opinionated commentary on literary matters - from the complete review

The Literary Saloon Archive

1 - 10 May

1 May: Israeli literature | How We Should Rule Ourselves | Indian Pamuk perspective
2 May: New Appelfeld book | TIBF | Hard Case Crime books
3 May: Publishing venture of the year ! | Tribal literature | Korean translation issues | Sharon and Oz
4 May: Collegiate concern | More on Weigel | Toby Press profile | The Lecture review
5 May: Reading the World site | Miles Franklin exhibit | Review breakdown update
6 May: More on Soyinka event | Wired on Amazon | Fascination review | New World Literature Today
7 May: Man Booker International Prize recognising translation | Javier Marias profile | More Penguin tales | TIBF news
8 May: Banville on Saturday | What Good are the Arts ? | In seiner frühen Kindheit ein Garten review
9 May: NIBF | Translation panel | Stansberry fuss | NYTBR notes
10 May: Reading the World background | Chinese fiction | More on TIBF | Read old books !

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       Reading the World background

       An interesting interview at Conversational Reading, where Dalkey Archive Press' Chad Post (who will also participate in the literature-in-translation panel at Housing Works; see below) offers more background on the Reading the World-book promotion, and publishing literature in translation in general.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Chinese fiction

       At Xinhuanet they find Nation searches for its novel soul, a lengthy (click through all four pages) look at the Chinese novel-highlights of 2004.
       Here, too, one hears of over-production (though on a smaller scale):

Currently around 1,000 or so novels are published annually. But at the same time it is also true that only about 30 make an impact with the reading public.

       They opine:

Looking back on the novels of 2004, we find that many writers still lack a general grasp and sense of observation of our times, society and its spiritual situation. Today's novels are generally lacking in terms of their ability to express the courage required to face reality and philosophical meaning.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       More on TIBF

       At least one somewhat in-depth English-language report on the Tehran International Book Fair: the Daily Star reprints an AFP report (story first seen at Bookslut).
       They're amused (or at least fascinated) by the presence of Islamic Jihad, Hizbullah, and Hamas stands, so that's what most of the piece focusses on .....

       Meanwhile, IRNA report that Culture minister: Media should focus on impact of books on people's life Tehran. (Somewhat disturbingly, the minister's full portfolio is actually: Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance (which don't sound like the easiest things to reconcile -- though maybe in Iran every ministry is also one of Islamic Guidance (they do seem to take that pretty seriously).) He:

underlined that the media should play a more active role in placing more focus on the direct impact of books on people's life.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Read old books !

       In The Times Libby Purves argues that A bit of Brontë does you good.
       Concerned about the fact that it is now possible to get an "English literature GCSE without knowing any novel written before 1914", she insists:

To get an understanding of the farther past we need its fiction.

       Yeah, that'll convince the kids. (Mind you, we're all for reading (and teaching) the old stuff -- but it's a hard sell.)

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       NIBF

       The Nigeria International Book Fair starts tomorrow (running 10 through 14 May) and we're thrilled by the focus: Publishing in Indigenous languages.
       At Vanguard Benjamin Njoku reports that Ngugi wa Thiong’o in Nigeria to honour Bookfair:

Kenya’s renowned writer, Ngugi Wa Thiong'o is expected in the country this week to lead talks during the event on how to promote publishing in indiegnous languages.

       We hope to hear more about this.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Translation panel

       Housing Works will host a panel on Lost in Translation (scroll down) on 23 May. Literary Saloon-keeper Michael Orthofer will be participating in the discussion that asks: "Why are fewer translated works published, and what can be done to reverse the trend ?":

In honor of May's designation as World in Translation Month, Housing Works presents two of the country's leading publishers of translated books in discussion with booksellers and literary critics about the difficult business of publishing, marketing, and selling works in translation. Leading the discussion will be Dennis Loy Johnson, editor of MobyLives.com and publisher of Melville House Books. His guests will include Chad Post and John O'Brien of the Dalkey Archive Press, perhaps America's leading publisher of translated books, Michael Orthofer of The Complete Review.com, and Margarrita Shalina, buyer for St. Mark's Bookstore in New York City.

