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Burnt Shadows
Beginning on August 9, 1945, in Nagasaki, and ending in a prison cell in the US in 2002, as a man is waiting to be sent to Guantanamo Bay, Burnt Shadows is an epic narrative of love and betrayal.
Hiroko Tanaka is twenty-one and in love with the man she is to marry, Konrad Weiss. As she steps onto her veranda, wrapped in a kimono with three black cranes swooping across the back, her world is suddenly and irrevocably altered. In the numbing aftermath of the atomic bomb that obliterates everything she has known, all that remains are the bird-shaped burns on her back, an indelible reminder of the world she has lost. In search of new beginnings, two years later, Hiroko travels to Delhi. It is there that her life will become intertwined with that of Konrad's half sister, Elizabeth, her husband, James Burton, and their employee Sajjad Ashraf, from whom she starts to learn Urdu.
With the partition of India, and the creation of Pakistan, Hiroko will find herself displaced once again, in a world where old wars are replaced by new conflicts. But the shadows of history--personal and political--are cast over the interrelated worlds of the Burtons, the Ashrafs, and the Tanakas as they are transported from Pakistan to New York and, in the novel's astonishing climax, to Afghanistan in the immediate wake of 9/11. The ties that have bound these families together over decades and generations are tested to the extreme, with unforeseeable consequences.
Hiroko Tanaka is twenty-one and in love with the man she is to marry, Konrad Weiss. As she steps onto her veranda, wrapped in a kimono with three black cranes swooping across the back, her world is suddenly and irrevocably altered. In the numbing aftermath of the atomic bomb that obliterates everything she has known, all that remains are the bird-shaped burns on her back, an indelible reminder of the world she has lost. In search of new beginnings, two years later, Hiroko travels to Delhi. It is there that her life will become intertwined with that of Konrad's half sister, Elizabeth, her husband, James Burton, and their employee Sajjad Ashraf, from whom she starts to learn Urdu.
With the partition of India, and the creation of Pakistan, Hiroko will find herself displaced once again, in a world where old wars are replaced by new conflicts. But the shadows of history--personal and political--are cast over the interrelated worlds of the Burtons, the Ashrafs, and the Tanakas as they are transported from Pakistan to New York and, in the novel's astonishing climax, to Afghanistan in the immediate wake of 9/11. The ties that have bound these families together over decades and generations are tested to the extreme, with unforeseeable consequences.
384 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2009
612 people are currently reading
11790 people want to read
About the author
Kamila Shamsie
55 books2,119 followersKamila Shamsie was born in 1973 in Karachi, where she grew up. She has a BA in Creative Writing from Hamilton College in Clinton, NY and an MFA from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. While at the University of Massachusetts she wrote
In The City By The Sea
, published by Granta Books UK in 1998. This first novel was shortlisted for the John Llewelyn Rhys Award in the UK, and Shamsie received the Prime Minister’s Award for Literature in Pakistan in 1999. Her 2000 novel
Salt and Saffron
led to Shamsie’s selection as one of Orange’s “21 Writers of the 21st Century.” With her third novel,
Kartography
, Shamsie was again shortlisted for the John Llewelyn Rhys award in the UK. Both Kartography and her next novel,
Broken Verses
, won the Patras Bokhari Award from the Academy of Letters in Pakistan. Burnt Shadows, Shamsie’s fifth novel, has been longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. Her books have been translated into a number of languages.
Shamsie is the daughter of literary critic and writer Muneeza Shamsie, the niece of celebrated Indian novelist Attia Hosain, and the granddaughter of the memoirist Begum Jahanara Habibullah. A reviewer and columnist, primarily for the Guardian, Shamsie has been a judge for several literary awards including The Orange Award for New Writing and The Guardian First Book Award. She also sits on the advisory board of the Index on Censorship.
For years Shamsie spent equal amounts of time in London and Karachi, while also occasionally teaching creative writing at Hamilton College in New York State. She now lives primarily in London.
Shamsie is the daughter of literary critic and writer Muneeza Shamsie, the niece of celebrated Indian novelist Attia Hosain, and the granddaughter of the memoirist Begum Jahanara Habibullah. A reviewer and columnist, primarily for the Guardian, Shamsie has been a judge for several literary awards including The Orange Award for New Writing and The Guardian First Book Award. She also sits on the advisory board of the Index on Censorship.
For years Shamsie spent equal amounts of time in London and Karachi, while also occasionally teaching creative writing at Hamilton College in New York State. She now lives primarily in London.
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February 24, 2020
ساعدني يا الله لكي أكتب ما يليق بهذا العمل.
هذه هي الرواية الثانية التي قرأتها لـ كاملة شمسي.
بعد "نار الدار" عرفت بأنني أمام أستاذة حقيقية، تستطيع كتابة شخصيات مركبة وبأصابع بارعة، تستثير قضايا الإرهاب والإسلاموفوبيا والعنصرية وكل تلك الأوبئة التي تصيبنا من فرط اعتوار قيمنا، وسقوطنا في الخوف، وتسامحنا مع اللا تسامح.
في "الظلال المحترقة"، عملها الأقدم، كانت أكثر من ذلك. تبدأ الرواية منذ الهجوم النووي على ناكازاكسي، مرورًا بـ دلهي، وصولاً إلى باكستان، وانتهاءً في نيويورك وأفغانستان سنة 2001-2002، بعد تفجيرات 11 سبتمبر تقريبًا، وكل ما تلا ذلك من صعود يميني قائم على إدانة الآخر لأنه يمثل "خطرًا محتملًا".
لوحة بانورامية حقيقية، عن تأثر الخاص بالعام، عن امتصاصنا للنكبات الذي يحدث رغمًا عنا، سواء كان قنبلة نووية أو حتى انقسام أهلي بين الهندوس والمسلمين، وصولًا إلى المنطق "الأبيض" الذي لم، ولن يفهم أبدًا، حجم الأذى الذي يلحقه، ومع ذلك يعاقبنا عليه.
ومع ذلك.. من الظلم اختزال أهمية العمل في القضايا التي يستثيرها. فالرواية، بعيدًا عن موضوعها المستحق، تحفة حقيقية، وهي ليست رواية بقدر ما هي ملحمة أجيال من عائلتين. خاطفة للأنفاس في تدفقها البسيط، شخصياتها مليئة بالندوب، شديدة الواقعية، لا ينقصها إلا أن نستخرج لها أوراقًا ثبوتية. إنها رواية عن الألم، الـ "تروما / الصدمة" ومحاولات التعافي، ثم السقوط اللولبي في الجرحِ إياه، ومحاولة خلق معنى من هذا الجرح، ليس لتفسيره فحسب، بل لمنحه قيمة، لكي يجعل من إنسانه شخصًا أفضل.
لم تمنحني كاملة شمسي رواية، بل عائلة. عائلة حقيقية مؤلفة من هنود وباكستانيين وألمان ويابانيين وأمريكان وأفغان أيضًا. قدرتها على النقل الأمين لأصواتِ هؤلاء، دون اختزالٍ أو مصادرة، ودون أن يمثّل أيّ منهم صورة نمطية دارجة، وقدرتها على أنسنتهم جميعًا مهما اختلفنا معهم، قدرتها على جعلنا نحبهم.. لا ينجح في ذلك إلا أستاذ.
لمن يتساءل، مثلي، دائمًا؛ كيف يمكن معالجة السياسة أدبيًا، هذا نموذج ناجح جدًا. لا يتخلى عن شرطه الفني، ومع ذلك هو قادر على تفجير مئات الأسئلة في رأسك عن طبيعة العالم الذي نرغب في العيش فيه، وما الذي يمكن لكل واحد منا أن يفعله لأجل ذلك.
وبعيدًا عن هذا التنظير الفارغ من الروح، هذه الرواية أبكتني مليًا. ليس في أجزائها التراجيدية بالضرورة، بل أمام شخصياتها المنهكة بأخطائها، أمام الذنب، وكل ما نخسره بسببنا نحن، لا بسبب قنبلة نووية، أو هجوم إرهابي على مبنى التجارة العالمي.
حبًا بالله، اقرؤوا كاملة شمسي.
هذه هي الرواية الثانية التي قرأتها لـ كاملة شمسي.
بعد "نار الدار" عرفت بأنني أمام أستاذة حقيقية، تستطيع كتابة شخصيات مركبة وبأصابع بارعة، تستثير قضايا الإرهاب والإسلاموفوبيا والعنصرية وكل تلك الأوبئة التي تصيبنا من فرط اعتوار قيمنا، وسقوطنا في الخوف، وتسامحنا مع اللا تسامح.
في "الظلال المحترقة"، عملها الأقدم، كانت أكثر من ذلك. تبدأ الرواية منذ الهجوم النووي على ناكازاكسي، مرورًا بـ دلهي، وصولاً إلى باكستان، وانتهاءً في نيويورك وأفغانستان سنة 2001-2002، بعد تفجيرات 11 سبتمبر تقريبًا، وكل ما تلا ذلك من صعود يميني قائم على إدانة الآخر لأنه يمثل "خطرًا محتملًا".
لوحة بانورامية حقيقية، عن تأثر الخاص بالعام، عن امتصاصنا للنكبات الذي يحدث رغمًا عنا، سواء كان قنبلة نووية أو حتى انقسام أهلي بين الهندوس والمسلمين، وصولًا إلى المنطق "الأبيض" الذي لم، ولن يفهم أبدًا، حجم الأذى الذي يلحقه، ومع ذلك يعاقبنا عليه.
ومع ذلك.. من الظلم اختزال أهمية العمل في القضايا التي يستثيرها. فالرواية، بعيدًا عن موضوعها المستحق، تحفة حقيقية، وهي ليست رواية بقدر ما هي ملحمة أجيال من عائلتين. خاطفة للأنفاس في تدفقها البسيط، شخصياتها مليئة بالندوب، شديدة الواقعية، لا ينقصها إلا أن نستخرج لها أوراقًا ثبوتية. إنها رواية عن الألم، الـ "تروما / الصدمة" ومحاولات التعافي، ثم السقوط اللولبي في الجرحِ إياه، ومحاولة خلق معنى من هذا الجرح، ليس لتفسيره فحسب، بل لمنحه قيمة، لكي يجعل من إنسانه شخصًا أفضل.
لم تمنحني كاملة شمسي رواية، بل عائلة. عائلة حقيقية مؤلفة من هنود وباكستانيين وألمان ويابانيين وأمريكان وأفغان أيضًا. قدرتها على النقل الأمين لأصواتِ هؤلاء، دون اختزالٍ أو مصادرة، ودون أن يمثّل أيّ منهم صورة نمطية دارجة، وقدرتها على أنسنتهم جميعًا مهما اختلفنا معهم، قدرتها على جعلنا نحبهم.. لا ينجح في ذلك إلا أستاذ.
لمن يتساءل، مثلي، دائمًا؛ كيف يمكن معالجة السياسة أدبيًا، هذا نموذج ناجح جدًا. لا يتخلى عن شرطه الفني، ومع ذلك هو قادر على تفجير مئات الأسئلة في رأسك عن طبيعة العالم الذي نرغب في العيش فيه، وما الذي يمكن لكل واحد منا أن يفعله لأجل ذلك.
