Belle prose, trop belle pour cette fiction.

https://nwhyte.livejournal.com/2945262.html

It's the story of a German doctor, dismayed by his wife's suicide, who sets off on a long sail journey with a friend; they are kidnapped by pirates and he ends up, after numerous rather horrible adventures, in a refugee camp in Darfur, where eventually he is rescued; but he finds that he cannot find peace in Frankfurt, and returns to Africa.

There are a couple of whopping big problems with it that require some suspension of disbelief. The pirates who capture the narrator and his friend are surprisingly eloquent for a bunch of militia. (One of them turns out to be a published poet, but the others are not.) The path from the Gulf of Aden to Darfur is politically implausible and geographically weak - there is no mention of the River Nile, which flows firmly across any conceivable route and is rather hard to miss. While Darfur is not exactly lush, it's not as desertified as portrayed here either. The parts of the book in Frankfurt seem a bit more grounded in local knowledge.

Of course, "Khadra" (in real life Mohammed Moulessehoul, using his wife's name as a pseudonym) is Algerian, and I suspect that some of the scenes of violence and indeed of refugee camps are more closely drawn from experience and knowledge of his home country rather than places further to the east or south. And certainly I've met militia leaders with literary pretensions, and even white Frenchmen who have adopted African-ness as a new identity like the character Bruno. So if you can swallow the implausibilities it's an interesting narrative.

‘Why are you sad?’ the marabout had asked me. ‘You shouldn’t be. Only the dead are sad because they can’t get up again.’ And I was alive. I breathed, I felt emotion, I reacted, I dreamt … I was in seventh heaven.

Libro che tenevo sott'occhio da qualche mese per le varie gare di lettura.. Si è rivelata una bella scoperta!!
La storia ha saputo trasportarmi prima nella vita di tutti i giorni Kurt, poi nelle sue disavventure africane.. Più volte al dottore viene chiesto se sa com'è la vera Africa, e durante il libro vengono fuori i vari aspetti di questo continente tanto crudele quanto magico.
Mi sono innamorata dello stile di Khadra e sono già alla caccia di un altro suo libro :)

3.5*

It's disturbing, compelling, likely to provoke much debate and makes me look forward to reading his next book.

Kurt Krausmann, a doctor living in Frankfurt, Germany met a beautiful woman while in Paris, both were there for work purposes, attending different conferences in the same hotel, seemingly wedded to their careers, they found each other and if we are to believe the doctor narrator, 10 years of contentedness followed.

Moments from the past now arrive unbidden, a mocking assurance as his illusion of bliss is permanently scarred the evening he arrives home to discover the loving (though recently tormented by he knows not what) Jessica, has committed suicide.

The doctor’s ritualistic, clinical, predictable life is turned upside down and he experiences extremes of emotion, the like of which he would normally only ever encounter in the detached manner he has of observing patients, those symptoms he has so often downplayed in others threaten to overwhelm him.

His friend Hans Mekkenroth, a wealthy philanthropist throws him a lifeline, suggesting he travel with him on one of his regular humanitarian missions, they will sail across the seas in his yacht to deliver supplies to the Comoros Isles.

Hans lost his wife Paula some years before and though there isn’t a day when he doesn’t miss her, he appreciates that life doesn’t stop, he has found meaning in using his wealth to try and alleviate the suffering of others (while enjoying the element of adventure), whether it is the poor of Africa or the 1st world problems of his companion the Doctor, Kurt.

Kurt is about to discover a version of suffering and misery worse than he came with, when they are hijacked by pirates in the Gulf of Aden in the middle of the night and taken hostage. Transported inland, they are initially held in a cave, while their captors decide what to do with them and teach them a lesson or two in the meantime.

The men are moved and lose all sense of where they actually are, as they try to understand who is in charge and what is going on around them. When they meet fellow hostage Bruno, a Frenchman who has been living a nomadic existence in Africa for 40 years, they begin to understand the varying potential prices on their heads and fear for their survival. Despite his captivity, Bruno the ‘born again African’ Frenchman, refuses to let go of his love for Africa, countering every negative situation with an alternative view.

The hostage experience awakens a once dormant, now seething rage in the Doctor, an equivalent madness that has been roused for some time in his captors, as they trade insults, tirades of hatred and contempt revealing how similar they all are, despite their intent to exert superiority and dominance, each striving to rise above the other. They have worn their societal labels, been perceived, and practised as a Poet(the African) and a Doctor(the Westerner) yet in this unforgiving environment, they are reduced to their despicable worst, seeing the other as their nemesis, representing the worst of those stereotypes, they reduce each other to in their respective forms of bigotry, showing themselves equally capable of the worst man can do, given the circumstances.

It is a compelling story that provokes as many questions as it answers, that at times risks falling into the stereotypical traps it seeks to avert. The Doctor had no desire to travel to the African continent, he is there by accident, thus he represents the perspective of those who come by their views through media and external cultural perspectives and his violent experience would seem only to strengthen those views, though they are challenged by some of his later encounters.

Without giving the plot away, I conclude he learns little from his experience, he reverts to his former self, seeks a form of escape from his reality, another version of the life he had before. Perhaps this is what Khadra is getting at, whether it's a hostage experience, a safari trip or medical relief, that Westerners remain unchanged by their experience? Certainly tourism is rarely a life changing activity, but living in another country for more than 40 years might be.

We were puzzled by the suicide of the Doctor's wife and though a reason is proffered, there is little introspection on his part to understand his role in it. Did his subsequent journey transform his character in any way? His reaction on his return and unwillingness to explore it, suggest not.

On the reverse side of this equation, we witness the horror of hostage taking and the keeping of prisoners in horrid conditions, the anger and violence of men, the arid landscape, civilian brutalities, villagers on the run and a refugee camp. They a significant contrast to the part of Africa I have been in recently through Wangari Maathai’s autobiography, Unbowed, One Woman's Story, she inhabited a woman’s world in the beginning and then through education, the Kenyan elite. Her story does more to dispel the myths and stereotypes than anything else I have read so far. She may have been an exceptional woman, but I have no doubt there are many more like her, who could teach us a lot more about the Frenchman Bruno’s favourite and frequent quote:

‘That’s Africa, Monsieur Krausmann!’

My complete review here at Word by Word.

This is a hard book to review. On the one hand, it has an engrossing plot which sweeps you in and draws you into a totally different world right away, forcing you to think about your own life circumstances and good fortune, which we almost always take for granted. On the other hand, it isn't perfect, and is somewhat preachy in its philosophies and politics. Also, it is sometimes truly difficult to read about how harrowing and horrifying human life can be in the third world. There are shocking scenes in this novel which I found difficult to read through. The characters are sometimes over the top, representing ideas and stands instead of being real people. Still, it is an important book, and pretty enjoyable all in all. I recommend it with all its faults.

Mon dieu, quelle déception que ce livre après avoir tellement entendu parler de l'auteur !
La vision de l'Afrique (sans aucune distinction entre les différents pays, au passage) montre des situations de chaos, de bandes guerrières et de massacres, qui existent certes, mais comment peut-on présenter seulement ça de ce continent, sans même parler des circonstances géopolitiques et des vendeurs d'armes qui contribuent à cet état de fait ?
Certes le personnage principal finit par voir le côté admirable de l'Afrique, mais par un tour de passe passe qui échappe au lecteur.

J'avais l'attentat du même auteur dans ma liste de souhaits, mais je vais l'en retirer de ce pas car je n'ai aucune envie d'avoir l'avis de M. Khadra sur le terrorisme.

En plus j'ai trouvé ça mal écrit et poussif.