What are you currently reading? (part 2)

[Yasna]

I finished reading My Name Is Red, which I mostly enjoyed. One thing that got tedious for me were the constant references to the will of god to justify this or that painting style. I don't mind god playing a major role in a character's life, such as the missionaries in 沈黙 (Silence), but something about artists massively censoring their own creative works based on religion irks me.

I also finished The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics. This is an absolute must-read for liberals of all types, and it's only 160 pages.

I'm currently reading a collection of short stories by Cho Se-hui called 난장이가 쏘아올린 작은 공 (The Dwarf).

[linguoboy]

I also finished The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics. This is an absolute must-read for liberals of all types, and it's only 160 pages.

I think there are very few "absolute must-reads" in this world and yet another straight white male Baby Boomer criticising every kind of identity politics except white identity politics doesn't make the list. (To quote Ta-Nehisi Coates, "That Trump ran and won on identity politics is beyond Lilla’s powers of conception. What appeals to the white working class is ennobled. What appeals to black workers, and all others outside the tribe, is dastardly identitarianism. All politics are identity politics—except the politics of white people, the politics of the bloody heirloom.")

I've kinda of fallen into a lull in my reading. Right now I'm only actively chipping away at two works, a short story in Ó Flaithearta's collection Dúil and Stefan Zweig's final novella, Schachnovelle. Although I like Zweig's writing, I didn't think I'd enjoy the latter as much. Like Ó Flaithearta, he's an excellent stylist but the story is also genuinely starting to intrigue me even though I'm not a fan of chess at all.

[Yasna]

I think there are very few "absolute must-reads" in this world and yet another straight white male Baby Boomer criticising every kind of identity politics except white identity politics doesn't make the list.

Your immediate fixation on the racial, sexual, and gender identity of the author shows exactly why this book was necessary.

(To quote Ta-Nehisi Coates, "That Trump ran and won on identity politics is beyond Lilla’s powers of conception. What appeals to the white working class is ennobled. What appeals to black workers, and all others outside the tribe, is dastardly identitarianism. All politics are identity politics—except the politics of white people, the politics of the bloody heirloom.")

Hah. Coates is pulling a sleight of hand there, redefining identity politics as anything that appeals disproportionately to a certain demographic. That's nonsense. Just because a given poverty alleviation policy might appeal disproportionately to black Americans doesn't make advocating for it identity politics.

P.S. I'd be happy to send you my copy of the book. PM me an address if you're interested.

[linguoboy]

I think there are very few "absolute must-reads" in this world and yet another straight white male Baby Boomer criticising every kind of identity politics except white identity politics doesn't make the list.

Your immediate fixation on the racial, sexual, and gender identity of the author shows exactly why this book was necessary.

As if. There's a reason why I repeatedly see this particular argument advanced by members of this particular demographic and it has everything to do with the history of power relations in this country and this particular demographic's dominance of them. As Coates points out, Lilla complete fails to see that having everything which the rest of us have had to win by through decades of organising, coalition-building, protest, etc. simply given to him as his absolute birthright is itself a form of "identity politics". Now that the rest of us have managed to use "identity politics" to come close to making us his political equals, he has to come up with some rationale for why they are fundamentally wrongheaded.

(To quote Ta-Nehisi Coates, "That Trump ran and won on identity politics is beyond Lilla’s powers of conception. What appeals to the white working class is ennobled. What appeals to black workers, and all others outside the tribe, is dastardly identitarianism. All politics are identity politics—except the politics of white people, the politics of the bloody heirloom.")

Hah. Coates is pulling a sleight of hand there, redefining identity politics as anything that appeals disproportionately to a certain demographic. That's nonsense. Just because a given poverty alleviation policy might appeal disproportionately to black Americans doesn't make advocating for it identity politics.

In what sphere? In the political arena it absolutely does. Just look at the conversation around reparations for slavery.

