, who lives with her numerous children & pets & kind of takes care of her entire working-class neighborhood & gets drugs for people & dabbles in witchcraft. the sister & the producer fall madly in love & start frequenting BDSM clubs. also somewhere along the way, the therapist again makes the acquaintance of his long ago ex-girlfriend's younger brother, who is now a world famous pop star with a country estate where he throws lavish weekend-long parties. the therapist hasn't spoken to his ex in years--not since she confessed that her father was molesting her, & the therapist went over to scare him into staying away from her, & the old man died of a heart attack. the pop star confesses that he has always been in love with the therapist & that his biggest pop hit was about the therapist. hence, there all these inter-connections, secrets, relationships sporuting & re-sprouting, the therapist again meets & falls for his ex-girlfriend, but she takes up with one of his best friends from his college days, who was with him during the heart attack incident, etc etc. all kinds of secrecy, sexual deviancy, class warfare, immigration trouble, etc. there's a lot going on, & it didn't always hold my attention 100% (hence the four-star review), but i liked it.
July 14, 2010
Here's a quick overview of what I thought of Hanif Kureishi's _Something to Tell You_. While scanning the popular library at school, I was immediately excited by the first line of this novel, in which the narrator Jamal introduces himself as a keeper of secrets. While the writing is very clever and Kureishi certainly has a knack for crafting intriguing, complex and believable characters, I found his pretensions to be overwhelming at times. I wished at various moments that the characters were more likeable; it seems their stiffness and irritability was too much for me. But aside from my minor issues, the book is a nice example of good writing. It can be a little slow--I was hoping it would pick up and it never really did. Yet my determination to finish and find more light and quick reading guided me to the end. Reading this book was like being in a relationship with someone who is highly interesting and intelligent, but as a companion lacks the spark to keep the proverbial flame ignited. But this assessment is very personal to my own taste.
February 24, 2009
It was a struggle to get through this novel, I didn't like the characters, couldn't remember what was going on each time I picked it up so I'd have to go back and re-read a couple pages, meh. I just can't keep trying to read books about perfectly middle-class people living in drug induced squalor, it's not interesting to me.
The story is about an analyst in London, from his multi-ethnic upbringing with British mother, Pakistani father, and gigantic violent sister; to his current haphazard affairs with newly separated wife and bratty son and his long-lost love whose father's death he is responsible for. There's also a best friend with his own separated wife and grown children, he's having an affair with the analyst's sister. There's the analyst's prostitute and a strip club and a club where people have orgies, yada yada yada.
I loved My Beautiful Launderette, but hated this. Won't be reading anymore Kureishi.
The story is about an analyst in London, from his multi-ethnic upbringing with British mother, Pakistani father, and gigantic violent sister; to his current haphazard affairs with newly separated wife and bratty son and his long-lost love whose father's death he is responsible for. There's also a best friend with his own separated wife and grown children, he's having an affair with the analyst's sister. There's the analyst's prostitute and a strip club and a club where people have orgies, yada yada yada.
I loved My Beautiful Launderette, but hated this. Won't be reading anymore Kureishi.
September 2, 2018
صورة عميقة لمجتمع الاقليات في انجلترا مصاحبه لصورة كامه للاضطراب النفسي من جميع انواعه
حنيف قرشي روائي غير عادي والمترجم كذلك
نهايه سعيده لبعض الروايات شديده السوء التي قرأتها في الفترة الماضيه
حنيف قرشي روائي غير عادي والمترجم كذلك
نهايه سعيده لبعض الروايات شديده السوء التي قرأتها في الفترة الماضيه
April 1, 2017
Story told in the first person by Kamal – a successful (in client and popular publishing but not wealth terms) psychoanalyst. The book is set in current times (including the 2006 bombings but not Brown’s premiership) with lengthy discussion of the 1970’s – when Kamal a left wing student meets Ajita. Her father a factory owner becomes a figure of left wing hate when his sweatshops are exposed on a documentary and later finding out that she has been abusing Ajita Kamal and two small time gangsters attempt to frighten him but actually lead to him dying of a heart attack. The guilt of this attack haunts Kamal in the modern times and later we find the two gangsters as well (one killing himself the other reappearing as a potential blackmailer of Kamal and then lover of Ajita).
Other characters are: Kamal’s imposing sister Miriam (piercings, tattoos, multiple children, violent personality); his first lover Karen (who made fame and fortune in youth and reality TV); his estranged wife Josephine and middle class-gangsta teenage son; his friend Henry (a arty director who has an unlikely affair with Miriam involving the fetish scene and who has a Greenham common daughter Lisa who falls for Kamal); Ajita’s brother (who realises had a huge crush on him as a youngster and is now a very rich rock star).