       Those not in New York should be able to catch it (over and over) on C-SPAN several weeks after the fact (that's the plan, at least -- we'll let you know the details).

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Stansberry fuss

       We learn from Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind that there's quite a to-do about Domenic Stansberry (a man whose first name no one seems able to spell ...) having won an 'Edgar' (best paperback original or some such category -- we don't really get why the cover selection (hard v. soft) warrants its own prize, but hey, it's the mystery world ...) for a book we recently reviewed, The Confession.
       One juror apparently did not agree with the selection. Fair enough (though there are some issues around her going public, etc.), but we were particularly disappointed that her e-mail, reprinted at CoaIM, states:

The cover art depicted a beautiful woman with her eyes wide and mouth agape in terror is she is about to be strangled with a blue necktie. And that's what the novel is about. The protagonist is a remorseless sociopath who enjoys raping and strangling women, which he does throughout the book and always gets away with it. At the end, he is smirkingly eyeing his next victim.

       What the cover art has to do with anything ..... Okay, she claims that's what the whole book is about -- but we found it a considerably more subtle work. Okay, not really subtle, but at least intriguingly ambiguous; certainly the reduction she offers here (and in the rest of her e-mail) is much too simplistic.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       NYTBR notes

       The New York Times Book Review can't be bothered to celebrate foreign fiction (or non-fiction) at any time, World in Translation Month or not, but, hey, one out of the eighteen full-length (and semi-full length) reviews in the 8 May issue is actually of a title (though neither fiction nor non-fiction ...) translated from a foreign language. A worthy one, at least, Durs Grünbein's selected collection Ashes for Breakfast (enthusiastically reviewed by Melanie Rehak).
       Rest assured that local barkeep Michael Orthofer will lividly contend that part of the problem regarding the reception of foreign literature in the US is the unwillingness of the review media to properly deal with it when he appears on the Lost in Translation-panel (see above).

       Meanwhile, there's a Nell Freudenberger-appearance in the same NYTBR: she reviews a Stewart O'Nan book, and reveals:

I was the type of kid who slept on the floor of her parents' bedroom until she was 10. I waste money, not to mention precious natural resources, by leaving multiple lights on at night, and have somehow never gotten accustomed to the shadows lurking behind my bedroom door.

       Her parents made the poor girl sleep on the floor when she was scared ? Dear god .....

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       Banville on Saturday

       It doesn't seem to have attracted much notice yet, but John Banville reviews Ian McEwan's Saturday in the new (26 May) issue of The New York Review of Books (article not freely available online). And he doesn't like it.
       He opines:

Saturday is a dismayingly bad book.

       And he finds:

Another source of dismay, one for which, admittedly, Ian McEwan cannot wholly be held accountable, is the ecstatic reception Saturday has received from reviewers and book buyers alike. Are we in the West so shaken in our sense of ourselves and our culture, are we so disablingly terrified in the face of the various fanaticisms which threaten us, that we can allow ourselves to be persuaded and comforted by such a self-satisfied and, in many ways, ridiculous novel as this ?

       He makes some interesting points but, like some of the other complaints about the politics expressed in the book, seems to be confusing issues here. Perowne strikes us as an authentic portrayal (in the sense of being realistic: he is a plausible figure (well, Banville isn't convinced by his: "literally unbelievable ignorance of literature" either, but that strikes us as wishful thinking on his part). However, Perowne's political (or, in part, apolitical) position is hardly persuasive. And the book's unlikely turns away from violence are anything but comforting: escape from violence comes in two instants, and in ways that are beyond the capabilities of the average person (an on-the-spot diagnosis and a poetry-recitation).

       (Updated - 9 May): Actually, Jenny Davidson at Light Reading noticed it, and has a longer excerpt (and some user-comments).

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       What Good are the Arts ?