وبعيدًا عن هذا التنظير الفارغ من الروح، هذه الرواية أبكتني مليًا. ليس في أجزائها التراجيدية بالضرورة، بل أمام شخصياتها المنهكة بأخطائها، أمام الذنب، وكل ما نخسره بسببنا نحن، لا بسبب قنبلة نووية، أو هجوم إرهابي على مبنى التجارة العالمي.
حبًا بالله، اقرؤوا كاملة شمسي.
March 31, 2021
Este libro me ha gustado muchísimo.
Con un estilo muy poético y sutil, la autora nos narra la vida de Hiroko, una joven cuya vida estará marcada por los bombardeos en Nagasaki durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Con ella viajaremos a la India de la partición, al Pakistán de los años 80, al Estados Unidos paranoico tras el 11S y finalmente de la mano de su hijo conoceremos el Afganistán de aquellos años.
Es una historia que pasa de puntillas por todos estos acontecimientos, porque está más centrada en los personajes que en los propios acontecimientos Históricos, pero aún así la ambientación y el contexto es muy importante, y la mirada política y social que hace la autora me parece profunda a pesar de su brevedad.
Es una historia que habla especialmente de la familia y de la amistad, de dos familias destinadas a encontrarse, de Ilse e Hiroko, de Harry y Sajjad, de Raza y Kim. Una saga familiar breve que ahonda en las diferencias culturales y en la sensibilidad de sus personajes.
Un libro que aunque no es perfecto por muchas cosas (y cuyo inició disfruté mucho más que su final) me ha dejado tanto poso que no puedo dejar de recomendar encarecidamente.
Con un estilo muy poético y sutil, la autora nos narra la vida de Hiroko, una joven cuya vida estará marcada por los bombardeos en Nagasaki durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Con ella viajaremos a la India de la partición, al Pakistán de los años 80, al Estados Unidos paranoico tras el 11S y finalmente de la mano de su hijo conoceremos el Afganistán de aquellos años.
Es una historia que pasa de puntillas por todos estos acontecimientos, porque está más centrada en los personajes que en los propios acontecimientos Históricos, pero aún así la ambientación y el contexto es muy importante, y la mirada política y social que hace la autora me parece profunda a pesar de su brevedad.
Es una historia que habla especialmente de la familia y de la amistad, de dos familias destinadas a encontrarse, de Ilse e Hiroko, de Harry y Sajjad, de Raza y Kim. Una saga familiar breve que ahonda en las diferencias culturales y en la sensibilidad de sus personajes.
Un libro que aunque no es perfecto por muchas cosas (y cuyo inició disfruté mucho más que su final) me ha dejado tanto poso que no puedo dejar de recomendar encarecidamente.
February 23, 2021
For me,it is Kamila Shamsie's second best book,after Home Fire.Not that I'd call it a great book,but it's still much better than the rest of her books.
It tries to tackle too many subjects,and doesn't quite succeed.It begins with the story of a Japanese victim of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki.
But if the idea was to show the destructive effects of the atomic bomb on this victim,that doesn't happen.The Japanese woman moves to India and goes through the rest of her life, without showing any ill effects.
The book then goes on to include a pet peeve of Kamila Shamsie, the partition of India and the creation of Pakistan.It is a constant theme in her work as her own family had to move to Pakistan at the time of partition.
Then,there are detailed descriptions of life in Karachi.It helps to fill up the pages and is also part of several of her other books.
After that,she returns to international conflict once again.First comes the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan,and a Karachi young man's journey to fight the Soviets.This whole section is very superficial.Added for good measure is the story of a US agent and his daughter as well.
Then comes the US invasion of Afghanistan,and that is included,as well.Again,nothing special about this part of the book.
In between,the subcontinent becomes nuclearised in 1998 after India's nuclear tests and Pakistan following suit.So,the Japanese woman,already a victim of the nuclear bomb, gets scared and moves to New York.
While some parts of the book were interesting,at times it felt very contrived,particularly the portion on Afghanistan.
The last hundred pages,in particular were so boring that I was relieved when it finally came to an end.A good many of the situations in the book,are scarcely believeable.
Too many conflicts are included,without focusing effectively on any one of them.The book essentially lacks a coherent storyline.
It tries to tackle too many subjects,and doesn't quite succeed.It begins with the story of a Japanese victim of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki.
But if the idea was to show the destructive effects of the atomic bomb on this victim,that doesn't happen.The Japanese woman moves to India and goes through the rest of her life, without showing any ill effects.
The book then goes on to include a pet peeve of Kamila Shamsie, the partition of India and the creation of Pakistan.It is a constant theme in her work as her own family had to move to Pakistan at the time of partition.
Then,there are detailed descriptions of life in Karachi.It helps to fill up the pages and is also part of several of her other books.
After that,she returns to international conflict once again.First comes the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan,and a Karachi young man's journey to fight the Soviets.This whole section is very superficial.Added for good measure is the story of a US agent and his daughter as well.
Then comes the US invasion of Afghanistan,and that is included,as well.Again,nothing special about this part of the book.
In between,the subcontinent becomes nuclearised in 1998 after India's nuclear tests and Pakistan following suit.So,the Japanese woman,already a victim of the nuclear bomb, gets scared and moves to New York.
While some parts of the book were interesting,at times it felt very contrived,particularly the portion on Afghanistan.
The last hundred pages,in particular were so boring that I was relieved when it finally came to an end.A good many of the situations in the book,are scarcely believeable.
Too many conflicts are included,without focusing effectively on any one of them.The book essentially lacks a coherent storyline.
August 21, 2018
A novel with great scope ranging over a vast sweep of modern history, written with great warmth and understanding. The characters are well drawn and believable. Characters with flaws, who make mistakes which have consequences, but who are understandable and feel like real people.
The novel is broken up into three sections. The first is in the 1940s; in 1945 Hiroko Tanaka has become engaged to Konrad Weiss, a German living, like her in Nagasaki. He is killed by the atomic bomb and she is injured. Following her recovery she goes (in 1947) to India to see Konrad’s sister Ilse (Elizabeth), who is married to an Englishman, James Burton who is a lawyer and rather upper middle class. This coincides with the end of English rule and partition. Hiroko meets one of James Burton’s employees Sajjad Ashraf. They fall in love and marry; partition taking them from Dehli to Karachi.
The second part moves to Pakistan in the early 1980s and the backdrop is the struggle against the Soviets in Afghanistan. The story here revolves around Sajjad and Hiroko again, their teenage son Raza and James and Ilse’s son Harry, who is working for the CIA (Ilse has left James and is now American).
The final section is set just after 9/11. Harry and Raza are working together in Afghanistan for a private security company, whilst Ilse and Hioko are in New York. Harry’s daughter Kim plays a central role.
A novel which seeks to encompass the dropping of the atomic bomb, the end of empire, partition, class, the cold war, the CIA supporting the mujahedeen, 9/11, the Taliban, Guantanamo Bay, terrorism, the fear of terrorism and the war in Afghanistan sets its sights high. The themes are no less impressive love, family, trust and betrayal, friendship, religion and a clash of cultures.
On the whole it works rather well; intelligently written, compassionate, gripping Shamsie attempts to explain some of recent history’s more complex issues through a family saga. A couple of grumbles; the ending is flagged up too early and obviously and it really is too short. Many hefty books would benefit from being shorter. I felt this one would have stood being longer to develop the issues and some of the characters.
Those are minor points; this is a competent and compassionate examination of many of the issues the modern world has to grapple with and I would recommend it.
4.5 stars
The novel is broken up into three sections. The first is in the 1940s; in 1945 Hiroko Tanaka has become engaged to Konrad Weiss, a German living, like her in Nagasaki. He is killed by the atomic bomb and she is injured. Following her recovery she goes (in 1947) to India to see Konrad’s sister Ilse (Elizabeth), who is married to an Englishman, James Burton who is a lawyer and rather upper middle class. This coincides with the end of English rule and partition. Hiroko meets one of James Burton’s employees Sajjad Ashraf. They fall in love and marry; partition taking them from Dehli to Karachi.
The second part moves to Pakistan in the early 1980s and the backdrop is the struggle against the Soviets in Afghanistan. The story here revolves around Sajjad and Hiroko again, their teenage son Raza and James and Ilse’s son Harry, who is working for the CIA (Ilse has left James and is now American).
The final section is set just after 9/11. Harry and Raza are working together in Afghanistan for a private security company, whilst Ilse and Hioko are in New York. Harry’s daughter Kim plays a central role.
A novel which seeks to encompass the dropping of the atomic bomb, the end of empire, partition, class, the cold war, the CIA supporting the mujahedeen, 9/11, the Taliban, Guantanamo Bay, terrorism, the fear of terrorism and the war in Afghanistan sets its sights high. The themes are no less impressive love, family, trust and betrayal, friendship, religion and a clash of cultures.
On the whole it works rather well; intelligently written, compassionate, gripping Shamsie attempts to explain some of recent history’s more complex issues through a family saga. A couple of grumbles; the ending is flagged up too early and obviously and it really is too short. Many hefty books would benefit from being shorter. I felt this one would have stood being longer to develop the issues and some of the characters.
Those are minor points; this is a competent and compassionate examination of many of the issues the modern world has to grapple with and I would recommend it.
4.5 stars
June 8, 2022
"Burnt Shadows" was a gift to me from a friend who valued this book highly. It was a gift for me because it has given me much food for thought. At the outset, I was determined to enjoy this book to share the pleasure with my friend, but as I progressed I could observe why she ranked it so extremely well.
I will not attempt a summary here. One can easily find that elsewhere. The scope of this novel is huge. It spans about 60 years, from the A- Bomb in Nagasaki, to the partitioning of India and Pakistan, to wartorn Afghanistan and to post 9/11 America. Shamsie has written a profound and powerful novel of family, nations and wars. Throughout this book we see the power of language, not solely as the means for communication, but as a cultural and attitudinal divide.
Shamsie has deftly described scenes of racism, class division and the panorama of wars. There are wars for power, wars for religion, wars for territory or family. But what is the outcome for the people who have suffered at the hands of their invaders? In a conversation with an American woman, an Afghan man who had fought against the Soviets stated, "...countries like yours they always fight wars, but always somewhere else. The disease always happens somewhere else.It's why you fight more wars than anyone else; because you understand war least of all."
In response to an act of apparent racial profiling, another character equates this with the concentration camps and replies, "...you have to deny people their humanity in order to decimate them." Shamsie has expertly drawn her characters and left the reader with a clear sense of them.
It has been difficult to encapsulate this novel into a short review because it is so complex and extensive. It has made a deep impact on me, with emotions ranging from tears and sorrow to anger.
I will not attempt a summary here. One can easily find that elsewhere. The scope of this novel is huge. It spans about 60 years, from the A- Bomb in Nagasaki, to the partitioning of India and Pakistan, to wartorn Afghanistan and to post 9/11 America. Shamsie has written a profound and powerful novel of family, nations and wars. Throughout this book we see the power of language, not solely as the means for communication, but as a cultural and attitudinal divide.
