Jedna od onih neobičnih "otkačenih" knjiga koje mi s vremena na vreme nalete i osveže mi dan... Imala sam zadovoljstvo da je čitam u rukopisu pre objavljivanja... Mnogo kasnije nastao je film... Knjiga je, nažalost, kod nas prošla nezapaženo i srećom u međuvremenu mu se promenio izdavač... Koji će možda više učiniti za ovog autora jer on to zaslužuje... Ako volite Marka Haddona ili Dana Rhodesa... ovo je autor za vas... :)

Everything Is Illuminated is one of the most focused books I’ve read. It doesn’t meander inappropriately, and there’s almost no excess. Seriously, this book’s got less fat than Christian Bale in The Machinist. It's either in full-on comedy mode, full-on fanciful mode, full-on drama mode, or some well-balanced combination of the three. Foer spent years editing the novel from his initial college thesis draft, and it shows—in a good way. There's no lag, and given some of the other books I was reading at the time (e.g. The Recognitions), this leanness and pacing were very welcome.

Moreover, I don’t think I’ve ever been so off-base with my preconceptions of a book. I’d somehow come to the conclusion that the controversy surrounding Foer was due to his pretentiousness, and I was prepared for something in-your-face erudite, clever, showy, and snarky (since I’d heard it was funny) with his first effort. This probably sounds idiotic for those of you familiar with Foer’s work, but that’s what I was expecting. The only question for me was: would he be able to use his pretentiousness in a way that I’d find enjoyable? But as I got into the book, what I found was one of the least pretentious literary novels I’ve ever read. And perhaps this puts the backlash that this guy’s received into a whole new light, although I don’t want to get into that right now. I’d rather talk about what Foer does (and does very well) in Everything Is Illuminated.

First, the humor. This book is funny, but not in the way I was expecting (Foer’s basically anti-snarky). And it’s with his comedy style that he probably makes most of his enemies. Instead of taking one of the modern American approaches to humor*, Foer utilizes the type of slapstick that ruled comedic cinema over 60 years ago and has more or less disappeared from popular culture. Bold, bold move. And one that I, as a long-time Abbot and Costello fan, happen to love. I’ve watched each Abbot and Costello movie between 3 and 25 times, and while I think their routines are brilliant, I’m also aware that the majority of Americans under 40 would likely yawn or cringe through many of them. It’s just a different style, full of classic gags sans sarcasm or irony, and one where any constraints of realism are given the boot while the routine is in progress—just like in Everything Is Illuminated. From Alex’s ludicrously over-the-top English, where Foer nabs Wallace’s gag of incorrectly substituting difficult words for easy ones, to the hero’s inconvenient vegetarianism; from the absurd dog behavior to the classic mistranslation humor reminiscent of the Pequod’s encounter with the French Rose-Bud, Foer never wastes an opportunity to inject an episode of hilarity. And to be honest, he’s not always successful. But when it works, and if you’re susceptible to this style of humor, you will laugh out loud.

I can’t think of another book that blends this kind of extreme comedy with fanciful melancholy so well (or even at all). The initially hidden sadness builds (in both the present-day storyline and the 18th-century through WWII storyline) to a dramatic moment that didn’t quite have the impact on me that Foer reaches for and that others have experienced. I’m not especially disappointed about this, although I am stuck knowing that I didn’t experience the emotional tidal wave that this book is capable of unleashing. But you might.



*Here I must rely on an excerpt from David Foster Wallace’s essay on Kafka’s humor: There's no recursive word-play or verbal stunt-pilotry, little in the way of wisecracks or mordant lampoon. There is no body-function humor in Kafka, nor sexual entendre, nor stylized attempts to rebel by offending convention. No Pynchonian slapstick with banana peels or rapacious adenoids. No Rothish satyriasis or Barthish metaparody or arch Woody-Allenish kvetching. There are none of the ba-bing ba-bang reversals of modern sit-coms; nor are there precocious children or profane grandparents or cynically insurgent co-workers. Ok, so there’s some word-play and maybe ‘Pynchonian slapstick’ could describe a few scenes in Everything is Illuminated, but since when was Thomas Pynchon’s sense-of-humor considered part of ‘contemporary U.S. amusement’?

