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aea2142's review against another edition
4.0
Oh, this was so sad. Rating it feels bizarre and awful. I can't remember the last time a book has conveyed such profound grief.
sneezysleeves's review against another edition
3.0
Books so beautifully written are hard to come by. Even with a broken heart, I was hypnotized by what Aidt is able to achieve with form in her writing. The pain of a mother’s grief is felt in each page turn and that’s a testament to Newman’s skillful translation. Similarly, each word is evidently written in a rare and expansive love that characterizes a fiercely protective mother.
———————————————————————————
“So strange that you don’t exist, I still feel you. My body still can’t understand that you don’t exist”
“Though no one has seen death’s face or heard death’s voice, suddenly, savagely, death destroys us, all of us, old or young. And yet we build houses, make contracts, brothers divide their inheritance, conflicts occur— as though this human life lasted forever. The river rises, flows over its banks and carries us all away, like mayflies floating downstream: they stare at the sun, then all at once there is nothing.”
“Shock-language. How ‘are’ ‘you’ doing ‘now’? A little ‘better.’ Have ‘you’ gotten any ‘sleep’ at all? Yes, ‘I’ ‘slept’ a little. Quote marks are necessary for describing the new reality, the no-reality, the one we suddenly find ourselves in, a state of emergency, where nothing ordinary resonates or can be established, where nothing in the entire world is recognizable.”
“Most of us don’t want to change, really. I mean, why should we? What we do want is sort of modifications on the original model. We keep on being ourselves but just hopefully better versions of ourselves. But what happens when an event occurs that is so catastrophic that you just change? You change from the known person to an unknown person. So then when you look at yourself in the mirror, you recognize the person that you were, but the person inside the skin is a different person.”
“It’s not possible to write artistically about raw grief. No form fits. To write about actual nothingness, the absence of life. How? To write about the silent unknown that we are all going to meet, how? If you want to avoid sentimentality, the pain stops the sentence mid-sentence. Words sit inadequate and silly on the lines, the lines stop abruptly on their own. The language that’s always followed me and been my life, can’t do anything. The language gasps, falls to the ground, flat and useless. Language’s mourning clothes are ugly and stinky.”
“That’s what poetry does sometimes. And it’s one of its most beautiful qualities. It’s also what makes poetry dangerous and portentous. The feeling of knowing something that you can’t understand yet or connect to anything in reality. As if poetry makes it possible to move freely in time, as if linear time is suspended while you write and a corner of the future becomes visible in a brief and mystical moment.”
“But poems also say something about giving back what the dead gave us when they were alive. That the dead’s being in a way still needs a place in life, and we should pass on the love they gave us. Here lies the hope. A hope that what you gave me will grow in others, if I am able to share it. And that my love is strengthened and made more beautiful because now it contains your love. This must not be destroyed by sorrow.”
“It’s an impotent rage. A rage that reminds me of what I experienced as a child. Just as children do not understand the forces they’re up against (the adults and their incomprehensible actions and refusals), the bereaved do not understand death. But there’s nothing to do about it. You can rage as much as you want, nothing will ever come of it. The adults decide and death decides. You can’t escape the loss of love from the adults, from the dead. Hard and furious and despairing, children and the bereaved must struggle on through life, and hope that the love underlying the feeling of loss is larger than the loss itself, and that this love creates love and compassion.”
———————————————————————————
“So strange that you don’t exist, I still feel you. My body still can’t understand that you don’t exist”
“Though no one has seen death’s face or heard death’s voice, suddenly, savagely, death destroys us, all of us, old or young. And yet we build houses, make contracts, brothers divide their inheritance, conflicts occur— as though this human life lasted forever. The river rises, flows over its banks and carries us all away, like mayflies floating downstream: they stare at the sun, then all at once there is nothing.”
“Shock-language. How ‘are’ ‘you’ doing ‘now’? A little ‘better.’ Have ‘you’ gotten any ‘sleep’ at all? Yes, ‘I’ ‘slept’ a little. Quote marks are necessary for describing the new reality, the no-reality, the one we suddenly find ourselves in, a state of emergency, where nothing ordinary resonates or can be established, where nothing in the entire world is recognizable.”