Shamsie has deftly described scenes of racism, class division and the panorama of wars. There are wars for power, wars for religion, wars for territory or family. But what is the outcome for the people who have suffered at the hands of their invaders? In a conversation with an American woman, an Afghan man who had fought against the Soviets stated, "...countries like yours they always fight wars, but always somewhere else. The disease always happens somewhere else.It's why you fight more wars than anyone else; because you understand war least of all."
In response to an act of apparent racial profiling, another character equates this with the concentration camps and replies, "...you have to deny people their humanity in order to decimate them." Shamsie has expertly drawn her characters and left the reader with a clear sense of them.
It has been difficult to encapsulate this novel into a short review because it is so complex and extensive. It has made a deep impact on me, with emotions ranging from tears and sorrow to anger.
February 28, 2024
Este livro, que descobri na biblioteca foi uma ótima surpresa! Peguei nele, talvez pela capa, e trouxe-o comigo.
Foi uma excelente surpresa este livro e esta autora que não conhecia de todo.
Foi uma excelente surpresa este livro e esta autora que não conhecia de todo.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 24, 2019
'Why? Can't women travel alone in India?'Here is how to write a novel with emotional truth: find your characters, and let them make their stories. But Kamila Shamsie, who in Burnt Shadows does this so superbly, has done so much more. When I shared the opening themes of the book with my brother, who lives in Japan (I will spare readers of this review a lengthy account of all the many borders this story crossed into my own life), said, referring to the bombing of Nagasaki art is essential to capture such feelings. Even to call it essential doesn't do justice to this text, which covers such an immense ground, making a kind of sense of the world that has been terrifyingly coming into being since 1945 from the perspective of what one character, with fatal disdain, calls ordinary, little-picture morality, the spider's eye view, people and their relationships...
Elizabeth almost laughed. So much for those demure Japanese women of all the stories she'd heard. Here was one who would squeeze the sun in her fist if she ever got the chance; yes, and tilt her head back to swallow its liquid light.
So many novels make their protagonists suffer, but Shamsie gives Hiroko, as if to atone for making her witness the bomb, for making her lose so much, carry so much, not only competence, talent, boldness among many admirable qualities, an independent spirit (
it didn't bother her in the least to know she would always be a foreigner in Pakistan - she had no interest in belonging to anything as contradictorily insubstantial and damaging as a nation) and ambiguously generous benefactors, but an extraordinarily desirable opposite number, countless sources of delight written and unwritten, a son who earns his own story, and always the last word. Frequently, in other characters' strands, we are made aware of barriers raised against women, but Hiroko always knows exactly which boundary is worthy of respect, which border may be politely or heedlessly transgressed.
Language lessons and translation are the ropes, ladders, hooks, bridges of the story. In learning language, the learner thinks their way into a cultural borderland where all manner of connections are possible, where influences mix, and from where their own culture looks different. The willingness, or otherwise, to hear and understand and learn another's language, or to teach, signals the direction of a story, an emotion. James Burton tells Hiroko it's not necessary for her to learn Urdu. Kim tells an Afghan Muslim she has read the Quran in English (how often do Muslims hear this?), while he, she presumes, has never read it in a language he understands, therefore she knows better than he does what it contains. Meanwhile, Hiroko only teaches Sajjad expressions of love in Japanese, Raza enters Iran and translates flirtatious questions of the man driving him to a carful of women into Farsi, having learned it while working in Dubai. 'Why are you travelling by car?' the driver wants to know, 'don't angels fly?' but they laughingly reply that women are superior to angels.
For all their noble feelings, their kind gestures, and their good intentions, the English and USians in this novel are treacherous, and these portrayals, especially, to me, of the Burtons, rang absolutely true. What was beautiful, soothing, redemptive to me in this story, was the view from elsewhere, from Hiroko and her birds, from Konrad and his optimism, from Sajjad and his family, from Raza and his friends. It doesn't have to be this way... there is no possible justification for the second bomb in a picture of any size. Things can change. Not everyone is like us.
'James!' Elizabeth said, coming to stand beside her husband. 'Did you know Sajjad's family came here from Turkey seven centuries ago?'
'Young Turk are you?' James smiled at Sajjad.
'No, Mr Burton,' Sajjad said, not understanding the reference. 'I'm Indian.' He glanced at Hiroko, who had her back to the three of them, looking up at the Arabic inscriptions on the minaret. She was offended, he knew, but what could he do about it? He looked at James, as though considering something that had never occurred to him before. 'Why have the English remained so English? Throughout India's history conquerors have come from elsewhere, and all of them - Turk, Arab, Hun, Mongol, Persian - have become Indian. If - when - this Pakistan happens, those Muslims who leave Delhi and Lucknow and Hyderabad to go there, they will be leaving their homes. But when the English leave, they'll be going home.'
Hiroko turned towards Sajjad, surprised and accutely self-conscious. She had been speaking to him of Konrad's interest in the foreigners who made their homes in Nagasaki, and now she saw her words filtering into his thoughts and becoming part of the way he saw the world.
'Henry thinks of India as home,', Elizabeth said, seeing how wounded James was by Sajjad's unexpected attack, and wanting to deflect it.
'Yes.' There was a tightening of Sajjad's voice. 'He does.' And you sent him away because of it, he wanted to say, the sense of offence which had started as an act to impress Hiroko no longer feigned. He recalled it very well, the day her opposition to the idea of boarding school ended. He had been playing cricket in the garden with Henry when Elizabeth came out and told her son he was 'such a young Englishman'. Henry had scowled, and backed up towards Sajjad. 'I'm Indian,' he'd said. The next day James Burton had told Sajjad how relieved he was that his wife had suddenly decided to withdraw all her 'sentimental' objections to sending Henry to boarding school.
'Something you want to say, Sajjad?'
'No, Mr Burton. Only that I don't suppose he'll continue to think of India that way for much longer.'
'For the best,' Elizabeth said, looking around her, feeling something that was almost sorrow to think that the descendants of the English would not come to the churches and monuments of British India seven centuries from now and say this is a reminder of when my family history and India's history entered the same stream irrevocably and for ever.
'Why is it for the best?' Sajjad's voice was as near angry as anyone had ever heard it. It was hard to say if Elizabeth or Sajjad was more surprised at his tone after eight years during which he used only excessive politeness as a weapon against her. But they were both aware that this would not have happened if Hiroko hadn't been there, disrupting all hierarchies.
May 19, 2016
س :-
ماالذي لم يعجبك في الرواية ؟
ج :-
الأسلوب والترجمة ، والجمل الإعتراضية الكثيرة المشتتة
لا أدري ، هل العيب في المترجمة أم الكاتبة ؟ ، ولكن على كل حال
!الأسلوب أصاب مرارتي في مقتل
س :-
ومالذي دفعك لقراءة 300 صفحة من الرواية وهي لاتعجبك ؟
ج :-
لأن آراء أكثر من صديق وصديقة تشيد بالرواية ، وبالتالي فأنا أكذِّب نفسي طوال القراءة وأقول لنفسي أن ثمة مشكلة لديّ ، ربما .
ولكن دعني أسألك سؤالاً ، مالذي قد يدفعك لتحمل أسلوب منفر بهذا الشكل غير آراء الأصدقاء ؟
لاتجد إجابة ؟ ، حسناً سأجيب أنا ، الذي قد يدفعك لذلك هو أن تلمح في العمل الذي تقرأه بادرة أمل تدفعك للتحمل ، أي أن تجد قصة جيدة تشغل عقلك أو قلبك أو كلاهما .. وبعد 300 صفحة من البحث والتحمل ، أقول لك أن القصة مملة ولا طعم لها ، لم أجد مايعيننى على التحمل أكثر من ذلك
بالإضافة إلى الملل والأسلوب المُنفّر ، هناك مشكلة أخرى أفدح
التوهان في الزمكان ، أو الزمان والمكان لكي أكون أوضح
بمعنى ، في معظم الأوقات ، أنت كقاريء لن تعلم أين أنت ، والمثير للغيظ أكثر أن الشخصيات تظل تلقي بك بحديثها في أماكن أخرى تتوه بينها أكثر وأكثر ، ستظل تسأل نفسك كثيراً .. أين نحن الآن ؟ .، ماهذه البلد التي يتحدثون عنها ؟ ، هل هي في الهند أم باكستان أم اليابان أم أمريكا ؟ ، هل الهند وباكستان بلداً واحداً وانقسموا أم لا ؟ ،مالذي أدخل أفغانستان في الموضوع ؟ ، هل حديثهم قبل التقسيم أم بعده ؟ ، من يكره من بالضبط ؟ ، في أي زمن نحن ؟ هل تتحدث في الماضي أم الحاضر أم المستقبل ؟
يا ربي
حسناً حسناً لا أريد أن أعرف أين نحن وعلام يتكلموا بالضبط
هذا ماتنتهي إليه
س :-
هل لديك أقوال أخرى؟
ج :-
الرواية - خلال الثلاثمائة صفحة الأولى لكي أكون دقيقاً - قصتها مملة ، لن تجد فيها ألماً يتعلق به قلبك ولا فِكراً يجذب انتباه عقلك ، إيقاعها بطئ ، السرد فيها مشتِت ، الجمل الإعتراضية ضربت الرواية في مقتل
الرواية خيبت آمالي ، عصرتُ على نفسى عشرين كيلو من الليمون حتى أكملها ، تعلقت آمالي بآراء الأصدقاء التي قرأتها قبل البدء ، وتعليقات القُراء على تحديثاتي أثناء القراءة ، ولكني آسفٌ لهم جميعاً ، وقتي لايسمح بتحمل هذا أكثر من ذلك ، ربما العيب في ، ربما لو كنت في إجازة أو متفرغاً كنت تحملتها حتى النهاية .
انتهى التحقيق
تمت
August 1, 2013
منذ زمن لم اعطي 5 نجوم.لكن الرواية تستحق كل الخمسة.فالكاتبة جمعت في ذكاء خيوط احداث العالم منذ نهاية الحرب العالمية الثانية حتي بعد 11 سبتمبر بسلاسة جميلة.
هذه الصورة تعبر تعبير تام عن الرواية فهي بكل اناقة اوضحت دور العم سام في مصائب العالم.
تحكي الرواية عن فتاة يابانية نجت من نجازاكي وفقدت فيها كل شيء حتي اجزاء من روحها فقدتها مع اجزاء جلدها المحترقة في هذا الجزء توقفت وبحثت فلم اكن قرأت كثيرا عن نجازاكي و اكثر ما هالني الحجج المغرورة للحكومة الامريكية بكل عجرفة يقولون هذا كان لانقاذ حياة الامريكيين ولسنا نادمين (هل تطالب الشخص معدوم الضمير ان يندم) بل و صل انعدام انسانياتهم الي التوقف والتصوير و انزال معدات القياس وكأنهم يجرون تجربة علي فئران في معمل!!! هيروشيما لم تكفيهم فقد كان لديهم نوع اخر من القنابل النووية لم يم تجربته.
