This is a mosaic novel put together out of fragments of stories of people in a rural district in Lower Silesia where the narrator has her summer home. There are some recurring characters like the narrator's neighbour, Marta, an old lady who has been a perruquier in her former life and still makes occasional wigs, and appears to spend the winter hibernating in her cellar. But there are a lot of people who come into the book for a chapter or two and are then never heard from again.

The history of the region and its shift in identity form a recurrent theme: There are tales of the Germans who were displaced from the region in 1945 and of the displaced Poles from further East who were moved into the houses the Germans left behind. Other stories take us into the spatial liminality of the border with Czechoslovakia, but never quite manage to get out of the confinement of the wet, deep valleys that never get direct sun in the winter months.

Tokarczuk also seems to be very interested in the way the isolated hill country has accommodated eccentric forms of spirituality: in particular the cult of a gender-bending medieval saint (Kümmernis, or Wilgefortis) and the story of the equally gender-bending monk who's writing her biography. And there’s a mysterious community of heretical knife-makers (some kind of Waldensians?) that keeps popping up on the fringes of the narrative. Mushrooms and other food also feature heavily, and we are drawn into discussions about the nature of dreams and the way they do or don’t intersect with fictional narrative.

Very interesting and absorbing, but — as so often with Tokarczuk — I’m not entirely sure where it was meant to be going. The point seems to be the journey, rather than the destination. ( )

L'asse del mondo è fatto di configurazioni iterative di istanti, movimenti e gesti. Non accade nulla di nuovo.
(pagina 296)

Non sono mai riuscita a ricostruire la storia in sé, ma sempre e soltanto la scena, le circostanze, il mondo che la faceva radicare in me, come se si trattasse di storie irreali, inventate, sognate, riflesse nella mia e nella sua testa, erose dalle parole.
(pagina 12)

Di punto in bianco mi venne in mente un'idea bizzarra e grandiosa:
che siamo esseri umani per dimenticanza e disattenzione.
(pagina 89)

Il fatto che ho vissuto qualcosa non implica affatto che ne abbia appreso il significato.
(pagina 108)

Che lusso, che dolcezza di vivere, sedere in una casa fresca, bere tè, mangiucchiare un dolce e leggere.
(pagina 220)

Da allora quello sguardo, quel punto di osservazione al di fuori di me, sarebbe comparso sempre più spesso, finché non avrebbe cominciato a cambiarmi, perché avrei perso la certezza di chi fossi, di quale fosse il mio centro, il punto intorno al quale si disponeva tutto il resto.
(pagina 286)

Fare, e non ottenere risultati
agire, e non smuovere niente
sforzarsi, e non cambiare nulla
partire, e non arrivare da nessuna parte
parlare, e non emettere voce.
(pagina 287)

( )

Egy borús kora tavaszi hajnalon Gabriel García Marquez hirtelen felriadt.
- Mi baj van, Gabo, rémálom gyötör? - kérdezte felesége.
(Ők már csak ilyen választékosan beszélgettek, még kora reggel is. „Rémálom gyötör”, nem „rosszat álmodtál”. Hiába, az irodalmi közeg.)
- Ne is kérdezd, mi corazón. Azt álmodtam, hogy lengyel író vagyok.
- Lengyel? De honnan tudtad, hogy nem bantu vagy irokéz?
- A vodkából, a katolicizmusból, meg az indokolatlanul sok mássalhangzóból a szereplőim nevében.
- Értem.
- Gombától illatos erdőkben jártam, galócák és tinóruk között, és áradó meséket fogalmaztam piciny, pusztuló falvakról, különös szektáktól, elfeledett vagy sosem volt szentekről, történelmi ballépésekről, kitelepítettekről, öngyilkosokról, szeretőkről, történeteim pedig összekeveredtek egymással, egymásba kulcsolódtak, besűrűsödtek, mint a jó szilvalekvár, és a végén olyanok lettek, akár az álom. Az én álmom.
- De nem a te álmod, Gabo. Csak az álmodban a te álmod. Különben meg valaki más álma.
- Igazad van, mi media naranja. Pedig jó sztori volt. Nobel-szagú. Vállalnám.
- Neked van már Nobeled, mi vida, ne légy telhetetlen. Hagyj egyet ennek a tehetséges lengyelnek is.
- Tudom, tudom... na mindegy, főzök egy kávét.
- Rummal?
- Nem is tudom. Most valahogy inkább vodkával.
( )

A double review: 'House of Day, House of Night' and 'Flights.'

I finally got around to reading 'House of Day, House of Night' on a friend's recommendation, after reading Tokarczuk 'Flights,' which is somehow even better. I'm baffled as to why this kind of form hasn't made its way into English-language writing, except in the most self-important and portentous way: a compendium of memoir (whether actual or purely formal), short stories, essays, research, tall tales, local history and so on, all of which is actually connected together in pretty obvious ways (here, by locality) rather than being aggressively meaningless, as in most fragmented anglo novels.

