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"Think [Nabokov's] Pale Fire, perhaps, or [Byatt's] Possession, but
in a contemporary Afropolitan context." Jenefer Shute, author of
Life-size, sex crimes and user ID. Unhappily married Cape Town
academic Art Berger is offered what appears to be a professional
lifeline: to reconstitute the final papers of the great South
African writer Charles de Villiers into book-form. He is
uncomfortable about the role of ghost-writer, but the project
becomes literary detective-work he cannot give up. Introduce De
Villiers' beautiful daughter Taryn, and Art is ensnared. Sunderland
alternates between sections, mostly in journal form, chronicling
Art's struggle to make sense of De Villiers' fragmented and
disordered text, and sections - scenes, notes, outlines - from that
very work (also entitled 'Sunderland'). A novel of (literary) ideas
as much as of character, this fascinating collaboration by two of
South Africa's finest wranglers of words still comes to a literal
crescendo; a finely tuned masterpiece to read in one sitting.
When a man meets the gods, nothing remains the same. "Goldin" is a
rich novel in which myth and fairytale are drawn into conversation
with urgent ecological and spiritual concerns. In a literary feast
of tales within tales, one man's crisis blurs into the fate of the
world. A goldsmith called Alan Goldin is selected by the gods to
help them decide how they should respond to the world's
predicament. Should they intervene? Should they do nothing?
To be an impartial adviser, Goldin must sacrifice that which he
loves most. The spiritual crisis that this provokes brings him into
contact with Mataji, an ancient woman who has incarnated the
goddess many times. Mataji's story, a narrative of yearning,
desire, sex and bliss which spans 150 years, reveals that she and
Goldin are caught up in the same problem. Her gods are Indian,
rather than Greco-Roman, but they are equally disturbed by the
impact of modernity.
"Goldin" repeatedly explores the granting and choosing of wishes
and desires. As one character puts it, ""mortals have built a
wish-granting machine of fabulous power, and can force the poor
world to yield up whatever they like. But they have not wished
well.""
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