E se dobbiamo batterci per un futuro migliore, non dobbiamo conoscere il nostro passato e riconciliarci con esso?

Quando leggo un libro cerco sempre di trovare il messaggio che vuole comunicare, di capire la tesi che vuole dimostrare: i libri che hanno un messaggio e dimostrano una tesi sono i miei preferiti, soprattutto se posso ricondurre questa tesi a qualche teoria psicologica, meglio ancora se riesco a trovare la dimostrazione di un qualche fondamento clinico.
Nel libro di J. S. Foer tutto questo c’è: c’è un messaggio e c’è una tesi che viene ampiamente sviluppata e dimostrata con dovizia di particolari e di eventi a sostegno della tesi medesima. Ma questo è anche il suo limite (almeno secondo me) perché è tutto troppo esplicito, troppo artificioso. La mia impressione, leggendo il libro, è che l’autore abbia prima sviluppato la sua tesi e poi gli abbia “cucito” addosso una storia che, in certi passaggi, risulta macchinosa.
Qual è questa tesi? I segreti (celati, rimossi, mistificati) del passato trovano sempre il modo di “emergere”, di far sentire il loro peso sulle generazioni successive, anche quando queste non sanno nulla, a livello consapevole, di cosa è accaduto. Il peso del passato oscura la vita presente nelle forme dell’incertezza, dell’angoscia, del senso di perdita soprattutto perché i segreti vengono trasmessi alle future generazioni attraverso l’ansia degli adulti senza alcuna possibilità di trasformare questa ansia in parole, che aiuterebbero a dare un senso alla sofferenza e al senso di mancanza che dolorosamente può diventare la base su cui si edifica la personalità.
Per dimostrare la sua tesi, Jonathan Safran Foer sviluppa il suo romanzo su due piani temporali.
Jonathan (giovane ebreo americano in viaggio in Ucraina per cercare le sue origini) racconta la storia di Trachimbrod (con i toni epici, a volte tragici a volte comici, della saga ebraica) sino alla distruzione avvenuta ad opera dei nazisti. Da questo villaggio, Safran (il nonno di cui Jonathan porta il nome) è fuggito verso gli Stati Uniti, grazie all’aiuto di una donna, Augustine. Jonathan ha saputo di questa vicenda da poco: la nonna gli ha dato una foto del nonno (morto poco tempo dopo essere giunto negli Stati Uniti) in compagnia di una donna di nome Augustine. Jonhatan decide di partire per l’Ucraina alla ricerca di questa donna; non sa bene il perché, ma sa che deve cercarla per capire meglio se stesso e conoscere questo nonno di cui sa solo quello che gli è stato raccontato dalla nonna. Intuisce che c’è qualche doloroso segreto di cui la nonna non riesce a parlargli.
Il secondo romanzo lo scrive Alex (il giovane ucraino che, insieme al nonno, accompagna Jonathan nella sua ricerca) ed è la storia tragicomica del viaggio reale compiuto alla ricerca di ciò che rimane di Trachimbrod, ma che si rivela un viaggio nella storia del suo paese e della sua famiglia. In entrambi i romanzi, il filo conduttore è l’occultamento del passato e la necessità di dire sempre la verità che, per quanto dolorosa, aiuta a rimanere se stessi e ad accettare gli errori commessi, a essere onesti e autentici con i propri figli senza dover rinnegare nulla di sé e della propria storia. Questa affermazione è valida sia che si tratti di persone sia di un’intera nazione. Non è un caso che il viaggio di Jonathan coincide con i festeggiamenti per il primo anniversario dell’indipendenza dell’Ucraina, nella celebrazione di un presente che non vuole ammettere le ombre del passato che portano il nome di antisemitismo e collaborazionismo.
