About My Mother by Ros Schwartz & Lulu Norman

Abstract

Nhu, who merits an entire chapter on her feminine, glamorous wickedness. Her fullframe portrait gushes, “Power is marvelous . Absolute power is absolutely marvelous .” The author’s sister—at times a sane, if one-dimensional voice—disgusted by her brothers’ violent play and the conditions of war alike, remains largely undeveloped. This graphic memoir reminded me how much form matters. We don’t read graphic novels to make complete sense of history but rather to try to understand and process the human impact of moments in that history, through our senses, our bodies. Though words and facts were sometimes a distraction, this is a compelling story about one man’s very internal, embodied, and unfinished struggle to understand not only widespread human suffering but also a childhood that was unjustly drawn and colored by war. Alison Mandaville California State University, Fresno Tahar Ben Jelloun. About My Mother. Trans. Ros Schwartz & Lulu Norman. London. Telegram Books. 2016. 247 pages. There is a sort of prophetic air that accompanies much of the titular figure’s speech in Tahar Ben Jelloun’s About My Mother . Though autobiographical in some moments, Jelloun appears aware that his personal reflection is peripheral, instead focusing much of his efforts on instilling life in his fading parent, Lalla Fatma. Fortunately, Jelloun captures his mother’s essence splendidly, conveying quirks and anecdotes naturally. With About My Mother , Jelloun illustrates a life remarkably, not only in a celebratory fashion but also in a way that recognizes and reconciles the reality of loss. Set in his childhood home, Jelloun’s detail about the location from which he finds himself several decades removed at the novel’s onset bolsters the two most visible characters outside himself, his mother and her personal assistant, Keltum. There’s a feeling the place conveys, with the living room’s broken chandelier and a myriad of colorful medications, which can almost be smelled through the author’s vivid prose. This attention to detail often lends itself to the weariness of Jelloun’s visit as perception melts into itself and time slows to a crawl, made evident as “images fall from the [television] screen and mingle with the dust on the carpet.” Chapters of quiet examination are interrupted by episodes of his mother’s delusional fervor, interwoven within the narrative to the rhythm of a persistent soul. One instance finds Jelloun’s mother preparing for the arrival of her three husbands, each of whom are long deceased. A similar excerpt finds Lalla Fatma claiming she was visited by her third spouse and the author’s father, whom, she recalls, appears exceptionally sharp. After her son reminds her of his father’s fate, Lalla comically resolves that “death suits him.” Jelloun conjures a realistic and engaging image of Alzheimer’s disease, but it is the revelations his mother voices that allow the novel to resonate. Jelloun recognizes that despite his mother ’s failing faculties, a life of adversity and Michal Viewegh Bliss Was It in Bohemia Trans. David Short Jantar Set against the backdrop of 1960s political upheaval in Czechoslovakia, Bliss Was It in Bohemia employs humor to portray the struggles of a family at odds with itself and with its political surroundings. With a unique juxtaposition of comedy and chaos, the author reflects the complexity of human emotional responses, telling stories both of universal human experience and particular historical significance. Kimball Taylor The Coyote’s Bicycle Tin House Books This fascinating work of nonfiction represents one journalist’s quest to discover how seven thousand bicycles wound their way through a surprising number of hands to wind up abandoned just across the border from Tijuana, centered on a mysterious figure named El Indio. Kimball Taylor’s gift at capturing human stories in a manner as captivating as fiction transforms this Quixotic journey into a landmark work on the recent history of human smuggling into the United States. Nota Bene WORLDLIT.ORG 91 passion strives to persevere. Perhaps the fiery and sporadic nature of his mother’s condition is what makes this work most harrowing, as Lalla Fatma’s moments of liveliness bring forth a momentary hope within the shadow of inevitability. Due to this, the work can at times seem emotionally...