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Search - Chronicle of the Seven Sorrows

Chronicle of the Seven Sorrows
Author: Patrick Chamoiseau

Pity the poor translator who has to grapple with Martinican writer Patrick Chamoiseau's playful and imaginative m?lange of formal French and Caribbean Creole--but envy the lucky reader who gets to enjoy his tasty gumbo, Chronicle of the Seven Sorrows. First published in France in 1987, Chamoiseau's debut novel is reminiscent of the work of Gabri... more »el Garc?a M?rquez and Salman Rushdie in its wild tumbling cataracts of language, its host of characters, and its freewheeling use of magical realism. Consider, for example, the origins of protagonist Pierre Philomene "Pipi" Soleil:

"That evening, H?lo?se went to bed a virgin for the last time, because meanwhile, black Phosphore had revealed to his sorrowing son the Method he'd learned from a sepulcher, and had turned him into a dorlis. Anatole-Anatole's modus operandi remains unknown. People get lost in conjecture trying to figure out if he used the technique of the toad hidden beneath the bed, the one of the ant that slips through keyholes, or the one of three-steps-forward-three-steps-back that lets you walk through walls. The fact remains that on the evening in question, he found himself in H?lo?se's bedroom despite all locks and barricades. Putting his new expertise as a dorlis to work, he went inside her without waking her up and spent eight delicious hours on her sleeping body. "

When H?lo?se wakes up the next morning, bruised and bloodied, she knows she's been assaulted by an incubus and takes measures (a pair of black underpants worn backwards) to protect herself against him. Unfortunately, the damage has already been done, and nine months later she gives birth to a son, who eventually grows up to be "king of the djobbers." The novel's plot, such as it is, follows Pipi's fortunes as he wields his wheelbarrow through the crowded market streets of Fort-de-France. Chamoiseau structures his tale like a collection of oral histories, dipping in and out of the life stories of minor characters, circling back and forth in time to cover a wide range of topics from slavery to World War II to relations between the white and black Martinicans. There's little if any real character development, but that's not what this "word scratcher" is after. In his dizzying cut-and-paste collage of Caribbean life, Chamoiseau is attempting nothing less than to communicate the soul of his homeland--a challenge at which he succeeds brilliantly. --Alix Wilber

ISBN-13: 9780803264267
ISBN-10: 0803264267
Publication Date: 5/1/2003
Pages: 240
Rating:

0 stars, based on 0 rating

Publisher: Bison Books
Book Type: Paperback
Other Versions: Hardcover
Members Wishing: 1
Reviews: Amazon | Write a Review

Genres:

Literature & Fiction >> World Literature

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