La necessità della verità e il rifiuto della menzogna come base su cui costruire la propria vita investe in modo prepotente soprattutto Alex che gradualmente getta la maschera di uomo cinico e superficiale (maschera indossata per assecondare l’immagine che ha di lui il padre) per rivelarsi un ragazzo sensibile che non ha vergogna delle sue ansie e delle sue insicurezze, ma anzi fa leva su quelle per accettare le proprie responsabilità.
Per Alex è un’operazione dolorosa perché la maschera è tenacemente attaccata alla sua pelle e senza di essa si trova indifeso e vulnerabile. Parallelamente, chiede a Jonathan di dare ai personaggi che animano Trachimbrod un lieto fine che essi da soli non riescono a cogliere, anche quando la possibilità di essere felici è a portata di mano e dipende solo dalle loro scelte. Jonathan non accoglie nessuna delle richieste di Alex: non si può tacere la verità, anche se è spietata, non si possono tacere le responsabilità di ciascuno nell’adempimento di quello che a posteriori sembra un ineluttabile destino, ma che a ben vedere è il risultato di scelte e omissioni volontarie.
La differenza temporale si accompagna a una diversità di stile che riflette la personalità dei due autori. Jonathan racconta le vicende di Trachimbrod in maniera tradizionale, almeno per quanto riguardo lo stile. I personaggi e l’intera storia hanno, però, il sapore delle fondazioni mitiche e vi troviamo tutti i “tipi” e i temi delle saghe ebraiche; gli espedienti grafici (intere pagine con punti di sospensione, titoli dei capitoli con un layout curvilineo) imprimono una specifica coloritura emotiva alla narrazione, stratagemmi che poi J. S. Foer riprenderà con maggiore consapevolezza in “Molto forte, incredibilmente vicino”.
Il viaggio alla ricerca di Trachimbrod nell’Ucraina moderna è scritto rispecchiando la scarsa conoscenza che ha Alex della lingua inglese: interi brani sembrano usciti dal traduttore di Google! Sicuramente bisogna riconoscere l’abilità di Foer in questa operazione che fa usare ad Alex parole che, a rigore di vocabolario, sono dei sinonimi del termine corretto ma che, rispetto al contesto, sono sbagliate, imitando il risultato di una traduzione letterale. Bravo anche il traduttore (Massimo Bocchiola) che ha dovuto ricreare lo stesso effetto in italiano. Dal punto di vista stilistico, insomma, una bella trovata ma dal punto di vista del lettore risulta un’operazione che rende difficoltosa e, in certe parti, poco piacevole la lettura. Meno male che, man mano che scrive il romanzo, l’inglese di Alex, grazie anche alle indicazioni di Jonathan, migliora e quindi la lettura diventa più scorrevole. Quindi abbiate fiducia e non vi fate scoraggiare dall’inglese maccheronico di Alex.

