A Story of Smelling

Patrick Süskind:
Perfume:A Story of a Murderer
(1985)

A story of smelling, set in the 18. centruy in France. My first question was to this book: is it necessary to set this story in this century? Or is it that kind of „historical” fiction, which use the past only for spectacular scenery, which makes the story extravagant.

Well, I think, it was necessary, first of all because of the life of the Parisians in the 18. century. It was quite crowded on the modern way, but still quite medieval.

So, the story is about a murderer, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Grenouille means frog), who was an unwanted child, an orphan who has a special attribution, he has no personal scent, but on the other way he has the talent to recognise odours, like a dog, or even more perfectly. Like this attribution shows us, the story has several magical realistic elements.

As an orphan he has quite little chance to grow up, even to be one or two years old, but he survives all these years, even the hard times as an apprenticed to a tanner. This is one of the magical realistic elements.

And later, when he spends seven years in a cave, where he discovers finally, he has no personal scent, is for example an other one.

He creates his first perfume in th laboratory of a great perfumier, Baldini. He creates the perfumes, Baldini gives his name to them. Grenouille creates the perfumes quite easily. The real challenge begins for him many years later, when he starts to create human body odours, which influence the behaviour of other people to him.

The horrific part of the story starts after this, when Grenouille decides to kill young virgins to make an only one an perfect odour.

The end of the story remains true to itself, still full with horrific and magical realistic elements.
Although it’s a quite bizarre and sometimes disgusting theme, the basic idea and the storytelling makes it interesting. A really amusing book.

(This review was written to the Fall Into Reading challenge. More>>>)

The White King

Gyorgy Dragoman: The White King

The life of the former „Eastern Block” form the point of view of a child. Djata is a 11 years old boy, his father is at a forced labor camp. This is the most important motive in the book, which contains of several grotesque and absurd, but still anecdotic stories from the life in Romania in the middle of the 1980’s.

Well, a 11 years old child is our narrator, which means, there is a conflict between what we know about life and what Djata tells us about it. It is similar to the Fatelessness by Imre Kertesz. First of all because this book gives quite often the feeling, everything what happens is normal. This is the “normal” way of life. And of course there are several moments which are typical for an 11 years old boy, but still there are always something bizarre and terrible in the background. Djata is always waiting home his father, and there are small signals, sometimes just some words in his storytelling, that their life becomes harder and harder. And even there is a conflict within the family, between his mother and his grandparents (the parrent’s of his father), which makes the situation more complicated.

Not only the point of view is from a child, but the way of storytelling. He uses sometimes very long sentences, as usually a child, who wants to tell the people many-many things, and he wants to tell it as fast as possible, and he looks like almost to forget to breathe.

The title of the book refers to the white king of the chess board, and this motive appears only a few times in the stories.

I’ve said at the start of this post, this is a book about the life in the former Eastern Block. Well, it is not quite accurate, because there were quite large differences between the countries in this part of Europe in that period. Although some things are very familiar to our former life here in Hungary, for example the motive of the brutal and tyrannical teachers, or even the scene, when Djata and his friend find the private screening room for the VIPs of the Party in the cinema (this is like a scene from the grotesque film of Peter Bacso, The Witness), and during reading the book there was nothing really shocking in this book, I should say, we have had still more freedom, a better and easier life here in Hungary.

And although there are some ( for me) uninteresting stories in this book, the end, the last story was really worth to wait.

The Sunday Salon: Hard to write review

There are two books I’ve read already weeks (month?) ago, and I always promise to write review, but I couldn’t manage still. Well, I don’t write reviews about every book I read, but these are on my list to the Fall into Reading Challenge list, and I have also the aim to write every books on that list something.

Well, I think, the problem is more difficult than I would not have enough time to post about these books.

The one book is The True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey. First of all the title of this novel is interesting for me. The True Story (History) of… that’s the typically postmodern fun, I love. I know, when a contemporary novel has that kind of title, it should be interpreted ironically, and of course the story of the book is a fiction. Either is about a real person or just a fictive someone. So that’s why I would say, I don’t care about what happened with Ned Kelly, I don’t care about very little episode of his life, the way of the narration is for me more important, more interesting.

Ok, it’s still important, that he was an outlaw. Not because it’s such an adventurous and exciting thing. But because this book is about who has the right to tell the truth. Maybe a journalist, who wants to sell more and more sample of his newspaper? Or a politician? Or… or… or maybe Ned Kelly. He has the right too to tell about his life what he want. The book plays with the idea of the found manuscripts (like the Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco). We can read Ned Kelly’s „letters” to his daughter, who he has never seen. But even this perspective makes Ned Kelly’s words more authentic than the other people, even when he was an outlaw.

