IN DESERT AND WILDERNESS

Author: Henryk Sienkiewicz
Year: 1978 (1911)
Publisher: Panstwowy Instytut Wydawniczy
Language: Polish

It seems commonly to be so that writers of children’s books are moderately successful when targeting a mature audience, and writers of literature aimed at adults fail to capture the hearts of the young whenever they try their luck at stories for children. Many have tried. Scandinavian legends Astrid Lindgren and H C Andersen are two examples of the former. Oscar Wilde and Virginia Woolf two examples of the latter.

There are a few, however, who have managed to make their mark on literature for all age groups. Swedish Nobel Prize winner Selma Lagerlöf is one. German writer and journalist Peter Härtling is another. Polish epicist Henryk Sienkiewicz a third.

Although Sienkiewicz is best known for his historical epics such as “Quo Vadis” or “The Teutonic Knights”, he is equally appreciated for his young adult novel “W pustyni i w puszczy” (“In Desert and Wilderness”). Despite the fact that this was Sienkiewicz’s only attempt at writing for teenagers, the book has become a classic in Polish literature and generations of Polish students have read it before graduating from grammar school.

The plot is set in Africa during the height of the colonial era. Staś and Nel grow up together near the Suez Canal and are fourteen and eight years old respectively when the story begins. Staś is the son of a Polish engineer leading the construction of the canal and Nel is the daughter of one of the senior directors of the company running the project. The fathers, both widowers, have become great friends over the years and also taken each other’s children to their hearts.

The point in time is 1884, just about the siege of Khartoum during the Mahdist war in Sudan. Staś’s and Nel’s fathers are called away on business and promise to send for the children once they have established themselves in their new location. When they finally do, the servants tasked with bringing Staś and Nel to them betray them and carry the children off to revolutionist Mahdi instead. The young captives realise that if they want to survive, they will have to find a way to escape from their captors.

Staś, who in the beginning of the story appears both boastful and vain, instinctively takes on the role as Nel’s protector. He proves himself protective, loyal and resourceful and on several occasions risks his life in order to save Nel’s. Nel, on the other hand, despite her tender age keeps Staś in line and more than once stops him from making mistakes or taking unnecessary risks.

The novel is aimed for a young adult audience in its early teens and upward but it shows that it is written by a master of the epic proportion and colourful characters. It is beautifully written, full of life and rich in flavour. The sentences, although suitably simple, are carefully crafted and contain much of the powerful yet gentle language that Sienkiewicz was world famous for during his lifetime.

But it also shows that he did not find it mandatory to spend his otherwise trademark attention to detail and facts on children. For although the historical context of “W pustyni i w puszczy” is largely correct, and the geographical descriptions are mostly accurate, his depictions of people and animals are bordering on fantasy. Vindictive elephants, oversized dogs that successfully fight lions and hyenas, one-dimensional representations of the local population and almost ludicrous dialogue where natives can barely put together a sentence in one moment, use elaborate vocabulary in the next, are all caricatures of what I assume someone born in the end of the 19^th century might imagine Africa to be. It is hard to believe that Sienkiewicz actually spent time there before writing this book, but he did.

Particularly the Muslim antagonists are portrayed not only as cruel and single-minded, but at times almost intellectually challenged (I believe the word Sienkiewicz’s contemporaries would use is “imbecile”). Furthermore, the relationship between Staś, the decision-maker and protector, and Nel, the damsel in distress, is all too well-known, although Sienkiewicz avoids some of the fiercest criticism by introducing a significant age gap between them.  

Modern critics have rightly questioned whether “W pustyni i w puszczy” should remain on the school curriculum provided its inaccurate and essentially racist content. Seeing as the book is intended for adolescents, this question is valid. However, as a reasonably well-educated adult, one should be expected to be able to identify these as relics of a past worldview no longer supported by society, and enjoy the novel for its remaining qualities.

Qualities of which there are many. There is no doubt that Sienkiewicz was a sublime storyteller. His environmental descriptions are enchanting and the main characters relatable and likeable. The storyline is simple but engaging and the pace is steady, although I suspect that a teenager in the 21^st century might find it too slow. We need to accept that an elephant simply does not make the same impression on the tiktok-generation as it did on the pegtop-generation.  

