Sherbert Illuminated

I regret to inform you, fellow readers, that summer has come to an end. With it must die my summer review format. In this final week of summer reading, I finished six books: Shadow and Act by Ralph Ellison The author of Invisible Man reflects on literature, music and society in immaculate prose essays. While not every work is as great as “On Bird, Bird-Watching and Jazz,” which inspired me to pick up this collection, each reveals the internal rhythms of a superb writer and critic. “In those days it was either live with music or die with noise, and we chose rather desperately to live” (187) Silence by Shūsaku Endō During the Tokugawa persecutions, two Portuguese Jesuits venture into the Japanese “swamp” in search of a mentor rumored to have abandoned the faith. The intense, melancholy themes presented by Endō are stifled by a too-conventional translation. “On the day of my death, too, will the world go relentlessly on its way indifferent as it is now? After I am murdered, will the ci

Fellow readers, I feel accomplished. This week, I managed to finish nine books, including one I’ve been reading for more than a month and a half. I even managed to find a new favorite, but the quality of books was overall quite mixed: Kindred by Octavia E. Butler Dana, a Black woman from 1975, is mysteriously and repeatedly transported to antebellum Maryland to save the life of a brutal ancestor. With plain, brutal prose and a gripping plot, Butler’s most famous work makes an uneasy home between science fiction, historical mystery and enduring political literature. “There had to be some kind of reason for the link he and I seemed to have. Not that I really thought a blood relationship could explain the way I had twice been drawn to him…What we had was something new, something that didn’t even have a name. Some matching strangeness in us that may or may not have come from our being related” (29) The Welkin by Lucy Kirkwood When a murderess pleads the belly, a jury of twelve matrons mu

Fellow Readers, I’ve already started planning my travel reading—starting with Swann’s Way on the plane. But my first priority is clearing my physical TBR. Even though I could have done better this week, I am pretty happy with the books I read: Teahouse by Lao She In a three-act play with an ensemble cast, a Beijing tea house and its proprietors must adapt to the political changes of the early 20th century. Although its pro-communist ending means that I’ll never see the play performed in English, the humor, strong characters and social commentary shine through in John Howard-Gibbon’s translation. “WANG LIFA: Reform! I’ve never forgotten about reform…what the hell if I lost a little face, a man has to live, hasn't he? I tried anything and everything, but only so we could live. It’s the truth. Sure I bribed people when I had to, but I never did anything unjust or immoral. Don’t I deserve a normal life? Who have I wronged? Who?” (106) Search Sweet Country by Kojo Laing The intertwin