The writing is good but the milieu in which the book is set (seemingly partly autobiographical) upper middle class success, decadence and immorality, with once radicals turned politicians, media figures and artists is unappealing and very uninteresting.
Other characters are: Kamal’s imposing sister Miriam (piercings, tattoos, multiple children, violent personality); his first lover Karen (who made fame and fortune in youth and reality TV); his estranged wife Josephine and middle class-gangsta teenage son; his friend Henry (a arty director who has an unlikely affair with Miriam involving the fetish scene and who has a Greenham common daughter Lisa who falls for Kamal); Ajita’s brother (who realises had a huge crush on him as a youngster and is now a very rich rock star).
The writing is good but the milieu in which the book is set (seemingly partly autobiographical) upper middle class success, decadence and immorality, with once radicals turned politicians, media figures and artists is unappealing and very uninteresting.
August 11, 2021
I discovered another great story teller! Although not perfect, it has the ingredients of a very good novel: very realistic characters which are shaped by what happens in the story, good story line, opinion on socio-economical problems of the time and place of the novel.
I don't know if this was a problem of the translation I had, but it was odd at times how dialogue continued without specifying which character is the one who speaks. I found it hard to imagine just from the dialogue line who was saying it, as the voice of the characters was somewhat similar one with the other.
Other than that, I also did not get too fond of the abundance of sex, drugs and alcohol, especially in the first part of the novel. I believe it is giving a sort of atmosphere which the author intended for this novel, but I thought he exaggerated a little bit with this.
I don't know if this was a problem of the translation I had, but it was odd at times how dialogue continued without specifying which character is the one who speaks. I found it hard to imagine just from the dialogue line who was saying it, as the voice of the characters was somewhat similar one with the other.
Other than that, I also did not get too fond of the abundance of sex, drugs and alcohol, especially in the first part of the novel. I believe it is giving a sort of atmosphere which the author intended for this novel, but I thought he exaggerated a little bit with this.
August 30, 2018
This book... I think if it weren't for a 9-hour plane ride (and not being partial to in-flight entertainment) I wouldn't have finished this book. Then when I did (admittedly to my relief), I needed some time to think it over, because at first I just didn't get where the author wanted to go with this. The protagonist is an acclaimed Freudian psychotherapist in London who mingles professionally and socially with a broad variety of people, from the upper crust to the somewhat more crusty entourage of his sister. What I found difficult to believe is that someone with such extreme taste and the extent of his casual drug use would continue to succeed professionally. Also I didn't really buy the sexcapades described in the book - or is this normal and am I really naive? Anyway. Bottom line I figured out the description of the protagonist's adventures and reflections is a Freudian analysis of his life and fantasies. So in that sense it is an interesting read, as a thorough introduction to Freudian analysis.
"The past rode on my back like a devil, poking me, covering my eyes and ears for its sport as I puffed along, continuously reminding me of its existence. The world is as it is: it's our fantasies which terrify; they are the Thing.
My mind had begun to feel like an alien object in my skull: I wanted to pluck it out and throw it from a bridge. Books couldn't help me; nor could drugs or alcohol. I couldn't free my mind by working on my mind with my mind. I thought: light the touch paper and see. Will it blow up my life or ignite a depth charge in my frozen history? Could I rely on another person?
Finally, I was forced to do the right thing. I would throw myself on his mercy and take the consequences. One morning, after making up my mind, I told Tahir Hussein the truth. How would the analysis ever work if I repressed such a momentous event?" (p66)
"The past rode on my back like a devil, poking me, covering my eyes and ears for its sport as I puffed along, continuously reminding me of its existence. The world is as it is: it's our fantasies which terrify; they are the Thing.
My mind had begun to feel like an alien object in my skull: I wanted to pluck it out and throw it from a bridge. Books couldn't help me; nor could drugs or alcohol. I couldn't free my mind by working on my mind with my mind. I thought: light the touch paper and see. Will it blow up my life or ignite a depth charge in my frozen history? Could I rely on another person?
