Tag Archives: Colonialism

I too, would cry if I was sleeping with children (The Lover)

“very early in my life it was too late”.

I feel like that quote in itself really encapsulates the tone of the book very well- the moodiness of the book, to the writing style being a sort of recollections of instances in her life past but sort of looking at it sometimes as if from a third person kind of view? Either way, this writing style was very Lana del Rey of her. This book heavily emanates a sense of melancholic nostalgia to me.

My feelings for this book is a warped one to some degree. I have first heard of this book from another source in a book review- as I believe for one reason or another its been quite popular recently and sort of exists in the same literary canon as Lolita, Norwegian Wood, Breasts and eggs,  as “modern classics” to read. So I did choose to read this book with some knowledge of what it would be about, and I sort of came to see this book outside the more academic context and saw it through the lens of “personal enjoyment” like a book you would pick up to read as a pass time. Which I feel like I can say now that this book does not suit those circumstances- pedophilia does not work as light reading.

On another note, this weeks shitty man award goes to the older brother of the book. I think that there’s enough shitty men in every single book so far that its probably worthwhile to hold a shitty man award by the end of the semester to see who can duke it out and win the title for the shittiest man of all. I wanted to beat the shit out of the older brother in this book really bad so I probably would vote for him as being the worst. And I feel like that says a lot when theres a literal pedophile in this book.

Now that I think about it, titling this book The Lover kind of feels like one sick joke. She states in the book that she doesn’t love him, and that his feelings of fear are too great to be love. So where exactly is the love in this book? Her family dynamics is also a big oof; I kept on sighing whenever they were mentioned. However, I guess I see more love in her relationship with her mother- she is after all just a girl obsessed with her own mothers unhappiness- as I would argue is often the case with eldest daughters in immigrant families.

My question to everyone this week is: out of all the shitty men this class has seen so far, which one do you think is the worst and why?

Black Shack Alley- Colonialism and Racism

I can’t quite believe that just last week we were talking about incest and now we are making a sharp turn towards racism and colonialism. Black Shack Alley is one of the stand out novels that I have enjoyed so far in this class. This reading feels a lot more reminiscent of common literary novels that we would feature in middle school or high school, not merely because it concerns race and colonialism, but because it offers a unique perspective and portrayal whilst still highly relevant to the setting and topic of the novel. I think that the author’s writing style is very powerful and vivid especially in his depiction of the of emotional truths to the story (for lack of a better word) that goes beyond just language to evoke imagery or to paint a picture ; he seems to have this ability to envelop the reader into the moment and I feel like considering the message and setting of the book, that is a very praise worthy feat. I feel like in this case, authenticity in experiences carries the bulk of the messaging, and thus a lot of the messages in the book need not be a direct finger point yet it still maintains the same effect.

There were a lot of parts of this book that were really striking to me. One of the many memorable quotes to me was “I already knew by intuition that the devil, misery, and death were more or less the same evil individual, who persecuted the blacks above all. And I wondered in vain what blacks could have done to the devil and to the béké to be so oppressed by both.” which was a thought by Jose when he was asking questions to Médouze. I feel like no words can ever describe the sadness you feel when you hear something like that, especially from a CHILD. As if the treatment would in any way ever be self-inflicted. I was reading up on some background for the book, and I found that the author only passed away in 2006 (and that the book is somewhat based on his own life and experiences). I think colonial history as it has been taught often seems like something of the past, without acknowledgement that it still controls the power dynamics of the world today and the conditions of colonialism for a lot of countries still remain basically the same regardless of legality. This is similar to how at the time when Jose was still at the plantation, slavery was technically abolished however the material conditions of the place remained largely the same.

A question to everyone this week: how has education played a role in your reckoning of social positioning within your ethnic background? I’m curious, because coming from an Asian immigrant household education is basically everything and the cultural messaging is very strong, and I find that to be a noteworthy topic within the book as well which made me curious about others.