SPOILER ALERT

There are three random observations from my side that were probably unintentional from Sienkiewicz’s side but were all too obvious to me as a 21^st century reader.

The first is that Staś’s and Nel’s fathers appear to be very close friends, to the point of creating a family together for their children. To be clear, there is absolutely no trace of any romantic feelings between them, but short of that, they would make a remarkable same-sex couple.

The second observation is that Staś’s servant, Kali, is repeatedly quoted still to this day as a symbol of primitive morality when he concludes that stealing a cow from Kali is a bad deed, whereas if Kali steals a cow from someone else, it is a good deed. What people who quote these lines from the book as a way to make fun of non-European cultures fail to remember, and which I did not know until reading the book, is that Staś when he heard Kali’s reasoning thinks to himself that it sounds very much like high level politics is done in Europe at the time. Sienkiewicz 1, racists 0.

The third observation is that Staś and Nel, after surviving the ordeals in Africa, return to Europe and do not get together again until they are adults. To my disappointment, in the epilogue, Sienkiewicz decides to wed them in holy matrimony which shakes my image of them as brother and sister and is completely unnecessary for the ending of the novel.

All in all, even though I mostly enjoyed “W pustyni i w puszczy” my recommendation to someone who is curious about Henryk Sienkiewicz would be to read “Quo Vadis”, and someone who is curious about old young adult novels with adventure in them to read “Treasure Island”.

THE SEVEN GOOD YEARS

Author: Etgar Keret
Year: 2018 (2015)
Publisher: Brombergs Förlag
Language: Swedish (translator Kristian Wikström)

In an earlier blog post, I compared some books to shiny pearls (see Convenience Store Woman from January 2023). This is how I think of books that appear leaner and less conspicuous than the bombastic classics that tower over the literary realm like mighty sphinxes, yet in all their unpretentious beauty and grace still offer the readers a sublime reading experience, gently ushering them into intellectual or emotional areas previously unexplored. Etgar Keret’s collection of short stories “De sju goda åren” (“The Seven Good Years”) is another such pearl. Across 36 short stories, most of which are only a few pages long, Keret picks out some nuggets from the time period between the moment his son Lev is born up until his father passes away seven years later.

Keret is a true Master of the short story format. Each text is a snapshot from reality to which he adds not only colour and context but moreover an additional dimension, a way of thinking and responding to the situations described in an innovative, analytical, and highly entertaining way. Some of his contemplations are deeply sensitive and personal. Others, laugh-out-loud hilarious bordering on the ridiculous.

Many of the themes are universal. The challenges of family, friendship, money, time, and a hot summer day are things we can all relate to. Other themes are specifically Jewish and provide peepholes into the world of a Jew, both in Israel and abroad, from a perspective that is rarely encountered in other literature, even that written by other Jews. Keret’s Jewish perspective is not that of a victim. It is that of an introspective observer studying his field from an emic point of view, starting with himself.   

In the very first text, his son is born, while all the medical staff at the hospital is scrambling to respond to a Palestinian missile attack. He comes into a world full of anger, conflict, hatred, and vindictiveness. In another, Keret examines domination techniques and phone salesmen, and how his own ability to see things from the perspective of others is abused by people for their own gains, as symbolised by the telemarketers. Year two opens with one of the funniest texts I have ready this year as Keret tries to be creative with how he dedicates his books during signing events. He also shares his experiences with a wealth manager on the Channel Islands, which certainly resonates with This Banker. In year three, he accounts for his participation in the Gothenburg book fair during a diplomatic row between Sweden and Israel. The fourth year begins with the threat of nuclear war between Israel and Iran and proceeds to discuss courtesy in a taxi as well as the challenges of seeing ones sister turn into a religious zealot. In year five, Keret discusses his identity as an Israeli of Polish heritage and what Warsaw, which is where his mother grew up and had to flee from, means for him and his understanding of himself in the world. He also dwells on his role as a writer and his decision to write. During the sixth year, Keret’s father is finally given his death sentence in the form of a cancer diagnosis. How Keret handles this is the theme until the end of the book. The seventh and final year is where Keret’s father passes away. The year ends with another missile attack on Israel. This time, his son is old enough to ask questions.  