The other book is Frater Gregorius by Mor Jokai. Every time I start to write the review I have the problem, I can’t write about a Jokai-novel for people, who has never read a book by him. Or even other Hungarian historical fictions about the middle of the 16. century. The book was interesting for me to compare the characters with other novel’s. Frater Gregorius (George Martinuzzi) was a statesman, a monk, a cardinal, in some novels he is a hated figure, but Jokai makes from his life a fairy tale (The book is from the end of the 19. century, the historian fictions from that period in Central-Europe are mostly romances) Ambition, hatred, revenge are in this novel good attributes, everything what Martinuzzi does, is good, because it’s good for the nation. Jokai is obviously of the opinion, Frater Gregorius was a good statesman for the Hungarian people, he is much much better than usually the Hungarian statesmen were. Jokai’s style is quite ironical, he talks quite often directly to his readers, and it’s a good fun to follow the storytelling of „the great storyteller”. But it’s so hard to write about it.

La Fermosa

Lion Feuchtwanger: Raquel:The Jewess of Toledo (1955)

The story of La Fermosa (Dona Raquel) is a famous Spanish story from the end of the 12. centrury. She was the paramour of King Alfonso VIII of Castile and Toledo for almost seven years. Her life with the king and her dead is adopted in several literary works, like in the chronicle of Alfons X, or in a play of Franz Grillparzer and of course, in the historical novel of Lion Feuchtwanger.
In his novel Feuchtwanger deals with the circumstances of the murder. Raquels father, a successful and envied Jewish merchant is the financial adviser of the king. He is a confident, straight, sometimes stubborn man, and typically NOT an everybody’s darling. But Catille and Toledo are still the lands of tolerance in this time, Jews, Christians, and Muslims live together, or try to live together. Althought the king is an undecided man, he seems to be very easy influenced, and he is quick-tempered someone. He likes to follow the knightly virtues (his mother-in-law is Eleanor of Aquitaine), and of course he wans to be a great Christian king. But after the Disaster of Alarcos(1188) people gets angry and the Jews are blamed for the loss of the battle, and a little group of kinght who are sent to protect Raquel and her father kill them in cold blood.
As I said, I think, this stories is more about the circumstances. The relationship between Raquel and the king is really schematic. As a female reader from the 21.centruy I would have enjoyed the story more from the point of view of Raquel.

More reviews by me for
The German Reading Challenge...
Fall into Reading 2009 Challenge
The Decades Challenge 09...

The Remains of the Day

Kazuo Ishiguro: The Remains of the Day (1989)

Somehow it’s a very sad story. There is an English butler, Mr Stevens, who has his philosophy of the importance of dignity. It looks like sometimes, it is the most important thing in his life. His whole life is intended for this principle. Of course, when someone serves other people for a lifetime, it can be an important principle quite easily. But reading Mr Stevens’ reminiscences of his life in Darlington Hall, there is a dissonance between what he says and what other people (we, the readers too) may think about him.

In the main line of the story, we are in the 1950’s, Darlington Hall the former home of the noble Darlington family has a new owner, an American, Mr Faraday. The feelings, that everything has changed after the ww2 extremely, is still there. The good old, “classical” English life seems to be over forever.

Mr Farraday encourages Stevens to borrow a car to take a well-earned break, a "motoring trip." And Stevens receives a letter from an ex-colleague, Miss Kenton (Mrs. Benn) at the same time. So Stevens starts this motoring trip, and he is going to visit Ms Kenton, and hopes, that the woman wants back after 20 years to Darligton Hall.

This trip is very strange. Stevens meets (mostly) accidentally a lot of people, and he can’t talk about other themes, only just about dignity. He is sometimes very ridiculous, and still we feel also sorry for him.

During this trip we can read also Stevens reminiscences about the life in Darlington Hall in the 1920’s and 1930’s. Lord Darlington was a friend of the Germans, he wanted to help the diplomatic talk between the UK and Germany, and there was a conference in the 1920’s in Darlington Hall also with American and French guests. It’s sometimes hard to decide, what kind of man Lord Darlington was. (And Stevens opinion even doesn’t help us.) Was he an old-fashioned gentleman, who wants to help the loser of a war? An amateur diplomat? Or he was someone who turely sympathized with the Nazi ideas? I think, he was an easily influenced man, a bit stupid someone. But Steven idealises him. He notices, that other people have a different opinion, but he thinks Lord Darlington was a good man. But he doesn’t dare to speak about it, this is just his “internal” opinion. There are situations, when Stevens denies, that he was the butler of Lord Darlington.

I feel sorry for Stevens is many situations. He thinks, he is indispensable at an international conference, he has to work even more than perfect. But while he wants to fill the expectations of his employer and the guests, his father dies, and the housekeeper, Miss Kenton leaves Darlington Hall. The people leaves him, who really needs him, really want to be with him.
Very sad, but still a wonderful story.