اكثر ما يذهلني في الحرب العالمية الثانية كيف ان هتلر حمل وحده لقب السفاح فيها و حمل الامريكان لقب الابطال!!!! اعتقد ان انعكست الاية و انتصر هتلر كانت قد انعكست الالقاب ايضا و الحقيقة ان كلهم مجرمون مجرم من وضع الناس في افران ومجرم من اذابهم بالاشعاع.
الحرب الباردة مع روسيا اذن لندعم الجهاديين -يحملون افكار متطرفة ماذا يهم ؟طالما ضد روسيا و في يصالح امريكا !!!!!
نهاية الحرب الباردة في صالح امريكا .تصفيق
لايهم طبعا مايحدث في البلاد المسكينة التي دمروها بزرع هذه الخلايا بها.
اكتواء امريكا بصنيعها في الجهادين
اذن المسلمون كلهم ارهابيون فلنجعل حياتهم جحيما!!!! ما الفارق في تعذيب بضعة الالاف من المسلمين في جوانتانمو حتي ان كانوا ابرياء او تشريد و قتل بعضهم في افغانستان او غيرها هذا مثل نجازاكي لحماية حياة الامريكيين!!!
تحية لكاميللا شمسي فقد صاغت كل هذا و اكثر بخفة الفراشة علي طول الرواية باحداثها الاجتماعية التي تلمس احزان الناس بعيدا عن الصورة الكبيرة التي تتوه فيها الوجوه.
هذه الصورة تعبر تعبير تام عن الرواية فهي بكل اناقة اوضحت دور العم سام في مصائب العالم.
تحكي الرواية عن فتاة يابانية نجت من نجازاكي وفقدت فيها كل شيء حتي اجزاء من روحها فقدتها مع اجزاء جلدها المحترقة في هذا الجزء توقفت وبحثت فلم اكن قرأت كثيرا عن نجازاكي و اكثر ما هالني الحجج المغرورة للحكومة الامريكية بكل عجرفة يقولون هذا كان لانقاذ حياة الامريكيين ولسنا نادمين (هل تطالب الشخص معدوم الضمير ان يندم) بل و صل انعدام انسانياتهم الي التوقف والتصوير و انزال معدات القياس وكأنهم يجرون تجربة علي فئران في معمل!!! هيروشيما لم تكفيهم فقد كان لديهم نوع اخر من القنابل النووية لم يم تجربته.
اكثر ما يذهلني في الحرب العالمية الثانية كيف ان هتلر حمل وحده لقب السفاح فيها و حمل الامريكان لقب الابطال!!!! اعتقد ان انعكست الاية و انتصر هتلر كانت قد انعكست الالقاب ايضا و الحقيقة ان كلهم مجرمون مجرم من وضع الناس في افران ومجرم من اذابهم بالاشعاع.
الحرب الباردة مع روسيا اذن لندعم الجهاديين -يحملون افكار متطرفة ماذا يهم ؟طالما ضد روسيا و في يصالح امريكا !!!!!
نهاية الحرب الباردة في صالح امريكا .تصفيق
لايهم طبعا مايحدث في البلاد المسكينة التي دمروها بزرع هذه الخلايا بها.
اكتواء امريكا بصنيعها في الجهادين
اذن المسلمون كلهم ارهابيون فلنجعل حياتهم جحيما!!!! ما الفارق في تعذيب بضعة الالاف من المسلمين في جوانتانمو حتي ان كانوا ابرياء او تشريد و قتل بعضهم في افغانستان او غيرها هذا مثل نجازاكي لحماية حياة الامريكيين!!!
تحية لكاميللا شمسي فقد صاغت كل هذا و اكثر بخفة الفراشة علي طول الرواية باحداثها الاجتماعية التي تلمس احزان الناس بعيدا عن الصورة الكبيرة التي تتوه فيها الوجوه.
March 18, 2024
Kamila Shamsie propôs-se seguir a história de duas famílias ao longo de mais de cinco décadas e outros tantos países. Tarefa ambiciosa passível de falhas. Senti que as quatrocentas páginas foram insuficientes para tão grande empreitada e os temas foram abordados com alguma superficialidade.
Contudo, a sensação de que a narrativa corre de forma muito rasa focando-se somente nos grandes eventos históricos é atenuada no final do livro. Foi mais um livro em que o pesar tomou conta de mim no final da leitura. Foi quando percebi que o que move esta história é sempre a estupidez humana, que incrementa o ódio no seu semelhante, que concebe guerras inúteis com base no preconceito e no extremismo fanático. As diferenças culturais, as tensões étnicas e os conflitos sociais não justificam a barbárie, a meu ver.
Conhecemos Hiroko Tanaka em Nagasaki, seguimos a sua família, os Ashraf, e os Burton através da India, Paquistão, Afeganistão e Estados Unidos. Foram anos em que estes países foram vítimas de acontecimentos de extrema violência que envolveram as famílias numa cadeia de mútua proteção. Foi uma leitura que me prendeu e desafiou, penso que a autora podia ter aprofundado mais, mas isso daria para outras quatrocentas páginas.
Contudo, a sensação de que a narrativa corre de forma muito rasa focando-se somente nos grandes eventos históricos é atenuada no final do livro. Foi mais um livro em que o pesar tomou conta de mim no final da leitura. Foi quando percebi que o que move esta história é sempre a estupidez humana, que incrementa o ódio no seu semelhante, que concebe guerras inúteis com base no preconceito e no extremismo fanático. As diferenças culturais, as tensões étnicas e os conflitos sociais não justificam a barbárie, a meu ver.
Conhecemos Hiroko Tanaka em Nagasaki, seguimos a sua família, os Ashraf, e os Burton através da India, Paquistão, Afeganistão e Estados Unidos. Foram anos em que estes países foram vítimas de acontecimentos de extrema violência que envolveram as famílias numa cadeia de mútua proteção. Foi uma leitura que me prendeu e desafiou, penso que a autora podia ter aprofundado mais, mas isso daria para outras quatrocentas páginas.
May 8, 2017
She had not thought of destination so much as departure, wheeling through the world with the awful freedom of someone with no one to answer to. She had become, in fact, a figure out of myth. The character who loses everything and is born anew in blood.
This book is amazing. No, scratch that. Amazing is probably too weak a word here. Think Astounding. Remarkable. The kind of book you tell your best friend to read so you can discuss it together, going over all the finer points.
I’ll admit, I started the book with wary suspicions. Look at that blurb. Nagasaki and the atomic bomb. 1947 and partition. 2001 and New York City and Afghanistan. The book looks like a mess waiting to happen, but. It wasn’t. In fact, it was quite miraculous how everything came together. How the lives intertwined. I have used that word quite often, but nowhere does it fit more perfectly than in this book: intertwining of fate and coincidences and relationships is a big theme in this book, and Kamila Shamsie’s canvas is the world.
But let us start at the beginning.
The Summary
Yes, I know everything can disappear in a flash of light. That doesn’t make anything less valuable.
It’s August 9, 1945, and Hiroko Tanaka, the disgraced daughter of a father who dared question the morality of children involved in Kamikaze flights, is very much in love, but with the wrong person: Konrad Weiss, a German living in Nagasaki, trying to understand their culture. In this instance, we know the bomb is going to fall, but what is more interesting is the xenophobia, the patriotism, the secrecy and the betrayals. Shamsie makes us care more about Hiroko’s mother’s death, about Konrad’s disloyal friend, about their secret love affair, than the devastation that we know is about to occur.
Since her mother’s death, she had taken to interpreting the silence from her father as an absence of anything worth communicating rather than an inability to form a new configuration with his daughter now his beloved wife is no longer around to serve as the voice to his thoughts.
That’s not to say that the bomb is just background noise. No, the bomb changes things, but we are now at the heart of those who suffered through it. There is no fine distance, no aloofness to be hidden behind. Shamsie is not concerned with talking about governments and politics; she wants you to look at the human who lives through war time, who survives, who has to learn to pick up the pieces later.
“When the war’s over, I’ll be kind.”
Fast forward to 1947 and the subcontinent, where Hiroko lands into another area full of upheaval. Going to Delhi, to the home of Konrad’s sister Ilse, now the married Elizabeth Burton, Hiroko is trying to escape the brand of Hibakusha, as hard a task as removing the bird shaped scars on her back from where the kimono she was wearing at the time of the bomb burned into her skin. Tensions in the area are chaotic with the upcoming partition into India and Pakistan, and it is here that we stumble into the world of the Burtons, a British middle aged couple, and Sajjad Ashraf, the husband James’s bored servant. It is here that, even as the outside world changes, it will be Hiroko’s presence that will cause the greatest change.
She saw her words filtering into his thoughts and becoming part of the way he saw the world.
Japanese, British, Hindustani. In the first half of the book, Kamila Shamsie is obsessed with nationality: which country do we come from, and how does it affect us? The Burtons, with their disintegrating marriage and their son sent out of the country because of the conflict, are as removed a part of the subcontinent as Sajjad Ashraf is in love with it. His Dilli/Dehli, where his whole family resides, is his life. He is in love with the culture, the poetry, and as reluctant to leave the city, but his blooming romance with Hiroko and the subsequent events put a twist in fate that brings us, once again, down to the level of the human reacting to the large, the international, the encompassing.
It seemed to Sajjad these were the kinds of things said so that repetition made fact of conjecture. He’d know what to do with an Urdu masterpiece written by an Englishman. He’d read it. Why pretend it was more complicated than that?
We move swiftly from the streets of Dilli to a pit stop in Istanbul before suddenly we’re in Karachi, the living, breathing city of Pakistan, where Shamsie’s prose shines at her best. It could be because she grew up here, but there is yearning in the writing here. If not for anything else, books like these should be read just for the breathtaking command over words, the mixing of emotion and thought and politics and culture all in one perfectly formed sentence.
He cursed under his breath the government which kept trying to force religion into everything public. His mother, with her most intimate relationship with Allah, would have personally knocked on the door of Army House and told the President he should have more shame than to ask all the citizens to conduct their love affairs with the Almighty out in the open.
In Karachi is where the story starts to show its desire to connect its characters. Raza Konrad Ashraf, whose very name is an amalgamation of religions and nationalities, is the book’s product of interconnectedness, Hiroko and Sajjad’s son, and Shamsie explores parenthood and adolescence like she understands what both these dual experiences can feel like.
She was overwhelmed by a felling of sorrow for her boy, for that look in her eyes which told her he knew and had always known that he would have to take that most exceptional part of himself and put it to one side. She knew what Sajjad would say if she tried to discuss it with him: ‘If the greatest loss of his life is the loss of a dream he’s always known to be a dream, then he’s among the fortunate ones.’ He’d be right, of course, but that didn’t stop this pulling at her heart.
Throughout the book’s course we careen throughout history, from Nagasaki to Hindustan to Karachi and then finally, inevitably, to 2001, where the shadow of 9/11 looms large over New York City and Afghanistan. It is over here that the Weiss and the Burtons will find their way into the lives of the Tanaka and Ashrafs, all the while spanning across greater demographics. We are no longer just concerned with nationalities, but with ethnicities, with religion, with the divergence of groups within groups and individuals whose particular choices can affect all those around them.