why can't you give a book ZERO or even NEGATIVE stars?

I don't care if I don't garner a lot of "helpful" reviews here... I just need to vent. JSF is nobody. I HATE his writing style and he doesn't get extra points for only being 25 when we published this. The story of Bume is lifted STRAIGHT out of the story of Remedious the Beauty from 100 Years of Solitude, and he even uses the same literary trick by naming everyone the same name (fortunately, they all have stupid nicknames). Man, what an awful book and I also hated the other one about 911, so it this brat makes you swoon, go for it... but I don't think he writes well, I don't think he is some sort of prodigy, i just think that he has a big thesaurus next to him and uses it too much! What a GAWD-awful book! Oh! And the rip off the the "Wild and Crazy Guys" that Steve Martin and Dan Ackroyd did 30 years ago ... they called... they want their characters back! Horrible, horrible horrible dreck, drivel, pabulum and horse-sh*t. I just cannot remember when a book made me SO angry and unhappy. And if you are a student and get assigned this book in school, I did find a groovy site called something like..."Everything is Illuminated for the student who has to write a paper on it" Don't waste your time reading this god awful piece of ripped off trash.

welcome back to project 5 star, in which i ill-advisedly pick up books i remember fondly and put them to the test of my current evil mind.

and, well.

i'd like to apologize for 18 year old me. she knew not what she'd wrought.

this does have moments of true loveliness and piercing observations of the human experience, but it is so weighed down in pretension and gimmicks that it's almost impossible to see to them.

it was actually all i could do to get through this book, which shifts between three perspectives that each manage to be as unreadable as the last. our characters — 18th century residents of a shtetl, a metafiction JSF, and a pathetic tour guide named alex — have the power to be memorable and real, but are only the former.

and not in a nice way.

sorry to the ex-boyfriend who bought me a signed first edition of this.

bottom line: people change! it's a bummer. kinda.

2.5

-----------------
original review

when it's 1:20 a.m. and you're thinking about your favorite book of the year (so far) again and you realize you never posted your review and you just havetohavetohaveto let everyone know how much you loved it.

Ho-ly shit.

https://emmareadstoomuch.wordpress.co...

This book was incredible. Truly. I’ve taken the last hour or two to just kind of continue with my life and try to absorb that experience. Because even though I’ve been reading this book for almost three weeks (bananas long for me), it still feels like one cohesive experience.


I just want to quote this book to you, if that’s okay. Just for a hot sec.


“There is no love--only the end of love.”


Between a grandfather and a grandson:
“(You have ghosts?)
(Of course I have ghosts.)
(What are your ghosts like?)
(They are on the inside of the lids of my eyes.)
(This is also where my ghosts reside.)
(You have ghosts?)
(Of course I have ghosts.)
(But you are a child.)
(I am not a child.)
(But you have not known love.)
(These are my ghosts. The spaces amid love.)”


Maybe quoting it wasn’t a good idea, because I want to give swaths of it to you all. I’ll end up trying to trick you into reading by including ever-lengthening passages.


These characters may very well stay with me for the rest of my life. Lovely Alex, with his love for his brother and his grandiose lies and his dashed dreams and his wonderfully terrible English (“Did you manufacture any Zs?”). The metafiction how-much-is-real Jonathan Safran Foer, dedicated to his notebook, staunch vegetarian. Brod and her 613 sadnesses, her love for everyone and everything and no one and nothing. The Gypsy girl whose heart broke for Safran, whom she did not love, and his books organized by the colors of their spines. The shtetl of Trachimbrod, its Trachimday and the Time of Dyed Hands and surname-initialed residents (Bitzl Bitzl R was my favorite).


This book sometimes gave me a feeling like my heart was swelling up. My hand twitched for a pencil or a Post-It while I read these lovely words, but I was always too absorbed and soon forgot what I was trying to remember to do. That feeling is why I read.


This was slow to start, and I almost--god forbid--DNFed it. Can you imagine? Even two-thirds in I contemplated three stars, sadly reminiscing on my vast love of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.


I know this review isn’t of YA, or a book that’s “in” right now, or a new release. I still hope you guys read this and will consider picking it up, though. Because I want to live inside this book.


Bottom line: I don’t even know what to say. I so badly want you to read it. But if you do and you don’t like it, even when you get to the beautiful, beautiful last seventy-five pages, please don’t tell me.


I want to write like Jonathan Safran Foer can write.