       Ah, yes, the perennially popular question. John Carey has written a book on the question (see the Faber publicity page (well, don't bother for now, but maybe in a few weeks they'll have some information) or pre-order your copy at Amazon.co.uk).
       The inevitable publicity blitz begins with -- how original ! -- The Observer asking ... well, Do the arts matter? They ask everyone (well, a couple of people) from David Hare to Ian Rankin.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       In seiner frühen Kindheit ein Garten review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is our review of Christoph Hein's new novel, the cumbersomely titled In seiner frühen Kindheit ein Garten.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       Man Booker International Prize recognising translation

       The Man Booker International Prize has announced an "additional award for translation": if one of the 10 authors up for the MBI Prize whose work is only available in English in translation takes the prize they'll toss in another £15,000, and:

The winning author will choose who the translator’s prize should go to and whether it is to be awarded to one translator or divided between several.

       So now we're wondering: if Stansislaw Lem wins the prize, will he give any of the money to Joanna Kilmartin and Steve Cox -- who (in)famously translated Solaris not from the Polish original but from Jean-Michel Jasienko's French version. (English rights holder Faber & Faber apparently won't allow (and/or are too cheap to commission) a new translation directly from the Polish.) And will Jasienko get a cut ?

       See also John Ezard's Found in translation - a £15,000 prize in The Guardian.

       (Updated - 9 May): Note that coverage of this prize has been terrible: the brief note in The New York Times (7 May, based on the BBC report) is typical, making no mention of the fact that the only translators eligible are those who translated the work of the author who wins the Man Booker International Prize (if the winner is one of the 10 authors who don't write in English -- otherwise there's no prize at all). This is not, as many weblogs have been misled into hailing it as, a general translation prize; in fact, it's about as limited a one as is possible. (The (possible) recognition for translators is nice, but it's not that much to get excited about.)

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Javier Marias profile

       In The Guardian Aida Edemariam profiles Spanish author Javier Marías (see also, for example, our review of his Dark Back of Time).
       We're very much looking forward to the first volume of Your Face Tomorrow, due out soon.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       More Penguin tales

       In The Times John Sutherland and Stephen Bayley look at anniversary-celebrating publisher Penguin in Bird with a brain.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       TIBF news

       Not much press interest in the Tehran International Book Fair in the English-language press, but in the FAZ Azar Attar offers an overview and general survey of the Iranian literary and publishing scene (a considerably brighter one than suggested here, by the way).
       Meanwhile, Mehr News now reports:

Several visitors to the 18th Tehran International Book Fair have expressed dissatisfaction at the fact that some foreign publishers are offering older books for sale at the fair.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       More on Soyinka event

       We mentioned the Nobel-heavy bash they threw for Wole Soyinka up at Harvard last week. Now there are two more reports about it: Ken Gewertz writes that Soyinka feted by fellow Nobel Prize winners in a Harvard News Office report (with photographs), while Toni Bee writes that Harvard's Dubois Institute celebrates Soyinka in the Cambridge Chronicle.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Wired on Amazon

       In Wired Ryan Singel writes on Judging a Book by Its Contents, about Amazon.com's new book-information (only available for selected titles -- though quite many).
       He notes:

While such services seem to have little value and have generated scant publicity, except from bibliophilic thrill seekers, web watchers say the madcap stats aren't just for kicks.

       Few of the books we cover are covered, but where they are we have found these statistical insights of some interest.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Fascination review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is our review of William Boyd's Fascination.
       What we haven't found mentioned anywhere is that the British edition of the book contains sixteen stories, but the American edition only fourteen -- "Lunch" and "Loose Continuity" were axed for American audiences. (Perhaps the publishers thought two more stories would be just too much for American audiences, but this not too great collection wouldn't have been harmed by their inclusion -- and we actually missed "Lunch", which, from some of the British reviewers' descriptions, at least sounds intriguing.)