It seemed the most extraordinary privilege – to have forewarning of a swerve in history, to prepare for how your life would curve around that bend.
There is much to be said about the book’s ending, and about how who we are defines what we think. But speaking too openly will only reveal an ending that should be read to be savoured.
The recommendation:
Recommended for everyone who is a fan of historical fiction/ interested in geopolitical change/ looking for a serious, good read. This book is literary fiction at its finest, not too pretentious or long to bore the reader, and not too glib or arrogant to put one off. Put this on your to-read list right now.
**
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!
This book is amazing. No, scratch that. Amazing is probably too weak a word here. Think Astounding. Remarkable. The kind of book you tell your best friend to read so you can discuss it together, going over all the finer points.
I’ll admit, I started the book with wary suspicions. Look at that blurb. Nagasaki and the atomic bomb. 1947 and partition. 2001 and New York City and Afghanistan. The book looks like a mess waiting to happen, but. It wasn’t. In fact, it was quite miraculous how everything came together. How the lives intertwined. I have used that word quite often, but nowhere does it fit more perfectly than in this book: intertwining of fate and coincidences and relationships is a big theme in this book, and Kamila Shamsie’s canvas is the world.
But let us start at the beginning.
The Summary
Yes, I know everything can disappear in a flash of light. That doesn’t make anything less valuable.
It’s August 9, 1945, and Hiroko Tanaka, the disgraced daughter of a father who dared question the morality of children involved in Kamikaze flights, is very much in love, but with the wrong person: Konrad Weiss, a German living in Nagasaki, trying to understand their culture. In this instance, we know the bomb is going to fall, but what is more interesting is the xenophobia, the patriotism, the secrecy and the betrayals. Shamsie makes us care more about Hiroko’s mother’s death, about Konrad’s disloyal friend, about their secret love affair, than the devastation that we know is about to occur.
Since her mother’s death, she had taken to interpreting the silence from her father as an absence of anything worth communicating rather than an inability to form a new configuration with his daughter now his beloved wife is no longer around to serve as the voice to his thoughts.
That’s not to say that the bomb is just background noise. No, the bomb changes things, but we are now at the heart of those who suffered through it. There is no fine distance, no aloofness to be hidden behind. Shamsie is not concerned with talking about governments and politics; she wants you to look at the human who lives through war time, who survives, who has to learn to pick up the pieces later.
“When the war’s over, I’ll be kind.”
Fast forward to 1947 and the subcontinent, where Hiroko lands into another area full of upheaval. Going to Delhi, to the home of Konrad’s sister Ilse, now the married Elizabeth Burton, Hiroko is trying to escape the brand of Hibakusha, as hard a task as removing the bird shaped scars on her back from where the kimono she was wearing at the time of the bomb burned into her skin. Tensions in the area are chaotic with the upcoming partition into India and Pakistan, and it is here that we stumble into the world of the Burtons, a British middle aged couple, and Sajjad Ashraf, the husband James’s bored servant. It is here that, even as the outside world changes, it will be Hiroko’s presence that will cause the greatest change.
She saw her words filtering into his thoughts and becoming part of the way he saw the world.
Japanese, British, Hindustani. In the first half of the book, Kamila Shamsie is obsessed with nationality: which country do we come from, and how does it affect us? The Burtons, with their disintegrating marriage and their son sent out of the country because of the conflict, are as removed a part of the subcontinent as Sajjad Ashraf is in love with it. His Dilli/Dehli, where his whole family resides, is his life. He is in love with the culture, the poetry, and as reluctant to leave the city, but his blooming romance with Hiroko and the subsequent events put a twist in fate that brings us, once again, down to the level of the human reacting to the large, the international, the encompassing.
It seemed to Sajjad these were the kinds of things said so that repetition made fact of conjecture. He’d know what to do with an Urdu masterpiece written by an Englishman. He’d read it. Why pretend it was more complicated than that?
We move swiftly from the streets of Dilli to a pit stop in Istanbul before suddenly we’re in Karachi, the living, breathing city of Pakistan, where Shamsie’s prose shines at her best. It could be because she grew up here, but there is yearning in the writing here. If not for anything else, books like these should be read just for the breathtaking command over words, the mixing of emotion and thought and politics and culture all in one perfectly formed sentence.
He cursed under his breath the government which kept trying to force religion into everything public. His mother, with her most intimate relationship with Allah, would have personally knocked on the door of Army House and told the President he should have more shame than to ask all the citizens to conduct their love affairs with the Almighty out in the open.
In Karachi is where the story starts to show its desire to connect its characters. Raza Konrad Ashraf, whose very name is an amalgamation of religions and nationalities, is the book’s product of interconnectedness, Hiroko and Sajjad’s son, and Shamsie explores parenthood and adolescence like she understands what both these dual experiences can feel like.
She was overwhelmed by a felling of sorrow for her boy, for that look in her eyes which told her he knew and had always known that he would have to take that most exceptional part of himself and put it to one side. She knew what Sajjad would say if she tried to discuss it with him: ‘If the greatest loss of his life is the loss of a dream he’s always known to be a dream, then he’s among the fortunate ones.’ He’d be right, of course, but that didn’t stop this pulling at her heart.
Throughout the book’s course we careen throughout history, from Nagasaki to Hindustan to Karachi and then finally, inevitably, to 2001, where the shadow of 9/11 looms large over New York City and Afghanistan. It is over here that the Weiss and the Burtons will find their way into the lives of the Tanaka and Ashrafs, all the while spanning across greater demographics. We are no longer just concerned with nationalities, but with ethnicities, with religion, with the divergence of groups within groups and individuals whose particular choices can affect all those around them.
It seemed the most extraordinary privilege – to have forewarning of a swerve in history, to prepare for how your life would curve around that bend.
There is much to be said about the book’s ending, and about how who we are defines what we think. But speaking too openly will only reveal an ending that should be read to be savoured.
The recommendation:
Recommended for everyone who is a fan of historical fiction/ interested in geopolitical change/ looking for a serious, good read. This book is literary fiction at its finest, not too pretentious or long to bore the reader, and not too glib or arrogant to put one off. Put this on your to-read list right now.
**
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!
January 22, 2020
For the first two-thirds of this book it was 5-stars in my head, up there with Home Fire - then the final third just became too convenient, too schematic, too obviously plotted. I could believe that someone present in Nagasaki the day the bomb was dropped could take herself to India to witness the dying days of the Raj, then the Partition and birth of Pakistan. I could even accept that her teenage son should become embroiled in the politics of Afghanistan when the Soviets invade, given his mixed heritage and the way it manifests in his features. But when the same two intertwined families also implicate themselves in post-9/11 Afghanistan, it all becomes a step too contrived - and even more unbelievable given their ages by then .
It's a shame Shamsie's judgement fails her towards the end because much of this book is just so good. There are images that are shocking: , but also a love and marriage that is deep and nuanced. Shamsie is especially good at writing scenes that are emotive without ever falling into sentimentalism.
She also manages the sweep of the book very well: as we move between sections, she fills in the gaps without recourse to clumsy narrative - though, at the same time, there are stories that take place which we never witness. For example, I wanted to know more, much more, about how Hiroko and Sajjad came to Pakistan, lived in a refugee camp, before we pick up their story, years later, in a middle class neighbourhood.
I'd say with this book we can see the writer who will emerge so triumphantly in Home Fire coming into being. This novel is still a bit too diffuse, lacking that targeted intensity of the later piece. Still, for the mingling of a family story with politics, this is very good. It's hard to write a female character who is strong and a bit abrasive yet who is also soft and loving, but Shamsie does it brilliantly with Hiroko. Overall, I'd say this is a not-quite-there-yet book, but one which gives a human face to big, global political movements.
It's a shame Shamsie's judgement fails her towards the end because much of this book is just so good. There are images that are shocking: , but also a love and marriage that is deep and nuanced. Shamsie is especially good at writing scenes that are emotive without ever falling into sentimentalism.
She also manages the sweep of the book very well: as we move between sections, she fills in the gaps without recourse to clumsy narrative - though, at the same time, there are stories that take place which we never witness. For example, I wanted to know more, much more, about how Hiroko and Sajjad came to Pakistan, lived in a refugee camp, before we pick up their story, years later, in a middle class neighbourhood.
I'd say with this book we can see the writer who will emerge so triumphantly in Home Fire coming into being. This novel is still a bit too diffuse, lacking that targeted intensity of the later piece. Still, for the mingling of a family story with politics, this is very good. It's hard to write a female character who is strong and a bit abrasive yet who is also soft and loving, but Shamsie does it brilliantly with Hiroko. Overall, I'd say this is a not-quite-there-yet book, but one which gives a human face to big, global political movements.
August 9, 2010
A twisting yarn of a book that struck me as something written fresh on the heels of 9-11. There were certain elements of the plot that I thought were probably even more impactful for readers who read this book a few years after that horrific event.
Beginning in Nagasaki, Japan, just before the second nuclear bomb drops, the story ventures to India, Turkey, Pakistan, and New York as it follows two families, one of German-English and another Japanese-Pakistani extraction. Lives mirror and intersect, and Shamsie makes some important observations about class and racial tension.
Because this book was recommended to me for my fondness for The Far Pavilions, I expected a grand, sweeping love story. No luck. The romance motif in this book is nothing like Ashok's fairy-tales. Instead the relationships are broken down jalopies, bravely forging ahead on unstable ground. On that negative note, one could also easily compare this novel to The Kite Runner for it's ties to the conflict in Afghanistan. For me, the Kite Runner is more straight-forwardly depressing. This book is much more thoughtful and introspective.
Ultimately, what was most interesting to me was the cultural soup of Japanese, German, British, Indian, Pakistani, and Americans that flavored the novel. My general takeaway was that the author wanted to show what happens when people choose to be nice to "the other", but still not treat them as equals--those actions have far-reaching, inhumane, humiliating consequences. I also thought that it was interesting to note that author dismisses the idea of using the personal element of a tragedy as the centerpiece of a larger tragedy...
Food for thought (Regarding Nagasaki):
"You lived it," Kim said. "our father died in it. Your fiance died in it. There's no shame in putting all the weight in the world on that."
It was the wrong answer.
Hiroko turned to her, face bright with anger.
"Is that why? That's why Nagasaki was such a monstrous crime? Because it happened to me?" She pulled the gloves off and threw them at Kim. "I don't want your hot chocolate," she said and stalked away.
This book brings up a lot of sediment to sift through. It wasn't always pleasant to read, but it was educational.
Beginning in Nagasaki, Japan, just before the second nuclear bomb drops, the story ventures to India, Turkey, Pakistan, and New York as it follows two families, one of German-English and another Japanese-Pakistani extraction. Lives mirror and intersect, and Shamsie makes some important observations about class and racial tension.