P.S. I'd be happy to send you my copy of the book. PM me an address if you're interested.

I work in a library. I have easy access to all Lilla's books. I'd rather read the works of someone criticising the unjust status quo rather than advocating for a return to an even more unjust status quo ante.

[Yasna]

There's a reason why I repeatedly see this particular argument advanced by members of this particular demographic and it has everything to do with the history of power relations in this country and this particular demographic's dominance of them.

It shouldn't matter, but some of the most intelligent critiques of identity politics have been made by "oppressed minorities" such as John McWhorter and Glenn Loury. Here's a recent piece by young black writer Coleman Hughes if you'd like a taste of this intellectual landscape.

Reparations and Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Pyrrhic Victory

As Coates points out, Lilla complete fails to see that having everything which the rest of us have had to win by through decades of organising, coalition-building, protest, etc. simply given to him as his absolute birthright is itself a form of "identity politics". Now that the rest of us have managed to use "identity politics" to come close to making us his political equals, he has to come up with some rationale for why they are fundamentally wrongheaded.

It's almost like you're not even familiar with the arguments made by Lilla and other reasonable critics of identity politics. All of them acknowledge that not all identity politics are bad, and that important progress has been made through some types of identity politics.

In what sphere? In the political arena it absolutely does. Just look at the conversation around reparations for slavery.

Apples and oranges. Most poverty alleviation policies directly affect citizens of all races, genders, and sexual orientations, and can effortlessly be framed without resorting to identity. Reparations for slavery? Not so much.

I'd rather read the works of someone criticising the unjust status quo rather than advocating for a return to an even more unjust status quo ante.

Where has Mark Lilla advocated returning to a more unjust status quo ante? Please be specific.

[Aleksey]

Some episods of Tom Sawyer, Robin Hood, offered by Lingualeo.

I also tryed Harry Potter, but it still seems to hard.
Too many new words.

[linguoboy]

Just finished Ahmet Altan's Son oyun (Endgame in Alexander Dawe's English translation). It's a solid noir thriller burdened with a lot of needless philosophising. You could have easily lost a fifth of the text. The God-as-novelist analogy Altan keeps returning to is precious to begin with and gets more and more tired with repetition. There's also a lot of obsessive love chatter between the romantic leads that I ended up skimming over. Some reviews praised the "unreliable narrator" but, really, I didn't see any significant discrepancies which challenged me to consider whether what he was telling me was true. Maybe I was just too impatient to finish the damn book and move on to something else.

I also read 獣の戯れ by 三島 由紀夫/Yukio Mishima in Andrew Clare's new translation (The frolic of the beasts) because a friend gave it to me. Not his best novel, but a lesser work by a master is still well worth reading. Plus it was short. There's plenty of jarring imagery and talk of obsession but I don't know that it added up to much in the end beyond "Desire will fuck you up". Books I read recently that I did really enjoy include two novellas by Yoel Hoffmann (first published as ספר יוסף and translated as Katschen / The book of Joseph), which I think I talked about elsewhere, and Nabokov's Pale fire, which was immensely clever and entertaining. Now that's how you do an unreliable narrator!

Not sure what to move on to next so I'm back to the Han. (The episodic nature of the text makes it easy to read a bit at a time while the lack of a propulsive narrative makes it easy to put down and not pick up again.) I have a friend who wants me to start The bone people by Kerri Hulme so we can talk about it but he described it as somewhat difficult to read so that's putting me off. I also feel it's high time I read something in another language, I just can't decide what.

[vijayjohn]

Quick, read La muerte de Artemio Cruz before I do!

Still trying to get through Kalila wa Dimna For Students of Arabic by Munther A. Younes, also trying a leisurely review of what little I'd read of Colloquial Hebrew, and recently started on Mahommed Kadery's adaptation (with side-by-side English translation) of Ziya' al-Din Nakhshabi's طوطی‌نامه.