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       New World Literature Today

       The Adam Zagajewski-heavy May-August issue of World Literature Today is now available online. The articles are only available in the dreaded and dreadful pdf format -- but some interesting stuff.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       Reading the World site

       We've mentioned the multi-publisher, twenty-title Reading the World-book promotion previously, and now there's a convenient Reading the World set of pages, where you can find some information about the titles involved, news, and the admirable booksellers who are in on this.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Miles Franklin exhibit

       There's a Miles Franklin exhibit at the Australian National Library. At ABC News they offer a decent introduction, as they look at the Brilliant life of literary great, and Paul Brunton offers a good introduction at NLA News.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Review breakdown update

       Another 100 reviews -- we've reached 1400 -- so another update of our looks at How Sexist are We ? and How international are we ?
       As usual, our coverage of female authors leaves a lot to be desired: only 17 of the last 100 titles reviewed were written by women. That does raise the percentage to an even 14 per cent, but it's still pretty poor. (We still have no explanation -- or excuse -- for the striking and shameful male/female author discrepancy, but are still resisting instituting an affirmative action programme.)
       On the other hand, we're more international than ever: a mere 42 of the past 100 titles reviewed were originally written in English (see the complete breakdown) -- far below the average to date (close to two-thirds of all books under review were originally written in English). Eleven French titles, eight Norwegian (yeah, we can't explain that either), seven each Japanese and German -- a total of eighteen languages other than English represented.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       Collegiate concern

       It's nice to see some interest in literature in translation even among college students, and The Columbia Spectator has touched upon the subject (and problem) several times over the past few weeks. Michael Jan, for example, writes about The International Gap, noting:

There are nearly 200 countries in the world each producing new literature every year. The problem seems to be that if a new book is not written for Americans, then it is probably unknown to the average Barnes and Noble customer.

       Things are a bit more nuanced than he suggests -- it's not quite true that: "The international authors and titles that do trickle into American culture by word of mouth are inevitably those that have won awards or prizes" (though that certainly helps) -- but he does offer a few examples that go a bit beyond the usual ones.
       Meanwhile, Gautam Hans wrote about The Unsung Art of Translation last week.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       More on Weigel

       We panned George Weigel's The Cube and the Cathedral a while back, but John Paul II biographer Weigel has been getting a lot of air time recently, and this book considerable attention, and while we'd love to forget and ignore this forgetable book we feel obligated to once again point out what a poor piece of work it is.
       The trigger for this outburst is the publication in The Los Angeles Times of a commentary-piece summarising his arguments in The Cube and the Cathedral, The Spiritual Malaise That Haunts Europe (this they can make freely accessible -- for a few days, at least -- and their book reviews they can't ?!??!).
       Once again, it is specifically the demographic arguments and examples and conclusions he offers that draw our ire. "Europe, and especially Western Europe, is suffering from a crisis of civilizational morale", he believes -- and, apparently with a straight face, claims that: "the most dramatic manifestation" of this "is the brute fact that Europe is depopulating itself".
       He offers his reverse-Malthusian vision of the apocalypse:

As recent demographic studies show, by the middle of the 21st century, 60% of Italians will have no personal experience of a brother, a sister, an aunt, an uncle or a cousin; Germany will lose the equivalent of the population of the former East Germany; and Spain's population will decline by almost one-quarter.

       In the book he's a bit more careful, but here he doesn't bother to mention at all that these are extrapolated numbers based on current trends -- a highly suspect game to play. (In demographics current trends tend not to last very long.)
       Far worse, however, is his Euro-centric view, which allows him to claim:

But I am convinced that Europe's demographic meltdown is best analyzed in the realm of the human spirit, and that it is directly related to European high culture's abandonment of biblical religion.

       It's an interesting thesis, but any argument suggesting a causal link (abandonment of biblical religion leads to demographic meltdown) must make mention of local demographic trends globally -- and this is something Weigel refuses to do, both here and in his book. He makes it sound as if the catastrophic decline in birth rates is a uniquely European problem. Unfortunately, it's anything but. Much of the world that never gave much of a damn one way or the other about biblical religion is going through the same thing.
       Mongabay.com conveniently notes World population growth rate continues to plummet and (scroll down) lists fertility rates across the world. Where are they lowest ?