Because this book was recommended to me for my fondness for The Far Pavilions, I expected a grand, sweeping love story. No luck. The romance motif in this book is nothing like Ashok's fairy-tales. Instead the relationships are broken down jalopies, bravely forging ahead on unstable ground. On that negative note, one could also easily compare this novel to The Kite Runner for it's ties to the conflict in Afghanistan. For me, the Kite Runner is more straight-forwardly depressing. This book is much more thoughtful and introspective.
Ultimately, what was most interesting to me was the cultural soup of Japanese, German, British, Indian, Pakistani, and Americans that flavored the novel. My general takeaway was that the author wanted to show what happens when people choose to be nice to "the other", but still not treat them as equals--those actions have far-reaching, inhumane, humiliating consequences. I also thought that it was interesting to note that author dismisses the idea of using the personal element of a tragedy as the centerpiece of a larger tragedy...
Food for thought (Regarding Nagasaki):
"You lived it," Kim said. "our father died in it. Your fiance died in it. There's no shame in putting all the weight in the world on that."
It was the wrong answer.
Hiroko turned to her, face bright with anger.
"Is that why? That's why Nagasaki was such a monstrous crime? Because it happened to me?" She pulled the gloves off and threw them at Kim. "I don't want your hot chocolate," she said and stalked away.
This book brings up a lot of sediment to sift through. It wasn't always pleasant to read, but it was educational.
May 21, 2015
I was impressed with the scope of this novel - from Japan to Pakistan to America, and covering about half a century - it touched upon a broad spectrum of cultures, politics and lives, with the twists and turns in the story largely governed by geographic location.
For me it was all about identity, and how a sense of identity can be damaged by the horror of an atomic bomb, or by failing exams, by subterfuge, or by looking different to those around you. But as well as exploring alienation, this book explores the wonderful ties that bind people together. The loves, the loyalties and the unavoidable ambivalence that makes up the knots that keep us together.
Several people in this book have the world opened up to them via their extraordinary gifts with languages, and reading this as a monoglot I was extremely envious. This is my fantasy, an effortless learning whereby new languages simply fall into your lap, and you are able to take off to new lands or explore new cultures, with a vast chunk of you being already at home in these new places. Friends teaching friends, mother teaching son, seemingly almost by osmosis. Yeah, I was envious.
I also liked the fact that I learnt a lot from this book. We didn’t spend enough time in any one culture to be utterly immersed in it, but we touched upon some fascinating experiences – what it was like to be a German in Japan during the second world war, what it was like to be an educated Indian servant to a British family, what it was like to be in Pakistan and Afghanistan - supporting the mujahidean, what it was like to be on the run (both in Afghanistan and America), and what it was like to be a Muslim in New York after 9/11. It was most rewarding to have these experiences opened up to me.
My one criticism is that some of the relationships felt a bit forced, almost too good to be true, also sometimes people’s lives seemed to take an unnecessary negative twist....almost on a whim. I felt like jogging the author’s elbow a couple of times. Having said that, most of the people in this book were beautifully evoked, their characters drawn with exquisite sensitivity, often via dialogue. All in all I found this book both moving and gripping. An excellent read.
For me it was all about identity, and how a sense of identity can be damaged by the horror of an atomic bomb, or by failing exams, by subterfuge, or by looking different to those around you. But as well as exploring alienation, this book explores the wonderful ties that bind people together. The loves, the loyalties and the unavoidable ambivalence that makes up the knots that keep us together.
Several people in this book have the world opened up to them via their extraordinary gifts with languages, and reading this as a monoglot I was extremely envious. This is my fantasy, an effortless learning whereby new languages simply fall into your lap, and you are able to take off to new lands or explore new cultures, with a vast chunk of you being already at home in these new places. Friends teaching friends, mother teaching son, seemingly almost by osmosis. Yeah, I was envious.
I also liked the fact that I learnt a lot from this book. We didn’t spend enough time in any one culture to be utterly immersed in it, but we touched upon some fascinating experiences – what it was like to be a German in Japan during the second world war, what it was like to be an educated Indian servant to a British family, what it was like to be in Pakistan and Afghanistan - supporting the mujahidean, what it was like to be on the run (both in Afghanistan and America), and what it was like to be a Muslim in New York after 9/11. It was most rewarding to have these experiences opened up to me.
My one criticism is that some of the relationships felt a bit forced, almost too good to be true, also sometimes people’s lives seemed to take an unnecessary negative twist....almost on a whim. I felt like jogging the author’s elbow a couple of times. Having said that, most of the people in this book were beautifully evoked, their characters drawn with exquisite sensitivity, often via dialogue. All in all I found this book both moving and gripping. An excellent read.
December 12, 2012
قوية، رائعة، مؤثرة، مُشوقة الي أبعد درجة
من ناجازاكي الي دلهي الي كراتشي الي نيويورك الي أفغانستان تسافر مع أحداث الكتاب الي تلك الأماكن وتفتقد الأماكن السابقة.. أو لا تفتقدها بالمرة!
هيروكو، سجاد، الزي وجايمس غرباء جدا لكن وقت اللقاء أقرباء بطريقة ساحرة.
مآسي ومآسي ما تتكون منه هذه الرواية... ليس بها لحظات جميلة أو حميمية بالقدر الذي تواجدت فيه الأحداث التراجيدية
هي رواية فيها الكثير من ا��مشاعر المتداخلة -وأيضا اللغات- بين شخصياتها ونتاج حياة أشخاص تؤثر علي الكل سواء داخل الرواية أو خارجها
ونهاية-مثلها كالجزء الأول من الكتاب- خلابة مُصورة علي طريقة تجعلك داخلها ومع الشخصيات بالفعل، فيها دروس لتخطي الأحزان وألا تؤثر تلك الأحزان علي اتجاهات الحياة المختلفة وردود الفعل.
اسلوب الكتابة عاماً جديد عليَّ ولكن سرعان ما تعودت عليه. وأعتقد اني لم احس ان النص مترجما وهذه ميزةٌ رائعة.
قراءة الرواية كانت حقا ممتعة.. فعلا عالم روائي مختلف
من ناجازاكي الي دلهي الي كراتشي الي نيويورك الي أفغانستان تسافر مع أحداث الكتاب الي تلك الأماكن وتفتقد الأماكن السابقة.. أو لا تفتقدها بالمرة!
هيروكو، سجاد، الزي وجايمس غرباء جدا لكن وقت اللقاء أقرباء بطريقة ساحرة.
مآسي ومآسي ما تتكون منه هذه الرواية... ليس بها لحظات جميلة أو حميمية بالقدر الذي تواجدت فيه الأحداث التراجيدية
هي رواية فيها الكثير من ا��مشاعر المتداخلة -وأيضا اللغات- بين شخصياتها ونتاج حياة أشخاص تؤثر علي الكل سواء داخل الرواية أو خارجها
ونهاية-مثلها كالجزء الأول من الكتاب- خلابة مُصورة علي طريقة تجعلك داخلها ومع الشخصيات بالفعل، فيها دروس لتخطي الأحزان وألا تؤثر تلك الأحزان علي اتجاهات الحياة المختلفة وردود الفعل.
اسلوب الكتابة عاماً جديد عليَّ ولكن سرعان ما تعودت عليه. وأعتقد اني لم احس ان النص مترجما وهذه ميزةٌ رائعة.
قراءة الرواية كانت حقا ممتعة.. فعلا عالم روائي مختلف
November 19, 2016
يمكن تكون أرخم رواية قريتها في حياتي، رواية سمجة كده، من النوع اللي مبيخلصش ومش بيبقى عاوزك تخلصه، رواية لازقة. بس مع كده أنا بحب إيمان حرز الله وترجمات حرز الله.
يلا مش مهم :D
يلا مش مهم :D
February 26, 2023
Gostei muito.
O final deixou-me com um nó na garganta que ainda não consegui desatar, talvez daqui a uns dias consiga escrever algo mais.
O final deixou-me com um nó na garganta que ainda não consegui desatar, talvez daqui a uns dias consiga escrever algo mais.
August 6, 2015
The Urakami Cathedral in Nagasaki, which was obliterated on 9 August 1945. The replacement was built in 1959 - Photograph: Shigeo Hayashi/Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum
”Sombras Queimadas” o quinto romance da paquistanesa Kamila Shamsie (n. 1973) está dividido em quatro partes: ”O Mundo ainda Desconhecido” (Nagasáqui, 9 de Agosto de 1945), ”Pássaros Velados” (Deli, 1947), ”Guerreiros Meio-Anjos” (Paquistão, 1982 – 1983) e ”A Velocidade Necessária para Substituir a Perda (Nova Iorque, Afeganistão, 2001 – 2002) numa narrativa que começa com um acontecimento trágico para a jovem mulher de vinte e um anos, Hiroko Tanaka, apaixonada pelo idealista alemão Konrad Weiss - o deflagrar a 9 de Agosto de 1945 da bomba atómica em Nagasáqui.
Nagasáqui, Japão 9 de Agosto de 1945
Hiroko Tanaka acaba por sobreviver com queimaduras nas costas em forma de três pássaros, três grous pretos, modulados pelo estampado do quimono que vestia, cicatrizes para a vida e que relembram a morte do seu noivo Konrad Weiss, um amor e um futuro perdido, uma “sombra queimada”.
Em 1947, após um luto solitário e doloroso, Hiroko Tanaka parte para Deli, Índia em “busca” das raízes de Konrad Weiss, da meia-irmã, Elizabeth/Ilse, casada com o advogado colonialista inglês James Burton, que tem no jovem muçulmano Sajjad Ashraf, um “servo” e um empregado bonito, inteligente e bem-humorado.
Uma amizade e uma história amor que se inicia com consequências imprevisíveis…
”Sombras Queimadas” é um livro complexo e abrangente, ambicioso na temática e nas ligações históricas entre os vários eventos, com um conjunto inesquecível de personagens, com destaque para Hiroko Tanaka e Sajjad Ashraf, o filho ambos Raza; os Burton, James e Elizabeth/Ilse, do filho do casal Henry/Harry e da sua filha Kim; um relato intenso e emocional sobre “Duas famílias, duas versões da dança da aranha. Os Ashraf – Tanaka, os Weiss – Burton – as suas histórias juntas, a história de uma bomba, a história de uma pátria perdida, a história de um homem abatido a tiro junto às docas, a história do colete à prova de bala ignorado, a história de fugir sozinho do maior poder do Mundo.” (Pág. 426)
Kamila Shamsie escreve um excelente romance - numa narrativa intensa e uma prosa poética - fragmentado no tempo e no espaço, com a acção a decorrer em aproximadamente cinquenta e sete anos, com destaque para eventos históricos, alguns deles catastróficos – a deflagração da segunda bomba atómica em Nagasáqui, Japão, a “partilha” da Índia britânica, com a criação da Índia e do Paquistão, a construção da bomba atómica e os testes nucleares da Índia e do Paquistão, a invasão soviética do Afeganistão, o 11 de Setembro, a radicalização islâmica – num contexto de histórias pessoais e políticas, um relato convincente sobre o amor, a lealdade, a incompreensão, a desilusão, a desconfiança, a culpa, a traição e a redenção.