“Most of us don’t want to change, really. I mean, why should we? What we do want is sort of modifications on the original model. We keep on being ourselves but just hopefully better versions of ourselves. But what happens when an event occurs that is so catastrophic that you just change? You change from the known person to an unknown person. So then when you look at yourself in the mirror, you recognize the person that you were, but the person inside the skin is a different person.”
“It’s not possible to write artistically about raw grief. No form fits. To write about actual nothingness, the absence of life. How? To write about the silent unknown that we are all going to meet, how? If you want to avoid sentimentality, the pain stops the sentence mid-sentence. Words sit inadequate and silly on the lines, the lines stop abruptly on their own. The language that’s always followed me and been my life, can’t do anything. The language gasps, falls to the ground, flat and useless. Language’s mourning clothes are ugly and stinky.”
“That’s what poetry does sometimes. And it’s one of its most beautiful qualities. It’s also what makes poetry dangerous and portentous. The feeling of knowing something that you can’t understand yet or connect to anything in reality. As if poetry makes it possible to move freely in time, as if linear time is suspended while you write and a corner of the future becomes visible in a brief and mystical moment.”
“But poems also say something about giving back what the dead gave us when they were alive. That the dead’s being in a way still needs a place in life, and we should pass on the love they gave us. Here lies the hope. A hope that what you gave me will grow in others, if I am able to share it. And that my love is strengthened and made more beautiful because now it contains your love. This must not be destroyed by sorrow.”
“It’s an impotent rage. A rage that reminds me of what I experienced as a child. Just as children do not understand the forces they’re up against (the adults and their incomprehensible actions and refusals), the bereaved do not understand death. But there’s nothing to do about it. You can rage as much as you want, nothing will ever come of it. The adults decide and death decides. You can’t escape the loss of love from the adults, from the dead. Hard and furious and despairing, children and the bereaved must struggle on through life, and hope that the love underlying the feeling of loss is larger than the loss itself, and that this love creates love and compassion.”
fatima099's review against another edition
4.0
4.5
كتاب مؤلم جدًا
" غريب أن لا يعود لكَ وجودٌ ، فأنا لازلتُ أحسُّكَ.
لا أفهم بكلّ حواسّي أن لا يعود لكَ من وجود. "
" كنتُ سأمشي لآخر العالم من أجلكَ .
لكن المسافة لن تكون كافية "
" ولكن أليسَ
كل الأحداث أحلام
ما إن نتركها خلفنا .. "
"ونحن الذين نعرف النهاية
نتعرّف على الألم
في نظرةِ الغريب"
كتاب مؤلم جدًا
" غريب أن لا يعود لكَ وجودٌ ، فأنا لازلتُ أحسُّكَ.
لا أفهم بكلّ حواسّي أن لا يعود لكَ من وجود. "
" كنتُ سأمشي لآخر العالم من أجلكَ .
لكن المسافة لن تكون كافية "
" ولكن أليسَ
كل الأحداث أحلام
ما إن نتركها خلفنا .. "
"ونحن الذين نعرف النهاية
نتعرّف على الألم
في نظرةِ الغريب"
suvimj's review against another edition
4.0
Aluksi tästä oli vaikea saada otetta. Kun pääsi kiinni poikkeavaan tyyliin ja tajunnanvirtamaisuuteen, hahmottui, miksi tällaista tyylikeinoa oli käytetty. Raadollisen riipaiseva ja rehellisyydessään kouriintuntuva kuvaus maailman suurimmasta tuskasta eli oman lapsen menettämisestä. Loppupeleissä rikkonainen ja poukkoileva tyyli vain korosti tuskaa ja sekavuutta, johon suurimman surun keskellä ajautuu. Vaikuttava pieni kirja.
sarahb_513's review against another edition
4.0
You can feel the heartbreak, pain , and grief throughout this whole book. Narrator was fantastic.
fiktiviteter's review against another edition
5.0
Läs min recension på bloggen: http://www.fiktiviteter.se/2018/11/01/har-doden-tagit-nagot-ifran-dig-sa-ge-det-tillbaka-av-naja-marie-aidt/
emilymaeconn's review against another edition
rating this book feels..so wrong so i’m simply not going to. this is so raw and painful and vulnerable and i don’t have much else to say. ouch.