Destination: The Former Yugoslavia
Book: The Tiger’s Wife (NEW March 2011) by Téa Obreht
The thought that kept haunting me as I read this novel was, “How did this magical realism get transferred from South and Central America to the Balkans? ” The Tiger’s Wife is full of legends, fables, and myths–magical explanations of otherwise unexplainable events. I cannot say too much about any of them without spoiling the story, but the tiger of the title is a pretty amazing story, as is a man’s repeated meetings with a mysterious figure referred to as the deathless man.
Stories pile on top of stories. Time is flexible, and the book progresses like a long oral narrative, jumping back and forth as something comes to mind. A grandfather cherishes his copy of Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book–which spurs his love of tigers in general and one in particular. He tells the stories of his own life, as magical as Kipling, to his grand daughter.
Because the narrator is a doctor, and her grandfather is a doctor/professor, the book balances a matter of fact, scientific view of life and death with the stories that spin farther and farther away from reality.
The Citadel above the Belgrade Zoo
Téa Obreht, who was born in Yugoslavia, never explicitly spells out which country carved out of the former Yugoslavia we are in. That’s fine, because the descriptions of place are vivid and she is making a point about the artificial way that people are split apart by geo-political boundaries.(The Library of Congress has a fine explanation of the history of Yugoslavia and the countries that are now in its place. I can’t give you a link, because they do not allow permanent links. You can search for it at the Library of Congress site--go to Country Research.)
Because a friend had recently spoken rapturously about Dubrovnik in Croatia, and I have a hankering to go there, I pictured the old town scenes in Dubrovnik rather than Belgrade in what is now Serbia. But I was wrong. The history of the Belgrade zoo, shows that the narrator was in Belgrade.
In the predominantly Christian villages that she depicts, small town prejudices generally require Muslims to hide their identity. People are weary of war, but accustomed to armies washing over them and sometimes confused about what all the fuss is about.
Ultimately the book is about much larger themes than the political struggles in the Balkan countries. But war brings death, and death is a prevalent theme with its rituals, people’s various attitudes toward facing death, and superstitions about how to delay one’s own mortality.
The author is probably seriously tired of remarks like this, but this very weighty look at life and death is all the more amazing given her youth. Obreht’s official portrait on the back flap of the book, with her long blond hair and pretty round face, could be from a high school year book. As an author, Obreht was name one of 40 under 40 by the New Yorker, and 5 under 35 by The National Book Foundation. Not only that, but her agent was 30 and her editor 26. Talk about youth revolutions!
But really, here is an author that belongs in the Traveler’s Library not only because the superlatives been heaped upon her are totally deserved, but also because in an Atlantic on line interview she said,
“I am very interested in place, and the influences of place on characters. What inspires me most to write is the act of traveling. I like to explore the idea of common conflict in perhaps a more amplified environment in my writing. Human conflict is human conflict I guess anywhere, but I like to explore the interactions of people with place and how place influences characters’ decisions, and their conflicts with one another, and also with the place itself—that’s something that I enjoy exploring.”
And by the way, you might want to follow that link to the Atlantic interview to see what her own reading choices are. First, though, believe me when I say, you want to read The Tiger’s Wife.
Disclaimer: The publisher sent me this book to review, and I thank them. The pictures come from Flickr with a Creative Commons license, and you can click on the picture to learn more about them. If you follow book title links to Amazon, I earn a few pence.
Have you visited any of the Balkan countries? More than one? Should I add Belgrade to my wish list along with Dubrovnik? And of course, I’m always eager to hear from people who have read the book.
PDF Tags: Balkans, Belgrade, BlogSherpa, book review, Croatia, Dubrovnik, magic realism, Obreht, Rudyard Kipling, Serbia, The Jungle Book, The Tiger's Wife, Yugoslavia
Enjoyed your review and the timing ~ Ms Obreht was here (Rochester, NY) for a reading on Friday night. It was a very enjoyable evening and her reading was such an interesting (additional) introduction to her book. I could have listened to her read the whole thing, she cast quite a spell with it. I’ve never been to the Balkans in person but I did get a copy of the book that evening and I’m looking forward to the visit while reading it. (and she really is as young as the picture on the back flap)