(This review was written for the challenge: Fall into Reading 09)

Take a look at my list for this challenge here...

Love after war

Bernhard Schlink: The Reader (1995)

First of all I have to admit, I don’t like the stories about teenage boys with the first love and the first sexual experiences. By starting to read this story I’ was a bit afraid, it will more focus on this motive.

The novel starts with the first meeting between the 15 years old boy Michael Berg and the 36 years old Hannah Schmitz in a West German city, in 1958. The story is told by Michael (later, when he is over 40), and the first part of the book is really about the relationship between these two people. The distance between them is not only because the age difference, but they are from two different worlds too. Michael is a son of a philosopher and Hanna is a tram conductress, and she is from Transylvania. This part of the book is easy to read, but it changes very soon, during the second part of the book.

In the second part we met with our protagonists in a court room. Michael attends a law school, and with a group of other students he observes war crimes trials, and Hanna is among those middle-aged women, former SS-guards in Auschwitz, who are now the defendants of a trial (a holocaust survivor writes her memories, the charges against Hanna and the other women base on that book).

That makes the age different between the protagonists a bit more different. Hanna was already an adult during the WW2, she was an active member of that society, she has her own experiences about that regime. Michael is a member of an other generation. He knows the era of the Nazis was terrible, but his knowledge is indirect, his generation has not its own experiences about it. The situation for Michael’s generation is easy: everyone who lived in the regime before is guilty. The life is easy: someone is a sinner or a victim. But Michael discovers through his feeling for Hanna, it isn’t so simple. Of course, what Hanna did is a serious crime, and everyone, Michael too, keeps just Hanna to sentence for prison.

The book is mostly about Michael thoughts. Moral considerations, the question of crime and punishment, the difference between the generations, the difference between common and individual sins. The easy read at the beginning turns into maybe the biggest moral problems of our era.

It’s still important in the story the feeling between Michael and Hanna, it’s important till the end of the book, but all with these circumstances it’s is in an unusual and a very serious context.
Excellent novel.

I would like to recommend some similar books in the topic the ww2 form the point of view of a younger generation:
Morbus Kitahara by Christoph Ransmayr English version: The Dog King (see on amazon...)
Arnyas foutca [the Main Street of Shadows] by László Márton
And a novel about the problem of the common and the individual sins:
Penize od Hitlera [Hitler’s Money] by Radka Denemarkova

(This review was written for the challenges: Fall into Reading 09 and German Reading Challenge 2009)

His story - her story

Margaret Atwood: The Penelopiad (2005)

I love the idea of this book. Telling the famous story about Odysseus' journey from the point of view of his wife, Penelope.

Penelope's name is traditionally associated with faithfulness, because she keps her suitors at bay in Odysseus long absence. She is like a statue of the faithfulness in the stories have been told during many-many centuries.

In the book Penelopiad she is a vivid character, although she is already dead, or better to say: her soul in Hades. Now, in the 21. Century. She knows many things about our life and compares it with her time several times. She tells us her own story but from a point of view of the 21. Century. She always contradicts the old myths. She knows myths, legends, the stories of epic poems are sometimes quite different to what has really happened. The adventures of Odysseus sound really good, but these are mostly just fictions, products of the poets' imagination.

These are stories told in the men's world. And what is with the women's world? The male poets' imaginations about women's life are sometimes nonsense.

Are there really only just two ways? The way of the wife (Penelope) and the vamp's one (Helen of Troy)? Is there a type of women, for whom men are fighting? And is there an another type of women, who are waiting for men end the fight? (Well, it looks like the main point in the men's world is: fighting.)

Penelope tells a story about her life which wasn't a fairy tale. But she was still the daughter of Icarius (a king) she was the wife of Odysseus (another king).

An totally another perspective is the Chorus' one. This is from the twelve maids killed by Telemachus, (the son of Odysseus and Penelope). The voice of the Chorus is quite sarcastic and wants to point to the value of the women's life (the worthless of women's life?) in the Greek myth. Those women's life who aren't goddesses, or queens or other noble and famous or extraordinary someone.

So, I love this novel, it's really a bright idea, and I love the opinion of this book, myths are just fiction of people, and now there is an other one.

The book was published as part of the Canongate Myth Series. Other book of this series is for example the Weight by Jeanette Winterson, which is a bit different, and it's more about the eternal desire of storytelling.

And I would like to mention an other book, which is related to Atwood's novel. It's the novel A pillanat [The Moment] by Magda Szabo. It's about the idea not Aeneas arrived in Italy to establish a new homeland after the Trojan War, but his wife. This story also contradicts to the well-known myth from the point of view of a woman.

(This review was written for the challenge: Fall into Reading 09)

Take a look at my list for this challenge here...

