Emerging Writers Network

Book Review 2019-004: The Females by Wolfgang Hilbig, translated from the German by Isabel Fargo Cole

Book Review 2019-004
The Females by Wolfgang Hilbig, translated from the German by Isabel Fargo Cole
2018 by Two Lines Press, LLC, 129 pages

(We purchased a copy of this book as part of the annual subscription plan with Two Lines Press).

 

Not sure if we more consider this novel a fever dream or a heated rant from the author. Whichever we end up on, it was enjoyable and we look forward to more of Hilbig's works, which have slowly been becoming available in English thanks to Two Lines Press. Hilbig, who moved from East to West Germany, as translated by Isabel Fargo Cole, has penned an extremely quick read of not much more than 100 pages. His narrator has serious issues with The State, seemingly an obvious stand-in for his former home. 

The book opens with him in a lousy job, relegated to the basement of a factory, working by himself in a tool room. He can see the main factory floor through a grate in the ceiling, and from a step and a craning of his neck, can see women running the presses. They are large of size in order to provide the strength necessary to maneuver the equipment. In his lowly position, he notes that he frequently masturbates, while admitting shame for doing so. Not too long into the novel, he is fired.

This leads to his being summoned to a meeting at the capital with the Workforce Steering Office. He's not jumped right into a new job after the firing, holding some hope that he might be a writer (though one with an unwillingness to show his work to others). The woman he met with noted:

You want to be an artists...what on earth do you plan to write...a writer, but you shy away from racing real life. that's where I have an excellent suggestion for you. As I'm sure you know, the sanitation department in M. is dealing with a considerable shortage of manpower. Trash collection, that's a crucial field of work--aren't they constantly looking for young people? You're young and pretty sturdy. You don't want to work in your profession, which is unfortunate, but you're a pretty sturdy fellow, and the work there isn't for sensitive souls. You should report to them as quickly as possible...__I nodded and promised to follow her advice, but she could tell I was lying: Fine, you do that...meanwhile I'll register you, so we can keep an eye on you and make sure you don't get stuck on the wrong track.--

The state causing him problems. While things like this are not rare in The Females, we believe that the title of the book is the true cause for Hilbig setting this fevered rant on to the page. In those first pages, we see females only as he does--something to gaze at, something to cause urges that must be taken care of. Throughout the rest of the novel, females completely disappear at times, all the way down to female nouns no longer being used. In the meantime, our narrator is commenting on pornography--an extension of those opening pages taken to the farthest extreme.

...I dug my arm into one of the trash cans. And I thought I felt hair, a fleshy hairy mound in the midst of the can whose contents massed around my wrist. Just as though I've managed to swallow my own fist, a labial circle closes, firm and sucking, around my lower arm, bent arm wrapped around the neck of my shadow, pressing the head of my shadow to my face, gingerly I've closed the fingers of the hand on that arm to form a fist, and for days to come, on the palm of my hand and between my fingers, I'll find the smell of the heat that my fist clutched.

Later on:

I leaped up: the champagne bottle over there on the curb, what did it remind me of? The womb simulacrum in the trash can, women's clothes dangling from the trash cans, skirts I put my hands up while calling women's names, women's names that made the police turn their lights out.

While the females are gone, at least from his senses, scenes that this are fairly common, with nearly everything causing him to think of females, and typically leaning toward being written about in a sexual manner. We think The Females is meant to be a bit of a screed on gender inequality, but aren't a hundred percent sure that Hilbig nailed things. Though, if not, he was close enough to get us to think about the issue. By the end of the novel, even the narrator seems to be thinking of females in better terms. Females had remained gone from his life until he went back to working in a boiler room, this time in a prison, where there are plenty of women again, the novel ending with:

Now I knew where they were to be found, I'd seen them again and preserved them in my heart; I could wait for them.

