On Vox: Orhan Pamuk: Snow

Snow

It took me several months, but I finally finished reading Snow by Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk.  It's a very dense book, and I don't think that's just because I was reading it in translation.

Snow deals with many of the political issues facing modern-day Turkey, of which I am aware from paying attention to the news, but I'm certainly not well-versed in the history or the contemporary problems in Turkey.  It's part love story, part murder mystery, and part political commentary.  Tensions between Turkey and the West, between Turkey and the Kurds, between Christians and atheists and Muslims all factor into this story.  The book is set primarily in Kars (which you won't be able to find on Google maps - I looked it up in my parents' trusty National Geographic atlas), which is in extreme eastern Turkey, close to the borders with Azerbaijan and Iraq.  In Kars, a number of Muslim girls have committed suicide rather than go to school without their heads covered.  Expatriate poet Ka Bey has come to the city, ostensibly to report on the "head scarf girls" suicides, but in actuality he's there to woo Ipek, a girl he knew in his youth and believes himself to be in love with.  Ka arrives in a snowstorm that shuts down all transportation into and out of the city soon thereafter.  Almost immediately upon his arrival he finds that his muse has returned, and during the four days covered by the main plot of the book, he writes something like 19 poems.

After that, the plot gets a bit hard to follow... Ka stays at the hotel where Ipek lives with her father and sister, Kadife.  There's a coup, and machinations by the Islamic fundamentalist Blue, and machinations by a washed up actor who was once maybe slated The whole thing is quite confusing.  It's narrated in the past tense by a friend of Ka's named Orhan (Pamuk, one would assume), with occasional flashes into the present day (roughly five years after the events described in the main plot).

I think that if I had been able to read this over a shorter span of time, I would be much less confused about it.  Overall, I did enjoy it, but it's not easy reading and the ending left me feeling rather ... at loose ends.

Originally posted on sarahmichelef.vox.com

Movie Review: Prairie Home Companion

I grew up on PHC, so naturally I was thrilled to see the movie. Of course it took me over a year to actually see it, but that’s not the end of the world.

First off, the casting. I cannot imagine ANYONE other than Kevin Kline playing Guy Noir. Perfection. Ditto for Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep. The interations, the very slight Minnesota accents, the talking over each other. I felt like Lola was just there to give them someone to tell their stories to. And Woody Harrellson and John C. Reilly… and so on. You get the idea - I could not have been more pleased with the casting.

It was perfectly obvious to me from the word go that Asphodel was an angel - why else would she have had on a white trench coat and always stand or sit in front of light? I wasn’t clear at all on how it was going to play out, though. Really, though, the plot was not the point. Really, though, there was no point. It was PHC through and through. I completely understand the criticisms - that only fans of the show would enjoy the movie. But, since I AM a fan of the show, it was no problem for me.

Matthew is really bothered by the fact that they actually gave the punchline to the penguin joke, though.

Movie Review: OoTP

800 some-odd pages in just 2 1/2 hours?  If you thought that Goblet of Fire was seriously truncated, well, you ain’t seen nothing yet.  (Or probably, if you’re reading my blogs, you have.)

 

( Not terribly spoilery thoughts, but some minor details contained herein )

I really think this one is suffering from coming out SO CLOSE to the release of Deathly Hallows - because all we’ve done is look for clues to what’s going to happen in the book after watching the movie.  We sure as hell were.