Kamila Shamsie (n. 1973)
August 14, 2021
"Sí, sé que todo puede desaparecer en una ráfaga de luz. Eso no lo hace menos valioso".
Una novela inmensa de una de mis escritoras favoritas ahora mismo. La pakistaní Kamila Shamsie sabe como nadie narrar los convulsos tiempos en los que vivimos a través de sus personajes, siempre en movimiento que cruzan fronteras, continentes, huyendo o intentando encontrarse a sí mismos. Es una novela muy ambiciosa por lo que cuenta y en mi opinión hay pocos escritores ahora mismo que me hagan entender tan bien como Kamila Shamsie, lo que significa ser musulmán en este momento tan complejo de la historia. A través de los lazos de dos familias, los Weiss-Burton y Tanaka-Ashraf, Shamsie nos hace entender como nadie las consecuencias de la guerra. Magnífica, ojalá nos llegarán más obras de esta autora a España...
"En cambio la guerra... Los paises como el tuyo siempre libran guerras pero nunca en su territorio. Vuestra enfermedad siempre se desarrolla en otro lugar. Por eso batallais más que cualquier otro país, porque sois quienes menos entendéis las implicaciones de la guerra. Deberiaís comprenderlas mejor./i>"
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https://kansasbooks.blogspot.com/2019...
Una novela inmensa de una de mis escritoras favoritas ahora mismo. La pakistaní Kamila Shamsie sabe como nadie narrar los convulsos tiempos en los que vivimos a través de sus personajes, siempre en movimiento que cruzan fronteras, continentes, huyendo o intentando encontrarse a sí mismos. Es una novela muy ambiciosa por lo que cuenta y en mi opinión hay pocos escritores ahora mismo que me hagan entender tan bien como Kamila Shamsie, lo que significa ser musulmán en este momento tan complejo de la historia. A través de los lazos de dos familias, los Weiss-Burton y Tanaka-Ashraf, Shamsie nos hace entender como nadie las consecuencias de la guerra. Magnífica, ojalá nos llegarán más obras de esta autora a España...
"En cambio la guerra... Los paises como el tuyo siempre libran guerras pero nunca en su territorio. Vuestra enfermedad siempre se desarrolla en otro lugar. Por eso batallais más que cualquier otro país, porque sois quienes menos entendéis las implicaciones de la guerra. Deberiaís comprenderlas mejor./i>"
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https://kansasbooks.blogspot.com/2019...
November 29, 2015
(كانت هناك حكاية عن بنت يزحف ناحيتها أبوها المحتضرفي هيئة سحلية وقد أرعبتها بشاعته حتى إنها استغرقت سنوات لتفهم أن آخر حركة قام بها كانت ناحيتها بعد أن قضى عمره كله يبتعد عنها، وأخرى عن ولد هزوه ليوقظوه من حياته ويخبروه أنها كانت حلمًا، وكذلك كان كل من أحبهم فيها، وأن هذا العالم المتفحم، هذا السجن، هذه الوحدة، هي الحياة الحقيقية. عن كائنات في كتب، بظهور قرمزية، وأعمدة فقرية مكسورة، قدمت نفسها قربانًا، لئلا تعيش في عالم يعتبر كل ما خُط فيه ضربا من الخيال. عن امرأة فقدت شعورها فنفذت النار من ظهرها وحرقت قلبها حتى ترى جثة مولود صغير،ولا تفكر في شئ سوى أنه سيكون هناك جثة أخرى، عن رجال ونساء يسيرون في عالم من الظلال يبحثون عن أحبائهم،عن وحوش تبسط أجنحتها و تحط على جلد البشر وترقد هناك في انتظار انقضاء مدتها، عن جيش أبالسة جهنمي أسقطته السماء ليقتل بمجرد أن يعانق، عن معلمة تعيش في عالم تدب فيه الحياة في الكتب، ولا تستطيع الهرب من كتاب التشريح الذي تلاحقها صور منه في كل مكان تذهب إليه صور لأجساد حين يتوقف كل شئ فيها عن الحياة)
تلك ليست حكاية خيالية من قصص ألف ليلة وليلة، ولا أسطورة فلكلورية، ولا قصة تحكيها جنية بحر ، إنما هي الحقيقة المجردة، حقيقة ما حدث في ناجازاكي في اليابان إثر القاء القنبلة النووية، عندما ينسلخ الجلد ويبقى الكائن حي، عندما يتشوه البشر ويعانون آلامًا لا طاقة لبشر بها، والأنكى من ذلك أنها تلازمهم طول الحياة،النص السابق كل حرف فيه حقيقة، إنها قصة الظلال المحترقة .
ناجازاكي ودلهي أواخر الحرب العالمية الثانية، إسلام آباد وكراتشي إبان حقبة الثمانينات، أفغانستان و نيويورك في مطلع الألفية الثانية، بين ذلك المكان والزمان تدور أحداث هذه الرواية، رواية عن ألم البشر واغترابهم وغربتهم ، رواية عن إمرأة يابانية أحبت ألماني فقضى نحبه في القنبلة النووية، وتركت على جسدها آثار لا تنمحي، وتركت في نفسها جروحًا لا تندمل، تسافر بعدها إلى الهند لمقابلة شقيقة حبيبها، تلك الألمانية المتزوجة من بريطاني وحياتها الزوجية موضة للانتهاء، لتقابل عندهما ذلك الهندي المسلم الذي يغير حياتها وتغير حياته هلى الاخرى.
في درب الغربة تدور الرواية، عما فعلته الحروب بنا، وما فعله الإرهاب بالعالم.
عن الفقد في أبشع صوره.
روايةجميلة ممتعة ، وترجمة إيمان حرزاللهمذهلة بكل معنى الكلمة.
24-11-2015
March 26, 2016
This has quickly become one of my favourite books of all time. It's an important and beautifully written read, give it a chance.
September 2, 2021
It is a saga of two families whose lives are inextricably intertwined. It is an epic tale sweeping across continents over a sixty-year period. Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie begins in Nagasaki on August 9, 1945; goes to India just before partition in 1947; to Pakistan in 1982-1983; and concludes in New York and Afghanistan in 2001-2002.
The central figure is Hiroko Tanaka, a Nagasaki resident. The novel opens with her as a twenty-one-year-old and engaged to a man of English and German descent. When the atomic bomb is dropped on Nagasaki, Hiroko loses her fiancé and her father. In addition to her emotional and psychological scars, Hiroko carries disfiguring burn scars on her back. Having lost everything in Nagasaki, she decides to make a clean break. She visits her fiancé’s half-sister, Elizabeth Weiss, who lives in India with her husband, James Burton. There she meets and marries Sajjad Ashraf, a Muslim employed by the Burtons. The partition in India forces the newly-weds to relocate temporarily to Istanbul then to Pakistan which they call home for nearly twenty years until Sajjad’s untimely death. Hiroko then relocates to New York to live with Elizabeth. The ties connecting the Tanakas, the Ashrafs, and the Burtons extend to their respective children, Henry Burton and Raza Ashraf, and to Henry’s daughter, Kim Burton.
Shamsie skillfully infuses the different time frames and locations with historical and political events. Through Hiroko’s eyes, we see Nagasaki in the aftermath of the atomic bomb. We see the escalating tensions in India between British colonists, Hindus, and Muslims. From neighboring Pakistan, we see Afghanistan’s armed struggle against Russian occupation. And in New York, we see the aftermath of 9/11.
Set against the backdrop of global conflicts over a period of nearly sixty years, this family saga wrestles with a number of complex issues. Scenes throughout reveal cross-cultural conflicts, racism, cultural understanding, cultural arrogance, ethnocentrism, loyalty, sacrifice, family, othering, betrayal, and the displacement of a civilian population. The four sections are seamlessly woven together with transitional passages to explain the leaps in time and location. The characters are unique, believable, and speak in authentic voices.
Shamsie’s portrayal of Hiroko is particularly effective. She emerges as independent, loving, strong, tender, adaptable, and the anchor which binds the narrative and families together. Her fluency in several languages illustrates how language facilitates understanding and appreciation of a culture. But fluency in languages and dialects can also have catastrophic consequences, as evidenced by Raza. Having inherited his mother’s language skills, Raza sets in motion a series of events which end tragically. Hiroko’s character also contrasts racism with acceptance of the other. When Kim Burton seeks understanding for reporting an Afghan Muslim to authorities solely on the basis of a shared religion with the 9/11 terrorists, Hiroko responds with, “Should I look at you and see Harry Truman?” Enough said.
A very powerful and compelling novel showing the impact of global conflicts on the lives of individuals. Told with compassion and sensitivity in immersive, riveting language.
Very highly recommended.
My book reviews are also available at www.tamaraaghajaffar.com
The central figure is Hiroko Tanaka, a Nagasaki resident. The novel opens with her as a twenty-one-year-old and engaged to a man of English and German descent. When the atomic bomb is dropped on Nagasaki, Hiroko loses her fiancé and her father. In addition to her emotional and psychological scars, Hiroko carries disfiguring burn scars on her back. Having lost everything in Nagasaki, she decides to make a clean break. She visits her fiancé’s half-sister, Elizabeth Weiss, who lives in India with her husband, James Burton. There she meets and marries Sajjad Ashraf, a Muslim employed by the Burtons. The partition in India forces the newly-weds to relocate temporarily to Istanbul then to Pakistan which they call home for nearly twenty years until Sajjad’s untimely death. Hiroko then relocates to New York to live with Elizabeth. The ties connecting the Tanakas, the Ashrafs, and the Burtons extend to their respective children, Henry Burton and Raza Ashraf, and to Henry’s daughter, Kim Burton.
Shamsie skillfully infuses the different time frames and locations with historical and political events. Through Hiroko’s eyes, we see Nagasaki in the aftermath of the atomic bomb. We see the escalating tensions in India between British colonists, Hindus, and Muslims. From neighboring Pakistan, we see Afghanistan’s armed struggle against Russian occupation. And in New York, we see the aftermath of 9/11.
Set against the backdrop of global conflicts over a period of nearly sixty years, this family saga wrestles with a number of complex issues. Scenes throughout reveal cross-cultural conflicts, racism, cultural understanding, cultural arrogance, ethnocentrism, loyalty, sacrifice, family, othering, betrayal, and the displacement of a civilian population. The four sections are seamlessly woven together with transitional passages to explain the leaps in time and location. The characters are unique, believable, and speak in authentic voices.
Shamsie’s portrayal of Hiroko is particularly effective. She emerges as independent, loving, strong, tender, adaptable, and the anchor which binds the narrative and families together. Her fluency in several languages illustrates how language facilitates understanding and appreciation of a culture. But fluency in languages and dialects can also have catastrophic consequences, as evidenced by Raza. Having inherited his mother’s language skills, Raza sets in motion a series of events which end tragically. Hiroko’s character also contrasts racism with acceptance of the other. When Kim Burton seeks understanding for reporting an Afghan Muslim to authorities solely on the basis of a shared religion with the 9/11 terrorists, Hiroko responds with, “Should I look at you and see Harry Truman?” Enough said.