• Hong Kong: 0.91
• Singapore: 1.05
• Lithuania: 1.19
• Czech Republic: 1.2
• Slovenia: 1.24
• Korea, South: 1.26
• Latvia: 1.26

       So the countries where the fertility rate is actually the lowest aren't the Western European ones that have turned away from religion, but Asian city-states and densely populated countries, and some former Soviet and Soviet-satellite states (which surely can't have gotten more secular than they were under Soviet influence).
       Maybe Weigel does have a good explanation for the fall in European fertility rates (not that he makes a plausible case for it in his book) -- but how does he explain South Korea's rate ? For that matter: what about Iran's ? At 1.82 it is considerably below replacement level, and hardly much better than the EU average (and has plummeted faster than European rates). (One imagines he'd argue that the mullahs simply aren't being tough enough any more .....)
       Weigel may be correct in his diagnosis (though the numbers sure suggest something very different is at work here), but intellectual honesty in discussing the issue requires at least a mention of these awkward facts. And Weigel doesn't bother.
       Unacceptable.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Toby Press profile

       At Ynet Dan Bentsur profiles the publisher Toby Press -- focussing on their efforts to translate Hebrew literature (though they do considerably more).
       Disappointingly, however:

Whereas the operational aspect does not pose a problem, Toby Press is not profitable yet.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       The Lecture review

       The most recent addition to the complete review is our review of Lydie Salvayre's forthcoming The Lecture.
       One previous Salvayre-title has been translated into English, The Award, but now Dalkey Archive Press has plans to tackle several more.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       Publishing venture of the year !

       Rarely have we been so excited about a new book series, but the Clay Sanskrit Library (see also the NYU Press publicity pages) is about as exciting as it gets. Like the Harvard University Press Loeb Classical Library (focussed on Greek and Latin classics), the Clay Sanskrit Library offers handy small bilingual volumes of the Sanskrit classics; twelve are already available. (The one disappointing aspect is that the Sanskrit text will be a transliteration (i.e. utilize the Latin script, not the Devanagari original).)
       We can't wait to get our hands on these things. Our Sanskrit offerings are currently fairly limited -- three reviews each of different translations of Kalidasa's Sakuntala (see, for example, here) and Meghaduta (see, for example, here) -- but this would allow us to expand them nicely.
       For additional information, see Eric Ormsby's article in the May issue of The New Criterion, The jewel in the cobra’s mouth (which is how we learned of this wonderful series) and Barbara Jester's NYU Press Book Series Aims to Bring Classical Sanskrit Literature to Readers Around the World in NYU Today. And for an interesting behind-the-scenes glimpse of the technical aspects of the undertaking, see this Clay Sanskrit Library -- Proposal.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Tribal literature

       The Telegraph (Calcutta) reports on a Lament for literature neglect -- in this case tribal literature in India:

Tribal scholars from across the country expressed concern over the neglect of tribal literature at the first-ever three-day All India Tribal Literary Conference

       It's nice to see some attention paid to this -- we defy you to find any Indian tribal literature at your local bookstore -- but a bit of realism and sense of proportion also seems called for. Or are slightly over-the-top claims like this the way to go:

"There are at most 26 European languages. But there are as many as 90 tribal languages and each of them has a traditional of glorious literature. Still they are badly striving for recognition," Devi said.

If given due recognition and honour, Devi added, the tribal languages can compete with mainstream languages.

       Honour -- due or undue -- always makes us wary (and worry). Accessibility is really all we ask for -- reserving judgement until we have that. (We're pretty sure that among the 90 at least one or two don't really have that impressive a tradition (or traditional) of glorious literature .....)

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Korean translation issues

       No surprise: mediocre translations aren't solely an American problem: The Korea Times reports Literary Translations Falls Short of Standards. Apparently :

Of all the American and English literature rendered in Korean, only six works are considered to be the finest of quality translations in terms of accuracy and readability, according to a recent study.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Sharon and Oz

       We've mentioned that Amos Oz won the Goethe-Prize -- and it's big enough a deal that Ariel Sharon gave him a call and told him how proud he was: see the official press release.
       At least it gave Oz an opportunity to say what's on his mind too:

Amos Oz thanked Prime Minister Sharon and expressed the wish that the government would assist Israeli authors in translating their works into foreign languages. The Prime Minister promised that the matter would be looked into soon.