The center-piece to this book is the story of St. Uncumber (Wilgefortis in German), who repelled a rapey would-be fiance by assuming the face of Jesus, beard and all, and thus became the patron of all women in horrible relationships (until her cult was suppressed fifty odd years ago)--and, more importantly, Uncumber's hagiographer (I'm pretty sure Tokarczuk make him up). This tale was inspired by the narrator's trip to the local church, which featured a pamphlet life of the saint; much of the rest of the book details the relationship between our narrator and her neighbor, Marta, which veers between standard small town comedy and fairy-tale airiness. Usually I would roll my eyes at the latter, but here it works, because Tokarczuk presents it so modestly--no "look at me undermining paradigms!" stuff here.

Perhaps the gender-bending, localism and fairy-tale aspects will date this book in a few years; perhaps not. But it works wonderfully with the later 'Flights.' 'Flights' is tied together by the narrator's travels in the world of bodily preservation, which she refers to as her 'pilgrimages.' The narratives here are more resolutely contemporary: families go on holiday, only for disaster to strike, and so on. The past is just as important as it is in 'House,' but the stories are more--if this is the right word--mainstream. As a special bonus, there are fabulous illustrations.

While 'House' is about one place, about the immobility of history and God and so on, and how all that immobility relies on motion and change, 'Flights' is more or less the exact opposite: same form, with science (in the form plastination) taking the place of God (if not religion) and tourism taking the place of localism: it turns out that the ever changing world of the human body and tourism and love relies on some fixity, as well.

Intelligent, beautifully translated, endlessly interesting, and blessedly non-self-important, I can only hope these two novels exert some influence over writers outside of Poland as well as inside it. ( )

The musings of a woman who moves into a town in Eastern Poland, telling of her neighbors, the town’s history, and various other folklore. Seems like a great premise and the author does have great promise, because there were sections I really liked, but there were just not enough of these to recommend the book.

The highpoints for me? I loved the sections on mushrooms, including the recipes, and the section “On being a mushroom”, where the narrator takes the point of view of a mushroom. The recipes explain why the author advises, ‘Don’t try this at home!’ in the preface, since she bravely picks wild mushrooms, some of which are dangerous. I loved the sections that related to Eastern Poland having been part of Germany, and then given to Poland after the war, including “To the Lord God from the Poles”, which described shared residency with German families in houses during the transition, and “Peter Dieter”, where an aging German returned years later to see what became of his town. I also loved the section on the husband and wife who begin affairs when the passion in their marriage wanes, each with an elusive “Agni”.

I struggled with the rest of it. Most of the sections with Marta, her elderly neighbor, are quite dry, with observations on life that I found often banal. There is a story told over many chapters about a saint from the distant past and the person who told her story; I found it tedious, and really wish it had been excised from the book altogether. It adds to what is the book’s biggest problem, which in my opinion is lack of cohesion.

With that said, through the disjoint images an overall impression does emerge, and it’s a book that others may appreciate more. I may consider other books by Tokarczuk if I can find English translations.

Quotes:
On affairs:
“To her, the relationship wasn’t to do with sex, rushed intercourse while imagining a thousand times over that just then her husband would appear in the doorway with his briefcase, like in a farce. She felt that Agni was healing her. His gentle caresses were like a cool compress, his kisses were like a hot drink; thanks to him her body was getting stronger, and not yielding to decay.”

On expressing oneself, unbottling:
“These conversations in bed, as they lay exhausted by sex, were an alternative sort of lovemaking, even a more exquisite one. They didn’t require any flirting, tactical manoeuvres or courtship, just the opening of a sort of floodgate inside himself; it was like unblocking a dam and letting the words pour out.”

On love, unrequited:
“How does the world look when your life is filled with longing? It looks artificial, it crumbles and falls apart in your hands. Every single movement, every thought is watching itself, each emotion starts but never finishes, and finally even the object of your longing becomes artificial and unreal. Only the longing is real, imposing conditions on you – that you must be somewhere else, that you must have something you don’t possess, or touch someone who doesn’t exist. This state of being is self-contradictory – it is the quintessence of life, and at the same time it is opposed to life.”

On old age:
“I’d like to be old like Marta. Old age seems to be the same everywhere, consisting of long mornings, pleasantly protracted afternoons spent watching a sluggish TV serial with the blinds drawn down while the sun stands still above the rooftops. An expedition to the shop is a major event still being commented on over dinner. Being old means washing the plates carefully, and collecting crumbs from the table in nylon bags for twice-weekly outings to feed the pigeons in the park.
…
Then I realized that it’s not that I want to be old – it’s not a particular age I’m longing for, but a certain way of life, one that’s reserved for old age, perhaps. It involves not taking actions, but if you do, doing it slowly, as if it’s not the result of the action that matters, but the actual movement, the rhythm and melody of the movement.”

On opinions:
“…whenever people say ‘everything’, ‘always’, ‘never’, ‘every’, you should watch out, because they’re really only talking about themselves – in the real world such generalities don’t exist.”

On women:
“…only a metre away stood beds, and on each one lay a woman’s body, a soft, broken, perishable machine designed to transfer the generations through time, a flimsy little boat that sails from one shore of the night to the other, as people spill out of it.” ( )