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I had a great time with this challenge to read memoirs, autobiographies, or biographies. I read 6 books:
- Dreams from my Father, by Barack Obama (completed 1/11/08 - review)
- Stolen Lives, by Malika Oufkir (completed 3/7/08 - review)
- Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver (completed 4/13/2008 - review)
- Infidel, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali (completed 6/21/2008 - review)
- Brother, I'm Dying, by Edwidge Danticat (completed 7/23/2008 - review)
- Paula, by Isabel Allende (completed 8/7/2008 - review)
Favorite book: This is a tough call. Every one of these was inspiring in some way. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle probably had the greatest impact in that it kick-started my own gardening and local-eating plan.
Least favorite book: Stolen Lives, simply because it wasn't quite as well-crafted as the others.
Thanks to Vasilly at 1330V for hosting this challenge!
Paula Isabel Allende
330 pages
At the age of 28 Isabel Allende's daughter, Paula, was stricken by porphyria and lapsed into a coma. Paula was written at her bedside as a way to work through emotions and unfinished business. Allende re-tells the tragic story of Paula's illness and treatment, while simultaneously recounting her life story.
I cannot begin to imagine the strain of caring for someone with a long-term illness. Allende approached the situation with fierce devotion and drive, doing everything within her power to help Paula. She rallied other family members even during the darkest times, and turned to her writing for emotional release.
Isabel Allende is one of my favorite authors, so I found it quite interesting to learn about her childhood, the family members who inspired her writing, and her escape from Chile's political unrest. In turn, she inspired me as a feminist, a mother, and a deeply spiritual woman. (
) I read this book for the Celebrate the Author challenge: Isabel Allende was born August 2, 1942.
Infidel
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
352 pages
It was Friday, July 24, 1992, when I stepped on the train. Every year I think of it. I see it as my real birthday: the birth of me as a person, making decisions about my life on my own. (p. 188)
This fascinating memoir recounts Ali's life story and her journey from a devout Muslim childhood to an adulthood as a controversial political leader in the Netherlands. Ali is unflinchingly candid about her childhood experiences as a refugee in Kenya, her family relationships, and her intense faith. As she approached adulthood she began to question the society in which she was raised, and the tenets of Muslim living, particularly the associated oppression of women. She risked all she held dear for her own independence.
The strength which enabled Ali to strike out on her own carried her from refugee centers to independent living and, eventually, to membership in the Dutch Parliament. She is an activist for women's rights, particularly in the Muslim community: I decided that if I were to become a member of the Dutch Parliament, it would become my holy mission to have these statistics registered. I wanted someone, somewhere, to take note every time a man in Holland murdered his child simply because she had a boyfriend. I wanted someone to register domestic violence by ethnic background ... and to investigate the number of excisions of little girls that took place every year on Dutch kitchen tables. ... The excuse that nobody knew would be removed. (p. 296)
Her candor has caused considerable controversy and sparked acts of extreme violence. She has remained strong through it all. Ayaan Hirsi Ali is an amazing woman who is sure to have a continued impact on the world. ( )
Vasilly over at 1330V is sponsoring a Memoir, Autobiography, Biography challenge for 2008. I'm in! And I'll participate in her group blog here. I would like to read at least 6 books for this challenge. My List:
- Dreams from my Father, by Barack Obama (completed 1/11/08 - review)
- Stolen Lives, by Malika Oufkir (completed 3/7/08 - review)
- Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver (completed 4/13/2008 - review)
- Infidel, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali (completed 6/21/2008 - review)
- Brother, I'm Dying, by Edwidge Danticat (completed 7/23/2008 - review)
- Paula, by Isabel Allende (completed 8/7/2008 - review)
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life
Barbara Kingsolver
352 pages
This was one of the most inspiring books I've read in a long time. In this memoir, Barbara Kingsolver describes the year that she and her family spent living on locally-grown livestock and produce, much of which they raised and grew on their own farm. Acknowledging the fast-paced and urban nature of modern American society, Kingsolver noted, "Most people of my grandparents' generation had an intuitive sense of agricultural basics: when various fruits and vegetables come into season, which ones keep through the winter, how to preserve the others." (p. 9) Yet today, most of our food is shipped over long distances and often from other countries, in order to be available to American consumers year-round. All this transportation requires fuel -- a waste and yes, a danger, given the threat of climate change.
This book is organized chronologically through the family's "year of eating locally," beginning in April with the first asparagus and the arrival of laying hens. In addition to their own food production, Kingsolver describes experiences with local food on a family vacation, as well as on a trip to Italy with her husband. Her husband and older daughter contribute essays, recipes, and sidebar topics that enrich the book and provide resources for the reader to conduct their own research on the subject.