 

Book Review 2017-001: The Arab of the Future by Riad Sattouf, translated from the French by Sam Taylor

Book Review 2017-001

The Arab of the Future by Riad Sattouf, translated from the French by Sam Taylor

154 pages, published by Metropolitan Books in 2015

 

(This book was purchased at Green Brain Comics)

 

This graphic memoir is subtitled, "A Childhood in the Middle East, 1978-1984," and the fact that the memoir is narrated by this child, ranging from pre-conception to the age of six years old leaves the reader with the wondering of just how reliable the information they are reading and viewing can really be. While there is some obvious love and admiration for his father, young Riad's descriptions of Abdel-Razak are not what you might call impressive. His father is represented as uncouth (he chews with his mouth open, for instance), horribly racist, and very naive when it comes to his views upon his standing within the world, even when it is pretty clearly pointed out to him.

Riad does refer to his father as brilliant and one that had been awarded a scholarship to the Sorbonne in Paris, and Abdel-Razak did graduate Cum Laude. He never seems to have any difficulties finding good work teaching as the family goes from France to Libya, to Syria, back to France and back to Syria (where they are headed as this memoir ends).

On the other hand, Riad treats his mother in a nicer manner, not perfect by any means as she for the most part accepts the role of woman standing behind her man, but she comes across as wiser, smarter about the world, and strong when it is absolutely needed. She is a French woman, a European with blonde hair, which Riad also has, and in a pretty luxurious manner, through these early years of his life. He is frequently referred to as yahudi, or Jew, by Syrian boys. Riad admits to not wanting a younger brother or sister (though even saying it might be a girl was a jinx according to Abdel-Razak--it HAD to be a brother).

I don't know that I learned much about Libya, nor Syria, at least not in this volume, and that was definitely something I was hoping for when picking this memoir up. Realizing that at least a portion of this might be the result of reading the memoir of a six year old, I do look forward to more from Sattouf as he looks at his later years.

There are many panels in this graphic memoir that not only have the narration, or some dialogue between characters, but will have lighter, cursive, notes--things that seem to point out very specific memories of young Riad. Things like plastic bags blowing around Syria, or memories of what the post office in Syria looked like from a distance. These maybe give the reader a boost in believing in the memory of Riad, no matter how young he was during the years this particular memoir cover.

The artwork itself is strong. It reminds me a bit of Charles Schultz's Peanuts--in that the characters are done pretty basically--strong outlines and not a ton of detail, yet Sattouf is able with just a little work on their expressions to completely allow the reader into their heads. And his usage of color in the background works very well, making sure the reader is aware of changes, or something specific within the panel that needs to be noticed.

Realizing as I bought and read this that there was already a volume two covering the next couple of years might have had me reading this a bit differently than had I not known it was going to be something longer. And actually, reading it in English, allowing for a year in translation, allows me to know that volume three is already out in France and likely on the way here sometime next year. I'm really looking forward to the second volume after completing this one and enjoying it as much as I did.

4 stars

 

National Short Story Month - Karate Chop by Dorthe Nors, Translated by Martin Aitken

A short little story collection, Karate Chop by Dorthe Nors (translated from the Danish by Martin Aitken) from Graywolf Press is full of short gems. Stories that might seem like they'll be cute or simply slide toward the dark or weird.

"The Duckling" begins:

Alongside the big farm, dad ran a duck farm, and because he was a clever man he earned a lot of money from it.

A story called "The Duckling" starting off that way--how dark can it get? Well at some point the dad gives the daughter who narrates the story a duckling born somewhat unhealthy, giving her a chance to raise it. Her thought is to put it in a bowl lined with a towel and put it in the oven to keep it warm. Perhaps not so surprisingly it dies. In a nice upswing however, they have a nice father/daughter moment burying the duckling together.

Another story, "Female Killers" has a married man staying up after his wife has gone to bed and he starts wandering the internet. He ends up looking up various female killers and maybe the only thing stranger than the facts that start to pop up about the killers is the thoughts that pop into the man's head about the female killers--they're odd, they're scary--they're inspired writing. He worries for the son (given up at birth) of the serial killer that will one day find out her name and find there are over 200,000 hits for her on Google; he thinks of chimps killing bush babies with spears they've made when put in the position of being hungry.

Nors' stories are short, but not quite what I'd consider minimalist. They have big ideas and just get to them quickly. It's a very entertaining collection and one you'll read in a day.