The author reviews a modern classic – Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe – that is a scathing critique of the European colonization of the life and culture of one of the indigenous communities of Africa, successfully overwriting the idea of Native Africans being “the white man’s burden”. Things Fall Apart, the first novel by…
Category: Reviews
Les Misérables by Victor Hugo (Review): From the Profane to the Sublime, This French Classic of the 19th Century is a Must-Read
In Les Misérables, the beginning isn’t the beginning. It’s a digression from a digression. In this review, the author considers the ideas generated by the novel, which are, otherwise, difficult to narrow down into specific themes. Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, affectionately called The Brick by fans, was first published in 1862. Widely considered to be…
Just Us: An American Conversation by Claudia Rankine (Review): The Fine-print in the Greatest Democracy of the World
In this review, the author dives into the series of personal essays in “Just Us: An American Conversation” to better understand the dialogue around the personal and political when it comes to black lives in America. Claudia Rankine is an American poet, essayist and playwright. She has written five collections of poetry and two plays,…
Whereas by Layli Long Soldier (Review): Exploring the Semantics of Hurt and Violence
Dive into the debut poetry collection, Whereas, by Layli Long Soldier, and learn how the poet voices the Indigenous People’s struggles against politicians in this review. In a time when much of the world is on fire, what does it mean to resort to poetry? Is it an effective pursuit? Does it exact real change?…
The White Tiger by Arvind Adiga (2008) Review: The Booker Prize Winner that Exposes the Darkness Underlying a New Shining India
Adapted into a 2021 film starring Priyanka Chopra Jonas and Rajkummar Rao, Adiga’s The White Tiger (2008) is an Indian novel that dives into the truths behind its modernization. “The story of a poor man’s life is written on his body, in a sharp pen.” Winner of the 40th Booker Prize, Indian author Aravind Adiga’s…
Scenes From A Childhood (1996) by the 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature Winner Jon Fosse (Review): Fosse, His Childhood And The Fossil of Confessions
Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature 2023, the author delves into Jon Fosse’s ‘Scenes from a Childhood’ in this review. In his 2022 interview with the Los Angeles Review of Books, Jon Fosse elaborated on what it means to have a backhand in the praxis of literary pursuit. He confessed to a mystic quality,…