[Yasna]

I finished reading 난장이가 쏘아올린 작은 공 (The Dwarf), which is essentially one of those labor movement novels that bemoan the plight of factory workers. The dynamics were somewhat different owing to the fact that South Korea's industrialization came later than that of other countries whose labor movements we commonly hear about. It reminded me of 蟹工船 (The Crab Cannery Ship) by Takiji Kobayashi.

I also read Night of Camp David by Fletcher Knebel, a 1965 novel which poses the question of "what would happen if the president of the U.S.A. went stark-raving mad?" It was really well executed, and a timely read.

I'm currently reading 무엇으로부터 위로받으세요? (What do you get comfort from?) by Dongwon Jang.

I also read 獣の戯れ by 三島 由紀夫/Yukio Mishima in Andrew Clare's new translation (The frolic of the beasts) because a friend gave it to me. Not his best novel, but a lesser work by a master is still well worth reading.

What's your favorite Mishima novel? I'm ashamed to say I still haven't read anything by him, though I have 金閣寺 (The Temple of the Golden Pavilion) and 潮騒 (The Sound of Waves) waiting on my shelves.

[linguoboy]

I also read 獣の戯れ by 三島 由紀夫/Yukio Mishima in Andrew Clare's new translation (The frolic of the beasts) because a friend gave it to me. Not his best novel, but a lesser work by a master is still well worth reading.

What's your favorite Mishima novel? I'm ashamed to say I still haven't read anything by him, though I have 金閣寺 (The Temple of the Golden Pavilion) and 潮騒 (The Sound of Waves) waiting on my shelves.

I've bounced off Golden Pavilion at least twice already. It's one of the most highly-regarded of his novels and I just don't understand why I can't get into it.

I still think 春の雪 (Spring snow) is his greatest novel and one of the greatest novels I've ever read. The whole 豐饒の海/Sea of Fertility tetralogy is worth reading though it yields diminishing returns. If you want to start with something more manageable, his short stories and plays are also masterful. 真夏の死 ("Death in midsummer") is a perceptive examination of grief that blew me away when I first read it.

[Yasna]

I've bounced off Golden Pavilion at least twice already. It's one of the most highly-regarded of his novels and I just don't understand why I can't get into it.

I still think 春の雪 (Spring snow) is his greatest novel and one of the greatest novels I've ever read. The whole 豐饒の海/Sea of Fertility tetralogy is worth reading though it yields diminishing returns. If you want to start with something more manageable, his short stories and plays are also masterful. 真夏の死 ("Death in midsummer") is a perceptive examination of grief that blew me away when I first read it.

Alright, I'm going to start with 金閣寺 then eventually find my way to 豊饒の海. I'm very hesitant to start a trilogy, never mind a tetralogy, but this one seems worth the time investment.

[Yasna]

I finished 무엇으로부터 위로받으세요? (What do you get comfort from?), which consisted of the author's photographs from South Korea, Kyoto, Hokkaido, and Bali together with his impressions.

I'm currently reading 인간병기 흙피리 (Ocarina), a thriller by Jeong Geon-seop.

[linguoboy]

Been plugging along with the reading lately. I not only finished Maqiao but also a collection of Albanian short stories I'd set down at least a year ago. Also two new books of short stories, American innovations by Rivka Galchen and Sightseeing by Rattawut Lapcharoensap.

I picked up the Galchen because I read one of her stories in that anthology from last year and found it entertainingly odd, but her collection was a bit more hit-or-miss and I can't say it really stuck with me. That's definitely not the case for the Lapcharoensap. He grew up in Bangkok but was born here in Chicago so it's an interesting combination of a familiar voice (as opposed to the slightly alienating voice of, say, the Vietnamese authors in my translation anthology) and an unfamiliar setting seen from the inside for once. I'm really annoyed to find out that he's hardly written anything since that collection came out 14 years ago since I'd love to see what he could do with a novel.