Опитвам се да отсея какво точно ми хареса в книгата, но онова, което не ми хареса, изглежда е доста повече. Измъчих се през първите стотина страници, докато свикна с разваления английски на единия от героите, после се увлякох със завръзката на историята и тотално се отегчих в последните стотина страници. Този роман би могъл да бъде и нещо много по-добро. А може би не... Защото се базира на истинския опит на автора да открие спасителите, помогнали на дядо му да оцелее в Холокоста, заради което посещава и Украйна, но на практика там не открива нищо. И си измисля фикция, изпъстрена с толкова много опити за оригиналничене, с толкова излишни порнографски сцени (повечето с участието на хора в смущаваща възраст), които не носят никаква добавена стойност към историята, с толкова зарязани и изоставени сюжетни нишки, че финалът (той пък е един финал...) носи истинско облекчение.

Probably in the top 3 best books I've read in the past 5 years. It is not an easy book to read, and it is at times bizarre and vaguely offensive. But it is also hearbreaking and heartwarming and funny and thought-provoking.

Throughout the novel, Jonathan is referred to as the "hero" by Sasha/Alex, but I believe that Sasha ends up being the real hero. I don't think that Jonathan becomes some sort of terrible person, but it is telling that Jonathon and Sasha stop writing to each other. I believe it is because Sasha has come away with a much deeper understanding of himself from their trip, while Jonathan seems to have mostly come away with good writing material. Sasha becomes so angry with Jonathon's story because it is not truthful in the way that Sasha is truthful. Jonathan wants to take pieces of what he knows for sure, and embellish and expound and fictionalize it to make enticing fiction. In doing so, he does make his grandfather out to be a pretty bizarre person, taking only his supposition that his grandfather had a dead arm and a lot of teeth as a baby, and looking through his journal, and then making up this whole ridiculous story about how the Safran had affairs with over 2,000 women because they were strangely attracted to the dead arm. Sasha, on the other hand, comes away from the trip with a better understanding of, and deeper love for, his grandfather, and a commitment to truth. He realizes the value of truth in seeing what his grandfather had to live with and in coming clean on certain aspects of his life. For instance, he admits that he is a virgin, though he boasted in the beginning of how many women he was "carnal" with. And he is not especially tall, as he also boasted about in the beginning. He also embraces his love for Ukraine, giving his savings away and deciding to stay there and take care of his family. And he is finally able to stand up to his drunken father and banish him from the family.

So, I believe that the title refers to the way the past illuminates the present, and the present illuminates the past. But differently for our two "heroes". For Jonathan, he has found the material he needs to become the writer he believes he was born to be. For Sasha, he has found the truth he needs to become the man he wants to be. You could argue the value of each. Jonathan writes everything down, documents the names on all of Lista's boxes, reads guidebooks on properly dealing with Ukrainians. Sasha listens to the stories, takes it all in, doesn't think to worry about each little detail to remember forever. Sasha is more concerned with understanding the heart of the truth, in short, while Jonathon wants the material to use later.

In one final thought, I remember that Ernest Hemingway was mentioned at some point in the novel, I believe by Sasha in talking about Jonathan becoming a great American writer. I took an American Lit class in which we discussed the novel Garden of Eden by Hemingway, and the way in which Hemingway addressed the guilt of the writer who puts themselves and those they love in emotionally reckless positions in order to create good writing material. I just thought it was interesting that his name comes into this novel because of Jonathan's intentions. Not that Jonathan creates any sort of emotionally reckless situation, but he in some way sells out his family history in order to write an interesting book.

On a side note, don't see the movie if you want it to be like the book. The movie felt like the screenwriter thoroughly read the first half of the book, and then skimmed the rest in about 8 minutes and threw the movie together from that. I felt like it missed everything that was important about the story.

Strano, ma bello; o bello, ma strano. Non saprei quale dei due aggettivi mettere prima.

Non me lo aspettavo così: autobiografico, ma narrato per la maggior parte dall'amico ucraino, con vari intermezzi forniti da lettere e narrazioni pseudo storiche (c'è molto realismo magico) che riguardano il destino dello shtetl Trachimbrod attraverso i secoli.

C'è molto ebraismo, utile per capirlo un po' di più e impersonarsi meglio coi personaggi.

