The Kingdom of this World by Alejo Carpentier

[Diane]

Rating: 4 Stars
Read: August 2016

An interesting fictional account of the Haitian slave uprising and subsequent brutal reign of Haitian King Henri-Cristophe, as narrated through the eyes of a slave. The setting is the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The book was written by Cuban novelist Alejo Carpentier, and is one of two books of his on the list.

Lots of good stuff in this short book - history woven with superstition, voodoo, and magical realism. Gives you a good sense of the time and place. I kept finding myself searching for more information about the characters and the history of Haiti. I think this book deserves to be on the list since it is one of the earliest examples of Latin American magic realism.

[Kelly_Hunsaker_reads]

4 stars

Although this book is well-written, simple and sparse in style, and is full of interesting history, I just didn't connect with it. I found myself looking up many of the people and events because it was all new to me. I probably leaned heavily toward a three star rating except for the fact that it brought so much knowledge into my life. So I bumped it up to four.

[1001shelf]

The link is fixed. This is the official link for the book as it was the original posted.

[Gail]

I read The Kingdom of This World as part of the #readingaroundtheworld challenge on Litsy. I was forewarned to read up on Haitian history before tackling the book and I am very glad that I did as many of the characters and events were given context that the author does not bother with in the novel. Also I have read Alejo Carpentier's Explosion in a Cathedral which forced me to learn a great deal about the French revolution from the perspective of the land owners in the French colonies. Further I had heard of and read about the Black Code or Code Noir which framed the treatment of slaves after Napoleon ratified it.

In contrast, the author Alejo Carpentier, who grew up in Cuba, gives us the perspective of historical events largely through the eyes of a slave/former slave Ti Noël who is experiencing the events as they happen and who has only his own immediate experiences and some gossip from friends and associates to give him the largely picture. As Ti Noël also views the world through his own religion, vodou, and his relationship with nature which is tightly woven with the land, we the readers are given a much more intimate view of the extreme violence perpetrated on the people of Haiti and the horrible scars left over from centuries of abuse.

I found it to be a very moving book which I believe is best read in a gulp so that the "magical" part of this first venture into magical realism comes through the violence.

I gave it 5 stars.

[Kristel]

Gail wrote: "I read The Kingdom of This World as part of the #readingaroundtheworld challenge on Litsy. I was forewarned to read up on Haitian history before tackling the book and I am very glad t..."

I just love it when I can learn so much from reading fiction!

[Pip]

Carpentier was a Cuban writer who undertook to write historical fiction, mythologising Latin-American experience. In this novel his protagonist is Ti-Noel, as a slave under French rule in Haiti, who is influenced by a slave, Macandal, who preaches revolt and has supernatual powers, it is widely believed by the slaves. There are differing accounts of Macandal's death by burning: by the French who believe he died and deserved to do so, and by the slaves who believe that he flew up to heaven and was saved by African gods. Carpentier skilfully shows how differing beliefs lead to differing perceptions of reality. Twenty years later another slave uprising is quashed and extermination of the whole black population is mooted. Ti Noel is taken to Cuba by his master. Later he is won in a card game by another plantation owner and eventually manages to buy a passage back to Haiti, where he finds that the slaves have been freed, the French have gone and the new regime of King Henri Christophe, a former slave, is more diabolical than anything that went before. King Henri is overthrown in turn and the country is run by mulattos. Ti-Noel lives in the ruins of his former owner's estate, retreating into the beliefs he learned from Macandal. He realises that despite the suffering, man is capable of loving and can find his individual greatness in the kingdom of this world, not the kingdom of heaven.

[Tatjana]

While reading I really enjoyed this book. It is set in Haiti, and describes an important moment in their history, including slave uprising and liberation of country. It is one of those magic realism stories, you usually find among South and Central America writers, making them really interesting and unique.
Nevertheless, three weeks after finishing the book I can hardly remember its contents.
Therefore, my rating would be 3 stars.

[Laokannan]

Just a remark to the one who started this thread, Alejo Carpentier never won the Nobel Prize. The book indeed is a fine example of Latin American literature and one of the earliest work of magic realism that subsequently inspired Rulfo, Márquez, Vargas Llosa, Allende and other Latin American writers, but for me Carpentier's best novel is Explosion in a Cathedral (El Siglo de las Luces), a beautiful and vivid depiction of the impact of the French Revolution in the Caribbean, and the savagery implemented to execute it. Carpentier is, for me, the best Latin American writer ever.