I also read another graphic novel, Monkey chef by Mike Freiheit. He actually worked in a monkey sanctuary in South Africa for a time and this is the account of his experiences there. It was interesting for me to see a younger straight guy work through his romantic issues, particularly the pressure to play the field. I've got a longer one I'm looking forward to called Upgrade soul and then a shorter one I bought mainly because a friend illustrated it. But now that the weather may finally be turning warm for a while I'm really looking forward to starting some summer reading.

[linguoboy]

I forgot to mention here that I'd finally started in earnest on La muerte de Artemio Cruz. The impetus was an RPG set in Mexico City that's slated to go for three weekly sessions so I'd initially hoped I could finish the novel more or less at the same time but I'm reading so slowly I doubt that will be the case. After a week, I'm still only a quarter of the way in. It's less daunting in both content and style than I'd feared but I still find it difficult to read more than 5-10 pages at one go.

As a fallback, I have Monica Ali's Alentejo blue. It's not as interesting as the cover blurb made it sound but it's a pretty easy read. For a while, it felt like all the Portuguese characters were somewhat unidimensional and the tourist/expats uniformly unsympathetic, but I finally finished a chapter with an English POV character who I didn't hate so perhaps things are looking up.

[linguoboy]

The Ali was disappointing. As I said, I had some misgivings about her characterisations and in the final chapter she more-or-less doubled-down on these. She was also attempting to bring all the various plotlines together at a singular event and the result was not very successful or satisfactory.

I feel like I need to be reading something queer for Pride Month so I picked up《鱷魚手記》by 邱妙津/Qiu Miaojin in the English translation (Notes of a crocodile) of Bonnie Huie. It's a largely-autobiographical novel of her lesbian awakening in Taiwan in the late 80s, told in a somewhat fractured and experimental style. I'm only about forty pages in so it's too soon for me to say much about what I think of it.

I'm over the 100-page mark in Artemio Cruz and it's giving me a lot to think about. Cruz is am undeniably despicable figure, but also somewhat sympathetic as he struggles to confront his imminent demise and the exigencies which make his last hours a psychological torment.

[Yasna]

I finished reading An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963 by Robert Dallek. I picked it up because I feel connected to JFK due to our shared Massachusetts roots, my Irish grandmother, and a temperament I easily relate to. The book was a great inside look at the job of being US president, especially all the conflicting intel and assessments a president gets from his myriad advisors, agencies, and the press. I come away from it with a new appreciation for how difficult the job is, and further certainty that the current holder of the position is woefully unqualified to perform the required duties.

I'm currently reading Neuroplasticity by Moheb Costandi, part of the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, and 吾輩は猫である (I am a Cat) by Natsume Sōseki.

I not only finished Maqiao but also a collection of Albanian short stories I'd set down at least a year ago.

Did you discover any standout Albanian authors from the collection?

[vijayjohn]

In addition to كليلة ودمنة, Colloquial Hebrew, and طوطی‌نامه (why is the font for Persian bigger than the one for Arabic? ), I've also been reading An Introduction to the Grammar of Sumerian by Gábor Zólyomi and am still working through Gayet Ciddiyim! by Gülse Birsel. I also recently started on Introduction to Attic Greek by Donald J. Mastronarde.

[linguoboy]

I not only finished Maqiao but also a collection of Albanian short stories I'd set down at least a year ago.

Did you discover any standout Albanian authors from the collection?

I keep meaning to go back and look through this to answer your question and I keep forgetting. Apparently Fatos Kongoli impressed me enough that I put one of his novels on my wishlist.

I finished the Qiu last night. I was willing to read it purely out of anthropological interest (what was it like to come out as a lesbian in Taiwan in the early 90s?) and it surprised me by telling quite a satisfying story. Although it begins very episodically, there is a through line and a dénouement. Qiu is only a year older than me and I didn't think much about how we were both in college at the same time until she started referencing bands that I listened to. It's intriguing to me to consider what kind of impact this book would have had on me had I read it closer to the time when it was published, when the memory of my college crushes was still painfully strong. I may go back one day and read it in Chinese.