A very powerful and compelling novel showing the impact of global conflicts on the lives of individuals. Told with compassion and sensitivity in immersive, riveting language.
Very highly recommended.
My book reviews are also available at www.tamaraaghajaffar.com
September 28, 2009
I read so much, and so quickly, that it takes a rare exception of a book to send me searching for post-it notes and a pen to write down quotes from the writing. I found the writing in this book so compelling, that I stopped reading everything else for two whole days and just immersed myself in the story of a woman who finds herself in the midst of several acts of war in the lifetime. From Nagasaki where she is scared mentally and physically, to Delhi where she runs with her new husband from the violence that surrounds the retreat of England, to the rise of the Taliban in Pakistan where she almost looses her son, to her retirement in New York city in 2001, where she lives with a dear old friend. There is so much that happens in this book, I really can't even begin to summarize the plot further than that.
"Two years after the war, they could accept an ally of Hitler sooner than they could accept someone of a different class."
Although all those circumstances may seem contrived to put together in one book, this book was so believable, that we kept catching ourselves at my bookclub talking about the characters as if they were people we knew. But in some ways they are. We are all expats living in Asia, most of us have lived in several countries, and most of us had had cross-cultural relationships. Although we haven't directly lived in the path of war, this book is us.
"We were just young and foolish, what did we know about each other? Almost nothing. It was luck, pure luck, that we discovered after marriage that our natures were so sympathetic to each other."
I don't know if a truer statement has been written about the vibe of an Asian city, "...world's urban tribes as they enter unfamiliar landscapes of chaos and possibility.. cars using their horns in a complicated and unrelenting exchange about power, intention, and mis-trust."
"Two years after the war, they could accept an ally of Hitler sooner than they could accept someone of a different class."
Although all those circumstances may seem contrived to put together in one book, this book was so believable, that we kept catching ourselves at my bookclub talking about the characters as if they were people we knew. But in some ways they are. We are all expats living in Asia, most of us have lived in several countries, and most of us had had cross-cultural relationships. Although we haven't directly lived in the path of war, this book is us.
"We were just young and foolish, what did we know about each other? Almost nothing. It was luck, pure luck, that we discovered after marriage that our natures were so sympathetic to each other."
I don't know if a truer statement has been written about the vibe of an Asian city, "...world's urban tribes as they enter unfamiliar landscapes of chaos and possibility.. cars using their horns in a complicated and unrelenting exchange about power, intention, and mis-trust."
March 24, 2022
Me ha encantado, un libro muy intimista y poético
August 14, 2009
A wonderful read, terrifying in parts, heart-breaking in others and beautifully written throughout - this story has had a huge impact on me and I know it will linger for a long while.
From the beginning of the book when the atomic bomb is dropped on Nagasaki, the effects of this act and of war on the familes involved in the story line shows just how pointless war is.
Kamila Shamsie paints some vivid pictures that are difficult to shift and often invoke high emotion.
I'd highly recommend this novel
From the beginning of the book when the atomic bomb is dropped on Nagasaki, the effects of this act and of war on the familes involved in the story line shows just how pointless war is.
Kamila Shamsie paints some vivid pictures that are difficult to shift and often invoke high emotion.
I'd highly recommend this novel
December 11, 2017
Há livros que estão arrumados na estante há anos e nunca foram lidos e não sabemos porquê. Não me lembro sequer de ter comprado este livro; talvez tenha sido uma oferta ou alguma promoção. A capa, o título e a sinopse são apelativos, mas o livro já teve arrumado no fundo da prateleira, já esteve numa pilha para ser vendido, e só na semana passada é que peguei nele, ao acaso, por não ter ideia concreta do que ler depois de ter acabado o romance do Afonso Cruz.
Embora não seja uma obra literária de excelência, é um livro muito bem conseguido, na medida em que condensa 60 anos de história em pouco mais do que 400 páginas, onde se cruzam várias personagens, várias décadas e vário países.
A história decorre em quatro momentos diferentes no tempo: 1945, em Nagasáqui, aquando do lançamento da bomba atómica; 1947, em Deli (Índia); 1982-83, em Carachi (Paquistão); e 2001-2002, em Nova Iorque e Afeganistão. Hiroko e o seu trajecto de vida são os fios condutores desta história, que se desenrola com fluidez e clareza. Recomendo.
Embora não seja uma obra literária de excelência, é um livro muito bem conseguido, na medida em que condensa 60 anos de história em pouco mais do que 400 páginas, onde se cruzam várias personagens, várias décadas e vário países.
A história decorre em quatro momentos diferentes no tempo: 1945, em Nagasáqui, aquando do lançamento da bomba atómica; 1947, em Deli (Índia); 1982-83, em Carachi (Paquistão); e 2001-2002, em Nova Iorque e Afeganistão. Hiroko e o seu trajecto de vida são os fios condutores desta história, que se desenrola com fluidez e clareza. Recomendo.
June 30, 2009
This book, from the Orange Prize shortlist, has had terribly mixed reviews. How can a book that tries to tie together the bombing of Nagasaki, the partition of India, the Afghan conflict and 9/11 possibly work? Well, it does - I absolutely loved it. Hiroko is a wonderful character - she lives on the page in a way a character hasn't for me in ages, and she's the anchor that holds this enormous story together. The writing is quite beautiful - some of the imagery will really stay with me, but it really doesn't spoil the narative, quite the opposite. The moments of tenderness - her time with Konrad, the beginning of her relationship with her husband, after some of the deaths (there's a few - they make you ache with grief...) - are quite superb. The narrative thrust is sustained and ambitious - it's a blooming good story, well told. Learnt a fair bit about the politics (India/Pakistan/Afghanistan) that I didn't know before too, but in the nicest way - by slow immersion in a wonderful story. A definite 10/10 for me...
November 21, 2023
ملحمة تاريخية مذهلة تبدأ من القنبلة النووية على ناجازاكي باليابان الى نهاية عهد طالبان بعد هجمات ١١ سبتمبر عبر هيروكو وحياتها ، مليئة بالشجن والمعاناة والألم ممتعة لأقصى حد .
لم تكن في قائمة الكتب التي أنوي قراءتها هذا العام أبداً ولا بالمستقبل القريب فهي من الروايات التي ندمت على شراءها منذ البداية ولكني أبقيتها بالرف القريب مني بسبب دار النشر التي أثق بإختياراتها كثيراً ، ألتقطتها يدي صدفة وحملتها مع مجموعة من الكتب ضمن أمتعتي برحلة سريعة ولم أتخيل أنني قد أقرأها ، لكن شاءت الأقدار أن أنتهي من تلك المجموعة سريعاً قبل أن تنتهي رحلتي ولم يتبقى لدي سواها فقرأتها مجبرة وندمت بعد ذلك على اهمالي لها فترة طويلة من الزمن ولكني لم اندم على قراءتها أبداً . مختلفة عما قرأته سابقاً كثيراً ومميزة ، اطلعتني على حياة وتاريخ لم أكن أعلم به ولم يكن من اهتماماتي فأصابني الحزن كثيراً بالمعاناة والمآسي التي تخلفها الحروب على البشر والدول.
نادراً ما اصف تفاصيل الرواية في مراجعاتي حتى لا أحرق الأحداث على من يقرأها بعدي ، لذلك أكتفي فقط بأن أنصح بقراءتها وبشدة.
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22-7-2017
لم تكن في قائمة الكتب التي أنوي قراءتها هذا العام أبداً ولا بالمستقبل القريب فهي من الروايات التي ندمت على شراءها منذ البداية ولكني أبقيتها بالرف القريب مني بسبب دار النشر التي أثق بإختياراتها كثيراً ، ألتقطتها يدي صدفة وحملتها مع مجموعة من الكتب ضمن أمتعتي برحلة سريعة ولم أتخيل أنني قد أقرأها ، لكن شاءت الأقدار أن أنتهي من تلك المجموعة سريعاً قبل أن تنتهي رحلتي ولم يتبقى لدي سواها فقرأتها مجبرة وندمت بعد ذلك على اهمالي لها فترة طويلة من الزمن ولكني لم اندم على قراءتها أبداً . مختلفة عما قرأته سابقاً كثيراً ومميزة ، اطلعتني على حياة وتاريخ لم أكن أعلم به ولم يكن من اهتماماتي فأصابني الحزن كثيراً بالمعاناة والمآسي التي تخلفها الحروب على البشر والدول.
نادراً ما اصف تفاصيل الرواية في مراجعاتي حتى لا أحرق الأحداث على من يقرأها بعدي ، لذلك أكتفي فقط بأن أنصح بقراءتها وبشدة.
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22-7-2017
March 26, 2016
بعض الأعمال تعرف طريقها إلينا لأنها تحمل جزء منا بصورة أو بأخرى ...
هذه الرواية تعتبر مرور عابر على ما حدث في العالم بدءا من احداث ناجازاكى إلى أحداث الحاى عشر من سبتمبر
الفكرة والترابط والأحداث والمشاعر كل شئ في هذا العمل جيد
والألم كذلك
ستشعر مع الإنتهاء منه أنك فقدت عائلة لا صديق ...
هل حقا هناك من كُتب عليهم الفقد طوال حياتهم ...
سأفتقد سِاجًد جدا لا زلت حزينة لموته ...
هذه الرواية جعلتنى أعلم أننا لم يعد هناك باعة كتب حقا بعد أن اشتريتها بعشرة جنيهات كروايات ليست ذات قيمة ...
لو يعلمون ...
هذه الرواية تعتبر مرور عابر على ما حدث في العالم بدءا من احداث ناجازاكى إلى أحداث الحاى عشر من سبتمبر
الفكرة والترابط والأحداث والمشاعر كل شئ في هذا العمل جيد
والألم كذلك
ستشعر مع الإنتهاء منه أنك فقدت عائلة لا صديق ...
هل حقا هناك من كُتب عليهم الفقد طوال حياتهم ...
سأفتقد سِاجًد جدا لا زلت حزينة لموته ...
هذه الرواية جعلتنى أعلم أننا لم يعد هناك باعة كتب حقا بعد أن اشتريتها بعشرة جنيهات كروايات ليست ذات قيمة ...
لو يعلمون ...
September 28, 2015
رواية مشحونة بالدراما والعاطفة والحزن ..تبدأ أحداثها من 9 أغسطس 1945 بقنبلة ناجازاكي مرورا بالاحتلال السوفيتي لأفغانستان الى باكستان واحداث مابعد الحادي عشر من سبتمبر وعودة مرة أخرى لأفغانستان هذا البلد الذي قال عنة أحد أبطال الرواية (مات جميع من لك ما عدا واحداً ,ياالله ماذا فعل الافغان لحمل كل هذة الاحزان؟) ...رواية ملحمية أتمنى أن يعمل منها فلم
الترجمة بهذه الرواية مش ولابد..النهاية المفتوحة ماأعجبتني دائما ومازلت أكرة النهايات المفتوحة.
الترجمة بهذه الرواية مش ولابد..النهاية المفتوحة ماأعجبتني دائما ومازلت أكرة النهايات المفتوحة.
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