Summer Reading Part 4: It's All About Politics

Fourth in a series to give the impression I did something intellectual this summer. Starred titles indicate books I particularly enjoyed.

Peter the Great
Robert Massie

The juggernaut. The behemoth. I have 15 pages in MS word to describe this book. I’m not touching it until September 10.

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*Absurdistan*
Gary Shteyngart

I have no idea what motivated me to pick up this book. The cover art is blandly abstract, the subject matter is not to my taste, and the main character is a filthy rich, obese, foul-mouthed, horny Russian Jew—totally someone I would identity with. It must be the title: Absurdistan, no other title could evoke so much political outrage, silliness, and pathos in one measly word.

Absurdistan is absurd—absurdly funny, bleakly funny—the type of hilarity that makes you laugh until your stomach hurts and then it punches you in the guts when you realize the situations are not funny at all, but very real and appalling. Shteyngart pulls off this audacious satire, ripping into everything from trophy wives to terrorism to obesity with a touch that turns the horrible into the hilarious. He even manages to satirize himself with his doppelganger Jerry Shteynfarb, who wrote The Russian Arriviste’s Hand Job, as opposed to Shteyngart’s first novel, The Russian Debutante’s Handbook. Where Absurdistan strikes the hardest is American ignorance and greed. A reader will immediately draw parallels between Absurdistan and today’s current events, but Absurdistan cuts off on September 10, 2001. An ominous ending that portends maybe nothing has changed after all.

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*Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress*
Dai Sijie

Whenever I start complaining about school, my parents always launch into a rueful tirade on their education in then hands of the Cultural Revolution. And I can’t compare: however aimless English class may seem, it can never be as aimless as reciting Mao’s quotations for the 437th time. (Random: Did you know blogspot is still banned in China?) After reading this book, I had a nice conversation with my dad (not about college for once!), but about how people would wait hours in line to buy Balzac’s books after the Revolution.

Since the Cultural Revolution is one of the most universally reviled policies, a book critical of it can be nothing new (except in China’s official bookstores.) Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, translated from the French since Balzac was a French dude after all, reads like a fable rather than a social critique. Ma and Luo are sent to the countryside to be re-educated where they discover a chestful of the forbidden Western cannon and as the title promises, they also meet the Little Seamstress. There are grotesque images, but the pastoral setting brings to mind a hermetic alter-world. It’s a slim and tightly written novel, made more powerful by its compact construction. The finishing touch is an ironic, oblique criticism of the Cultural Revolution that almost twists the themes around. Makes me want to get off my butt (or maybe on, since I tend to sit while reading) and read Balzac.

I’m also really curious about the film adaptation of this book because it’s directed by Dai Sijie from his own novel. How often does that happen?