Sebbene disorientante però questa commistione di stili porta a un romanzo molto toccante (e non potrebbe non esserlo quando poi l'unica conclusione possibile è lo sterminio nazista).

Niente male comunque riuscire a costruire una storia commovente partendo tutto sommato da episodi autobiografici; bravo Safran Foer.

My knowledge of the English language is only based on movies and music (I have never studied it properly). Although I understand a lot (and where I don´t understand I´m not shy of using a dictionary), I have the feeling that I cannot relate to the apparent general opinion about this particular book, at least according to the "praise to" pages right at the beginning.

So, I do not agree with those saying this book is "extremely funny" (Observer). I sensed at times that there was some funny misuse of the language (if you read the first page, you will understand why). Susan Sontag says "Made me laugh a lot" (The Times Literary Supplement). Maybe it was just my sense of humour...

I could relate to this: "It´s hard to get through the first chapters of Everything is Illuminated (...)" (New York Times Book Review). They intented it as a compliment, I see it so because of my struggles with the English language - I just needed some time to get used with the different styles of the different voices.

I am glad I finished this book. Sometimes I felt the author is trying too much, I had other ideas about the structure, but I´m not the author :-). Now I can hardly wait to dig into the secondary literature!

And I want to watch the movie as well.

I would surely recommend this book to the fellow readers. :-)

Після хорошого фільму, знятого по книжці, завше виникає питання, чи точно варто читати книжку, бо можна мати до неї завищені очікування. А я відаю мало речей, що гірші за завищені очікування. Тому добре робити якісь такі маніпуляції фільм-книжка і зворотно - книжка-фільм лиш з позиції часу, коли пам'ять вже не тримає добре, що там в книжці чи фільмі діялося (звісно, якщо у вас така ж дірява пам'ять, як моя чи ви не єврей, якщо вірити Фоеру, що каже в "Все ясно", що пам'ять - це шосте відчуття у євреїв). Я слухав цю книжку двома мовами. Спершу польською, потім трохи українську, потім туди-сюди, як виходило. Першого разу перемкнувся на українську, бо здалося, що я чогось не розумію. Чи точно автор говорить саме це, коли пішла мова про Трохима, котрий заїхав в Брід. Колись я вже мав таку практику, коли перечитував книжку Стасюка українською, аби впевнитися, що все правильно розумію. Деколи такі стрибки дуже цікаві, бо мови стрибаєш між перекладами, а в цьому конкретному випадку - ще й між двома різними типами начиток. І манера оповіді в польського диктора перетворювала мені манеру письма, ведення оповіді Фоера подібною на тексти Андруховича. А коли я слухав українською, то здавалося, що це місцями ближче до Винничука, коли йшлося про оті минулі часи, про історію становлення Трохимброду. І отак я собі стрибав між мовами (і чому я не пошукав оригіналу, аби загнатися остатошно?) і ще між кимось третім, либонь, оповідачем із фільму, Алєксом (бо коли описувалася сучасність, то в польській версії бракувало тієї мовної мішанки, котра є в перекладі Семківа), то ніби ще більше розгортав оті тексти, котрі співтворили Фоер і Алєкс, і котрі твори творці фільму. І замість того, аби прояснюватися, аби в кінці міг сказати, що ну нарешті "Все ясно!", бо я ж це прослухав і продумав на стількох рівнях, що може й Фоеру таке не світило, то зрозумів, що ніц до холєри не ясно. And I think it's beatiful, бо яке до грома ясно в епоху blackouts?

One of the funniest and most adventurous books I've read in a long time. Foer seems to be having fun as he's writing, and it shows in every word of the Alex sections. Okay, yeah, there are some problems with what he's trying to do. But the language almost lets you forget that, and really, it would be a shame to miss the sheer daring of this book.

614-ე ნაღველი ამ წიგნის დასრულებაა.