Enjoyable fiction about the past

Philippa Gregory: The Other Boleyn Girl (2001)

Actually, I have a problem with the title of this novel. Of course, before reading, I thought, Anne is the famous Boleyn girl and Mary is the other one. But after I’ve finished this books, I’m a bit confused. Who is the other one?

Well, the novel is a historical fiction. I think, the main characters and the main events are well known. King Henry VIII, Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, George Boleyn, The Duke of Norfolk, etc.

The novel starts with Anne’s arriving at the court and ends with her execution. It’s told by Anne’s sister, Mary Boleyn. And that’s why I’m a bit confused. The narrator is Mary, but the story she tells us is Anne’s life in the court. It looks like Mary tells us a story about Anne, about the other Boleyn girl.

But anyway, on which girl’s life is the story more focused, the choice of the narrator is perfect for a historical fiction. Mary Boleyn is (almost) always there where something important (something “historical”) happens, but she is mostly just an eyewitness of the event and not the protagonist. Excellent point of view for a narrator.

Beside that we can read about a famous story from this perspective, we can also learn the life of Mary Boleyn. (And yes, I think now, she is the other one.) We can read about the time she was the mistress of the king, about her first and - of course - about her second marriage. Etc.

However Anne’s life is more interesting. At least for me. Things we can learn about Mary sound sometimes quite stupid. Just think of the opinion, a son is more important than a daughter. Everyone at the court has this opinion, even Anne and Lady Boleyn too. Everyone, except Mary and her husband. They think about it like the modern people, like us. That makes sometimes the story a bit ridiculous. Are only Mary and William Stafford “clever” and all the other people in the story “stupid”?

Nevertheless the book is still enjoyable, because my reading focused more on the historical segment of the book, and not the relationship between Mary and William.

I think, Gregory's way of storytelling pulls the reader into world of the novel very suggestive. And that makes the fiction about the past OK.

(This review was written for the challenge: Fall into Reading 09)

One historical event, several point of views

E. L. Doctorow: The March (2005)

One historical event, several point of views. The March by E. L. Doctorow remind me sometimes of Sandor Marai’s novel about the hours after Caesar’s assassination. We can learn during reading that book what kind of thoughts had the residents of a spa town after Caesar death. Everybody has his own opinion, the patricians, the innkeepers, the bakers, the eunuchs, even Caesar’s doctor, or the people who are left out of the conspiracy. So, we can read several little personal stories about the great man and the big historical event.

And that is, why I think, Doctorow’s book is something like Marai’s one. We can read in the book The March several little personal stories about the American Civil War. About Sherman’s infamous march in 1864. This is the central plot of the book, the central story actually told by other stories. Doctorow mingles fictional characters with real ones. We can learn Sherman’s point of view about this March. But also the fate of many soldiers and civilians.

Many people take part of this march for this or that reason. Dr. Wrede Sartorius is a European doctor, interested only in his profession, in the healing, I would say, he hates war and army. He aims to help not only the Northern but the Southern soldiers and civilians too. Emily Thomson, a well-born Southerners joins to this march after her father’s death. She became a nurse working with Sartorius.

Pearl is young girl, a “white Negro” an illegitimate daughter of a plantation owner became a drummer of the army first, later a nurse, also in the “hospital” of Wrede Sartorius. I like her character. She is much more smart than she looks at the first time. And I think, her life, her chances to live a happy live represents the humanity in the story mostly.

And there are another characters in the book like Archie and Will escaped from the prison by the start of the march. Some reviewers say they are comic figures, but I have another opinion. They are such annoying characters. Especially Will. He is not a good man. He harms innocent people’s life. Like the photographer and his assistant. Well, I know, this is the brutality of the war.

At the end from the personal stories we can get a compact story, which is fuller and much more to say, as the narrator trough an only one point of view (from an outsider’s perspective) would have told the event.

(This review was written for the challenge: Fall into Reading 09)

Fall into Reading 2009 - My list

A new reading challenge for me?
Yep.

The site http://callapidderdays.com/
hosts a reading challenge for this autumn, the
Fall Into Reading 2009

So, here is my list:

Book I started to read, but still not finished:
The March by E. L. Doctorow √
(Review here....)
Frater Gyorgy [Frater Gregorius] by Mor Jokai√
(mini-review here)

A fenykepesz utokora [The Photographer's Posterity] by Pal Zavada

The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory √
(Review here....)

Books I'm going to read during this fall:

The Penelopiad by Margareth Atwood √
(Review here...)
The Reader by Bernhard Schlink √
(Review here...)
The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro √
(Review here....)

The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass

The Jewess of Toledo by Lion Feuchtwanger√
(Review here....)
Perfume by Patrick Süskind√
(Review here...)
True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey√
(mini-review here)
The White King by Gyorgy Dragoman√
(Review here....)