       We figure the PM has a few other things on his mind, but he could do worse than follow through on this.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       New Appelfeld book

       In Ha'aretz Yossi Avni-Levy reviews a new book by Aharon Appelfeld, Polin hi eretz yeruka ("Poland is a Green Country"). It'll probably be a while before it is available in English.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       TIBF

       The Tehran International Book Fair runs 4 through 14 May.
       Apparently they really need it:

The managing director of Roshangaran Publications said on Saturday that Iran’s book publishing sector is poor, sick, and in the throes of death, and the Tehran Book Fair is the only factor injecting life into it, keeping the sick body alive

       See also this overview.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Hard Case Crime books

       The most recent additions to the complete review are our reviews of three books from relatively new publisher Hard Case Crime (which has certainly gotten a lot of press and weblog coverage):

• Domenic Stansberry's The Confession
• Richard Aleas' Little Girl Lost
• Day Keene's Home is the Sailor

       Pulp fiction, through and through -- and we'll certainly be tackling more of them.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

       Israeli literature

       At Ynet Dan Bentsur reports that Europe embraces Israeli literature (link first seen at Black Market Kidneys via Conversational Reading). It offers some fun facts and opinions on literature in translation in Europe v. in the US, such as:

"Europeans are much better readers," she says. "Israeli writers are literarily sophisticated and produce very high-quality work, and there is much more of an audience for that kind of writing in Europe than in the U.S."

Harris says authors such as David Grossman and Meir Shalev, who sell more than 100,000 copies in Israel and 20,000-30,000 copies of their works in Europe, rarely pass the 5,000-copy mark in the U.S.

       Ouch !
       And:

According to Harris, literary books by European authors are sold in incredibly low numbers in the U.S, and they are almost equivalent to a print-run in Israel.

"Jose Saramago, one of the most important Portuguese writers, may sell more than 70,000-80,000 copies in Israel," she says. "In America, the number would be closer to 5,000."

       It's not like we haven't heard this before -- but it's still a useful reminder. How is this possible ? Why are Americans so vehemently (militantly ?) opposed to literature in translation ? Or is it a question of exposure -- i.e. they're not even aware this stuff is available ?
       (The only ones we ever hear from are readers who are open to this stuff -- but what the hell is wrong with the other 200 or 250 million potential readers in the US ?)

       Meanwhile, at Ha'aretz they're thrilled that Amos Oz got the Goethe-Prize (see our previous mention) and think it signals a Global interest in Israeli culture. They offer some interesting statistics re. Israeli literature in translation and note:

The success of Hebrew literature is a fact, and the only one who fails to understand this is the State of Israel. In recent years, every European country has been alloting ever-increasing resources to the translation of their books, while in Israel, the budget in this regard was slashed by 40 percent four years ago. The Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature, the publishers and the writers are running into major difficulties when trying to promote what appears to be a fertile and promising export industry.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       How We Should Rule Ourselves

       We'd missed that Alasdair Gray has a new book out (with Adam Tomkins), How We Should Rule Ourselves (see the Canongate publicity page or get your copy at Amazon.co.uk).
       There have been a couple of reviews: see, for example, those in:

• Independent on Sunday
• The Observer
• Sunday Herald

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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       Indian Pamuk perspective

       In The Hindu Meenakshi Mukherjee offers a Pamuk-overview, from ain Indian perspective. Of some interest, though some of the conclusions and claims are a bit simplistic, including:

The western press invariably refers to his religion and likes to project him as a builder of bridges between Islam and the West. For an Indian reader, it is possible to go beyond such simplification and think of Orhan Pamuk as an outstanding novelist of our time whose abundant inventiveness can turn abstract inquiries into vividly realised human situations. Islam is not his central concern. He happens to write about a society where most people are Muslims.

(Posted by: complete review)    - permanent link -

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