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Saturday, August 11th, 2007
Fazıl's conversation with Ka about atheism in chapter 32 is hilarious, with an edge of tragedy running through it. Some choice passages: "...but you've been to Europe; you've met all the intellectuals and all those alcohol and sleeping-pill addicts who live there. So please, tell me again, what does it feel like to be an atheist?""Well, they certainly don't fantasize endlessly about suicide." ... "Just be yourself." "That's not going to be possible as long as I have two souls inside my body," said Fazıl... "It scares me to have nothing but Kadife inside my head. It's not just because I don't know her. It's because this proves I'm a typical atheist. I don't care about anything except love and happiness. ... And when I think that, my feelings for Kadife become all the more unbearable -- it hurts to know that my only consolation would be to spend the rest of my life with my arms around her." "Yes," said Ka ruthlessly. "These are the sorts of thoughts you have when you're an atheist." And much more. I am beginning to think from little lines like "The pity and annoyance he could see on Ka's face made him blush with shame", that one of the central themes of this book is the experience of being socially at a disadvantage vis-a-vis the person you are speaking with, and the feelings of embarrassment and shame that that gives rise to.
posted evening of August 11th, 2007: Respond
➳ More posts about Snow
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Friday, August third, 2007
I am thinking a lot as I read Snow about how to structure the reading diary so as to avoid revealing important plot points, while still talking about my reaction to the story as it unfolds. I think I'm doing that pretty well.
posted afternoon of August third, 2007: Respond
➳ More posts about Orhan Pamuk
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Chapters 27, 28, 29 of Snow: The story is changing in important ways here. A lot that has only been hinted at is coming out into the open, along with an affirmation (in 27, "Only much later would he realize that -- apart from Necip -- everyone he met in Kars spoke the same code") that what is in the open is not necessarily the whole story. The narrator, who has been gradually insinuating himself into the story since Chapter 1, now has an identity and a history. And unmasks himself, saying near the end of 29, "Here, perhaps, we have arrived at the heart of our story." The story is about Pamuk the novelist trying to understand the "difficult and painful life" of his character Ka.
posted afternoon of August third, 2007: Respond
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I am reading Sylvia Moominsummer Madness for bedtime stories now, not sure if this is the first or second time we have reread it. Last night, she was absolutely loving the bit with Snufkin getting his revenge on the Park Warden, it seemed like she remembered it very clearly from last time (at least a year ago). Anyways, I want to put together a Moominpost for KIDLIT but I haven't figured out quite what yet. It seems to me like reading diaries belong on this site -- after all that is the primary purpose I had in mind when I created READIN -- and that site is more for analysis. There should be analysis of this particular book and of the series in general; I'm not quite sure yet, where to start.
posted morning of August third, 2007: Respond
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Saturday, July 28th, 2007
Chapter 23 of Snow contains the most detailed and almost-sympathetic presentation yet of a (bloodthirsty) Turkish nationalist viewpoint. I am not sure what to make of how familiar it sounds to me: it reads almost exactly like thousands of American conservative/hawkish opinion pieces -- ok, more eloquent than 99% of those pieces, but not different in kind. But where do I go with this? Some possibities: - The Turkish context is a huge factor which I am missing totally because I am not Turkish. Pamuk is writing for a Turkish audience.
- Pamuk is writing for a western audience and is eliding over distinctions that exist between our nationalists and their nationalists.
- They really are exactly the same.
What else?... Ka's ironic distance is making sense here as the only way to keep himself clear of Sunay's nationalism. If I'm understanding correctly his cosmopolitanism means the presumption is that his sympathies are with the nationalist in a dispute with fundamentalists -- my own sympathies would certainly default that way.
posted evening of July 28th, 2007: Respond
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Monday, July 23rd, 2007
...And as of chapter 22, I'm back to despising Ka for his narcissism, and myself for sympathizing with it. The lack of awareness he demonstrates for the violence around him (and/or his maintaining ironic distance from it) is really troubling, and is seeming to have real-world repercussions for people not as privileged as he is, for instance the people in the tea house after curfew when he stops in with his police escort, or the Georgian migrant workers whom they pursue. The violence seemed to me like a farce at first reading, only gradually sinking in how serious were the events being described, and I sort of think this was Ka's reaction as well -- he is so caught up in his constructed reality that he is experiencing the world around him as scripted. And maybe he is in shock? That is the only way I can explain his demeanor at the veterinary college in a way that allows me to remain sympathetic to him.
posted evening of July 23rd, 2007: Respond
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Sunday, July 22nd, 2007
The events in chapter 17 of Snow have totally knocked me for a loop. The confident grasp of the book's plot and structure that I was feeling in 15 and 16 is out the window. I sort of had an idea what was going to happen based on the spoileriffic back cover blurb; that idea was completely wrong.
posted evening of July 22nd, 2007: Respond
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Saturday, July 21st, 2007
I'm really intrigued by Ka's drunkenness -- I am dying to figure out what Pamuk means here. More to say about this but I haven't figured out what, yet.
posted evening of July 21st, 2007: Respond
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Chapter 15 is where this story is really beginning to come together for me. I had been liking a lot of disconnected stuff, and feeling fairly befuddled by the whole thing -- now all of a sudden I am grinning in agreement, underlining every other sentence, absolutely wincing when I see some bad news about a character I have come to love. The moment of transition might have been at the end of chapter 14, when İpek used Ka's phrase "the silence of snow" in a totally natural-seeming way. At this point I realize I am no longer condemning Ka for his narcissism (and myself for sympathizing with him) -- his narcissism seems like the most natural thing in the world to me. Another important cusp: "I think you're right," said Ka. "As it happens, I've already decided to answer the call that's been coming from deep within me my whole long life and open my heart to God."They caught his sarcastic tone -- for what it was worth. Knowing he was very drunk, they all suspected that this witticism might well have been prepared in advance. Up until now, I have been taking Ka's dialogue as generally pretty earnest. I think going forward, reading it with more irony assumed will make things easier to understand. -- Although that was not the case in reading Ka's conversation with Necip later in the chapter -- straight and ironic are both plausible interpretations, and both equally hard to decipher. I am really dreading Necip's fate.
posted evening of July 21st, 2007: Respond
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Friday, July 20th, 2007
I am getting more attached to seeing Ka as a narcissist. Chapter 11, "Ka with Sheikh Efendi", portrays a mental space I am closely familiar with, viz. talking happily and effusively with a group of people while simultaneously feeling secretly scornful of them and fearing that they are not taking me seriously. But the words of Ka's conversation with the Sheikh have an otherworldly, unbelievable quality to them. So I am adding together the realistic portrayal of Ka himself and the unreality of his relations with others, and coming up with narcissism. I am feeling a little disappointed that I don't get to see the surpassing beauty of the poetry Ka is transcribing during his ecstasies. But that is likely part of the point being made here.
Hm... Now I just read chapter 13, in which Kadife comes across with a distinct fullness of character. Maybe the thing that makes Ka retreat from interacting with others into the privacy of his head, is religion, and Kadife's explicit refusal to discuss her beliefs allows him to treat her as an equal. The places I have noticed a particularly stilted quality in the dialog have all been conversations between Ka and Islamists -- Efendi, Nicep, Blue, Muhtar. (His conversation with İpek was pretty surreal too, but in a different way, and that's pretty easy to explain as a product of his infatuation.)
posted morning of July 20th, 2007: Respond
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