Keret brilliantly finds way to tie two or three observations together into one unified reflection that draws on one experience to examine or explain another. It is almost as if he is capable of stopping the clock to show us a scene frozen in time, and reveal to us the vulnerability, imperfection, angst, and self-repression of the people in it and put it in the context of a carefully delimited cultural or historical superstructure.

Etgar Keret may not be a journalist and he is certainly no philosopher, but he is an observer and a highly intelligent thinker, and he is very acutely aware of his surroundings. This together with his sense of humour and charm will render most readers defenceless. While every short story is a gem, the collection as such is a well-filled pouch of precious pearls. He will not win the Nobel Prize for his writing, but he will win many hearts.   

 

THE SEAGULL & UNCLE VANYA

Author: Anton Chekhov
Year: 1967 (1896 & 1897)
Publisher: Gebers Förlag AB
Language: Swedish (translator Jarl Hemmer)

A dead seagull at the feet of a confused young actress. Shot out of boredom and spite. Red blood seeping from its still heart onto its snow-white plumage. Its eyes wide open reveal nothing. Maybe because there is nothing to reveal. A receptacle devoid of content. A body without spirit.

This is the scene in Anton Chekhov’s play “Måsen” (“The Seagull”) where the shooter, Konstantin, and the young actress Nina go their separate ways after a short romance. He is passionate about the future. She is in love with the past. They can never truly know each other. He goes on to become a celebrated playwright of avantgarde drama, she is seduced by an elderly writer past his prime and gives birth to his child before being abandoned and shamed. “Måsen” is a play about the new challenging the old but also about humility challenging pride. Chekhov wants to show us how hard it is to create beauty and how easily it is ruined.

The second play in this short volume is “Onkel Vanja” (“Uncle Vanya”), another one of Chekhov’s most famous works. The mansion inhabited by professor Serebryakov and his young second wife along with his deceased first wife’s mother, brother (Vanya) and niece, is the ideal setting for a perfect storm. All the disappointment, disenchantment, and grievance on the side of Vanya toward his brother-in-law, whom he once revered, is like a powder keg about to explode. Vanya came many years earlier to the mansion to help his sister and her husband run it while the latter was still alive and the former was busy with his research. After her passing, Vanya stayed on and continued to run the estate, growing increasingly dissatisfied with his mission.

Anton Chekhov’s greatness is in his skilful construction of the dialogue as a way of developing his characters and the relationship between them. Whereas the engine in many playwrights’ works before his is a misunderstanding (comedies) or deceit (tragedies), the force that propels Chekhov’s plays is the impossible reconciliation of individual desire and ambition. Every person on stage is essential to the plot and to the message that Chekhov is trying to convey. No villain is necessary in either “Måsen” or “Onkel Vanja”. Fate and society are quite enough.  

Chekhov’s importance to the modernist revolution in late 19^th century modernist theatre can hardly be overstated and the school he established spread across Europe and the British Isles. Most famously, George Bernard Shaw implicitly dedicated his play “Heartbreak House” to Chekhov by the subtitle “A Fantasy in the Russian manner on English Themes”. It probably also widely known that Chekhov repeatedly argued about the minimalist storytelling technique where everything that is placed on stage needs to serve a purpose: known as Chekhov’s gun. If a gun is shown in the first act, the principle goes, it needs to go off before the end of the last, alternatively, if it does not go off, that in itself must be a significant turn of events in the plot.

Reading plays is in many respects different from reading novels. There is no narrator, descriptions are scant, and the setting implicit. All there is, essentially, is the dialogue. Exclusively external. When one reads a stage play, one must try to imagine the emotions, the gestures, the voices, deducing it all from the lines and the context. The work is intended to be performed, not read. This transfers the burden from the director and the actors to the reader. Often with poor results.

Although, I have never seen a play by Chekhov performed live on stage, after having read “Måsen” and “Onkel Vanja”, I am confident that the experience of these works would be ten times more potent had I enjoyed it from the stand at a theatre. Knowing what a play is about is one thing. Feeling it something altogether different.