The Leopard (2006)

By Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
What can you say about a book that is an acknowledged masterpiece? It is beautiful, terribly sad, frequently amusing (in a sly kind of way)…not a book to read if you’re looking for an upper, though. Apparently it also made a lovely film, but I haven’t seen it so I can’t add my two bits on that.

The Leopard tells the story of the dying days of the Sicilian nobility, during and after the 1860 revolution, led by Garibaldi, that resulted in a unified Italy under King Victor Emmanuel. The main character is the Prince, Don Fabrizio, a Sicilian nobleman, who reflects on the changes to his country and way of life, while negotiating the rise of a new and increasingly wealthy middle class and the corresponding decrease in the fortunes and status of his own family. The novel seems to be about betrayals (personal and state), the sadness of things ending, the feeling that lives have been wasted, mortality, yet this is all presented gently and eloqently, so the the sadness steals over you while you think you are just enjoying the language.

I do wish I could read Italian, so I could read the original and then compare it to this translation. I wonder how different they are? It must be like writing a whole new book…well, kudos to Archibald Colquhuon (the translator), kudos. I remember being disappointed with Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose, because I thought the writing would be more beautiful than it was – it felt kind of clunky, and I wondered if the original Italian novel was more lyrical and poetical, or if Eco just wasn’t a poetical kind of guy. No such worries here, though.

Rating: 9.5 out of 10

Slaughterhouse 5 (2003)

By Kurt Vonnegut
I think I’ll find it difficult to say anything meaningful about this book because although it’s written in an amusing style it is about terrible things – the experiences of members of the American army during the fire-bombing of Dresden in the Second World War. Vonnegut himself was in Dresden at this time, as he says in the first chapter, but writes the story through the eyes of Billy Pilgrim, a chaplain’s assistant who became a successful optometrist after returning from the War but who also became “unstuck in time” – he may be in Dresden during the war one minute, and then 40 years ahead in his life the next, writing letters to the local paper about the planet Tralfamadore and how he was kidnapped by its inhabitants and kept in an intergalactic zoo for over 6 months. It manages to be both light and tragic simultaneously. Hmm I’m not sure what to say next, only that I thought this book was excellent and I will be reading more of Kurt Vonnegut soon. Although it has some science fiction overtones, it is primarily a book about how horrible people are to each other, so I don’t think despisers of science-fiction should worry.

Rating: 10 out of 10

The Quiet American (2005)

By Graham Greene
Another book I read after seeing the film, and a really beautiful book. (The film is also good - it convinced me that Michael Caine is an actor worth his salt). It is always harder to write reviews of the books that are truly good – harder to be flippant, I suppose. The story is set in Vietnam, just before the US really get involved in the war, and is told by Thomas Fowler, an ageing English journalist. Vietnam has got under his skin, and he doesn’t want to go home. A young American arrives on the scene, Alden Pyle, talking about “A Third Force” that could bring stability to the region, and who promptly falls in love (of a sort) with Phuong, Fowler's mistress. The story then becomes one of trying to keep hold of what he loves, while still trying to remain neutral, to not take sides in what is happening around him.

To me, this was one of those novels where as I was reading I was conscious of it being perfect in all ways - succinct, poetic writing with complex characters that really seem to breathe, whose passions, sadness and fear are palpable. Strange that most of these books I have encountered so far are quite short.

Oh no, I have just realised this is a book about a LOVE TRIANGLE!! It tricked me! Wow, it really must be a good book.

Rating: 10 out of 10
Don't be put off by the gloomy topic - one of the best books I have read.