Finally, I was forced to do the right thing. I would throw myself on his mercy and take the consequences. One morning, after making up my mind, I told Tahir Hussein the truth. How would the analysis ever work if I repressed such a momentous event?" (p66)
May 14, 2024
Puh, was soll man daraus machen, was will einem der Autor sagen. Was bleibt, sind Fragezeichen…
June 30, 2011
Disclaimer “I really want to have coffee with Hanif Kuraishsi, would love to hug him”
Smooth telling, coherent links between the little actions of the different little stories of the characters, entertaining, respectable vocabulary if sometimes pretentious (but I love it). This book found me scrutinizing mistakes and pitfalls of the novelist and there were not many I could find.
It’s the story of middle life crises where multiple characters find themselves with much of their life behind them they wonder have they done enough of the right stuff? And how much more can they do and achieve to become noticed and accepted?
It is a novel of Guilt, remorse, and hope of better coming days no matter where you are currently in your life. It’s a novel of the haunting hidden un-dealt past coming back to take penance , it’s a novel that found me absorbed that I was glad I didn’t see the negativity in some of the reviewer which is understandable. This is after all not a novel for everybody, if your life has the theme of mid life crises enveloping your days and thoughts for years then definitely it is for you. If you are married, have kid carrier of so so success and have been feeling empty and wondering why when you have been given so much from God you have this void in you? Then go ahead read it, as noticed by the bad reviews are by younger (by age) readers.
Set in London where a psychoanalyst tells us of his teenage years from mixed parents (A Pakistani father and English mother which is a repeated theme of Mr. Kurishi) , it has quirky characters of different calibers, nobody seems to be normal. In all my four experiences with Mr. Kurishi I found him dealing with the issue of identity be it ethnical, sexual, psychological and whatever else forms different people identities. (The Buddha of suburbia “novel” and two other screen plays “My beautiful launderette and Venice” are the other three just by the way)
Just for negativity I hated the kid he sounded wrong I feel the writers loves his kids and think they are quick and clever and wanted to have a prodigy of his love toward them in his book but you know what he ended with a smart ass kid that no way to be 13 I wanted to slap him over and over “maybe it is just me of nicotine” but no I really hate that kid.
Second disclaimer "for some reason I rarely give 5 I think 4 is for great well done novels and 5 comes every now and then in a life time"
Smooth telling, coherent links between the little actions of the different little stories of the characters, entertaining, respectable vocabulary if sometimes pretentious (but I love it). This book found me scrutinizing mistakes and pitfalls of the novelist and there were not many I could find.
It’s the story of middle life crises where multiple characters find themselves with much of their life behind them they wonder have they done enough of the right stuff? And how much more can they do and achieve to become noticed and accepted?
It is a novel of Guilt, remorse, and hope of better coming days no matter where you are currently in your life. It’s a novel of the haunting hidden un-dealt past coming back to take penance , it’s a novel that found me absorbed that I was glad I didn’t see the negativity in some of the reviewer which is understandable. This is after all not a novel for everybody, if your life has the theme of mid life crises enveloping your days and thoughts for years then definitely it is for you. If you are married, have kid carrier of so so success and have been feeling empty and wondering why when you have been given so much from God you have this void in you? Then go ahead read it, as noticed by the bad reviews are by younger (by age) readers.
Set in London where a psychoanalyst tells us of his teenage years from mixed parents (A Pakistani father and English mother which is a repeated theme of Mr. Kurishi) , it has quirky characters of different calibers, nobody seems to be normal. In all my four experiences with Mr. Kurishi I found him dealing with the issue of identity be it ethnical, sexual, psychological and whatever else forms different people identities. (The Buddha of suburbia “novel” and two other screen plays “My beautiful launderette and Venice” are the other three just by the way)
Just for negativity I hated the kid he sounded wrong I feel the writers loves his kids and think they are quick and clever and wanted to have a prodigy of his love toward them in his book but you know what he ended with a smart ass kid that no way to be 13 I wanted to slap him over and over “maybe it is just me of nicotine” but no I really hate that kid.
Second disclaimer "for some reason I rarely give 5 I think 4 is for great well done novels and 5 comes every now and then in a life time"
August 21, 2018
Certain passages piqued my interest. Real nuggets of wisdom articulated beautifully. I paused and re-read a number of two or three line sections that really resonated with me.
Otherwise it lurched between the not sublime enough and the too ridiculous for words. The gratuitous, inauthentic orgy scenes, the incongruous spliffs, the caricatured seedy parts of London: all very blah.
In short, this book could and should have been edited by 250 pages....
Otherwise it lurched between the not sublime enough and the too ridiculous for words. The gratuitous, inauthentic orgy scenes, the incongruous spliffs, the caricatured seedy parts of London: all very blah.
In short, this book could and should have been edited by 250 pages....
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