Last Saturday I popped into a local used bookstore which has relocated to a more convenient spot and left with The corpse exhibition and other stories of Iraq, a volume of short stories in translation by Hassan Blasim/حسن بلاسم. It's kind of surprising to find an Arab author who lives in the diaspora and writes in Arabic, since even a lot of Arabs living in the Middle East write primarily in colonial languages. I figured he'd be an antidote to the Ali and, boy howdy! His stories are short and filled with shocking brutality. I have a feeling even this small collection is going to be tough going.

And of course I'm still working on the Fuentes. I'm trying not to get depressed by the fact that it's taken me so long and Spanish my second-best foreign language at this point. The writing really is extraordinary and it's worth the effort I'm putting into it but I just find I don't have the energy for more than about 5-10 pages per day.

[vijayjohn]

I read a short story in an issue of Mathrubhumi (basically a literary magazine) by R. Unni called ഒറ്റപ്പെട്ടവൻ [ɔˈtəpɛʈəʋɛn] 'The Loner' to myself and then read it out loud to my dad. It was a pretty funny story. It's about two drunkards witnessing Jesus's encounter with an imprisoned Pulayan (a man from the lowest subcaste) who was framed for murder. Jesus in this story is basically a bearded man who is initially unable to do a lot of basic things, including bathing in the river, since he can only walk on water, not swim in it.

[linguoboy]

Saturday morning I finally finished the Fuentes. I feel like I deserve a medal.

I got independent confirmation of the quality--and the difficulty--of the writing: Last Tuesday I was out to dinner with an Ecuadorean friend and I showed him a particularly lovely descriptive passage I'd just read. He swooned over it, too, and then confessed to having trouble with some of the same parts that send me to a dictionary. (At the top of the page, the author makes mention of picadillo de charal. We're both used to "picadillo" meaning "ground beef" so we assumed "charal" was a dialect word for some kind of a wild mammal. It isn't; it's a genus of fish found only in lakes of the Mesa Central of Mexico and, if you don't know that, it makes a later reference to dividing up "pescado" quite confusing.) And he's one of the best-read Spanish-speakers I've ever met.

Now that I can see the whole structure, I can appreciate how well-constructed it is. At first, it seems like you're hopping around in time with no rhyme nor reason, but later you can see how the memories--like ripples on a pool--are both farther back and farther forward starting from one of the most pivotal events in his life. Thankfully, the last extended reminiscence is also one of the most straightforwardly narrated (though one sequence where two people are sitting in a room together thinking about all the things they're not saying to each other gets a little hairy).

I rewarded myself for making it to the end with a short story from the Bolaño collection that restored my faith in my Spanish skills: In four prose-packed pages, there were only two words I didn't know and had to look up. So it's not just the style which makes the book hard to comprehend. All in all, I'm very glad I read it; I may even reread it when I'm close(r) to death myself.

I also polished off two other works: the Blasim collection and a compilation of recent Vietnamese short stories in translation called Wild mustard that I first started sometime last year. I think the reason it took me so long is that the stories are rather repetitive. At least half of them feature protagonists with a nostalgic longing for their home village after abandoning it for the big city. There's a lot of tragedy and despair in the stories with almost no humour or happy endings to balance it out. Blasim, for all his horror and blood, at least has humour, along with a generous dose of fantasy. Some of the stories are surreal enough to remind me of the works of Iranian author Sadegh Hedayat. Several have inconclusive endings and leave you with the feeling that they are metaphors for something, but for what exactly?

Saturday, while it was still steaming hot out, I started an early novel by Daniel Woodrell. I also have a book of short stories by Hilary Mantell (of Wolf Hall fame) that I'm most of the way through already.