I came to this book already interested in gardening, and in supporting our local farming community. I've now identified some initial steps I can take to increase the amount of local food on my own table. I'm not quite ready to raise (and yes, slaughter) my own livestock, nor am I going to swear off the supermarket altogether. But I'd like to think my actions will result in a healthier, tastier diet and make a small dent in fossil fuel consumption. (
)I read this book for the Celebrate the Author challenge: Barbara Kingsolver was born April 8, 1955.
Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail
Malika Oufkir
290 pages
In 1972, Moroccan defense minister General Mohamed Oufkir staged a failed coup d'etat against King Hassan II. Oufkir was reported to have committed suicide, but was found with five bullet wounds. In retaliation for the coup, his entire family was imprisoned: Oufkir's wife, Fatima, and his children Malika, Raouf, Soukaina, Maria, Myriam, and Abdellatif. A cousin, Achoura, and a close family friend, Halima, joined them. Malika Oufkir was 17 years old; her brother Abdellatif was only 3.
Malika had been adopted at age 5 by King Mohammed V, to serve as a playmate for his daughter. After King Mohammed's death Hassan came into power, and continued to treat Malika like a member of his own family. However, she was completely separated from her family of origin and had only recently rejoined them when the coup attempt took place. The first part of this memoir vividly describes the opulence and luxury of Moroccan court life, which of course was in sharp contrast to prison conditions. Over a 20-year period, Malika and her family were kept in three different places, with markedly different conditions and privileges. Initially they were able to spend their days together, later they were transported to a harsher environment and placed into cells either alone or with 1-2 other family members. They spent 10 years without direct face-to-face contact, and yet devised ways to communicate and support each other in maintaining their will to live. Their mental and physical strength is both amazing and inspiring.
Oufkir's story is a shocking one, and yet is just one example of people who "disappeared" during King Hassan II's reign. I am embarrassed to admit that even though I came of age in the 1970s, and was nearly 30 by the time the Oufkirs gained their freedom, I knew nothing of the human rights violations in Morocco. Stolen Lives was a compelling and enlightening read. (
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Dreams from my Father Barack Obama
442 pages
In the summer of 2004, we had just returned to the U.S. after 4 years in England. Those years had been a time of change and turmoil in my home country. We were eager to reconnect with, and understand, the political landscape and the people who would shape the future. At the Democratic National Convention in August, a "young" (my age) politician named Barack Obama gave an inspired keynote address that left me both awestruck and hopeful. When I came across Obama's book at a library book sale recently, I thought it was time to learn more about the man behind the powerful rhetoric. First published in 1992, Dreams from my Father describes Obama's childhood, his early career as a community organizer, and his first visit to Kenya, his father's homeland.
In one respect, this book is about a search for identity, with Obama exploring his "uneasy status: a Westerner not entirely at home in the West, an African on his way to a land full of strangers." (p. 301) As part of this search, Obama gains an increasing awareness of race issues in American society:
- A friend of his grandfather's, as Obama was preparing to leave his home in Hawaii for college: "They'll give you a corner office and invite you to fancy dinners, and tell you you're a credit to your race. Until you want to actually start running things, and then they'll yank your chain and let you know that you may be a well-trained, well-paid nigger, but you're a nigger just the same." (p. 97).
- Describing a campaign by the Nation of Islam to sell branded products: "The the POWER campaign sputtered said something about the difficulty that faced any black business -- the barriers to entry, the lack of finance, the leg up that your competitors possessed after having kept you out of the game for over three hundred years." (p. 201)
- On those in Chicago who had marched for civil rights and yet, "...at some point had realized that power was unyielding and principles unstable, and that even after laws were passed and lynchings ceased, the closest thing to freedom would still involve escape, emotional if not physical, away from ourselves, away from what we knew, flight into the outer reaches of the white man's empire -- or closer into its bosom." (p. 277)
"The study of law can be disappointing at times, a matter of applying narrow rules and arcane procedure to an uncooperative reality ... But that's not all the law is. The law is also a memory; the law also records a long-running conversation, a nation arguing with its conscience. ... I hear the voices of Japanese families interned behind barbed wire; young Russian Jews cutting patterns in the Lower East Side sweatshops .... I hear the voices of people in Altgeld Gardens, and the voices of those who stand outside this country's borders ... all of them asking the very same questions that have come to shape my life ... What is our community, and how might that community be reconciled with our freedom? How far do our obligations reach? How do we transform mere power into justice, mere sentiment into love? The answers I find in law books don't always satisfy me ... And yet, in the conversation itself, in the joining of voices, I find myself modestly encouraged, believing that so long as the questions are still being asked, what binds us together might somehow, ultimately, prevail." (p. 437-438).
Obama keeps the "plot" moving along. Although many of the characters are not fully developed. I had to keep reminding myself this is a memoir, not a novel. And since this book was written long before Obama's run for the U.S. Presidency, it has a certain authenticity. I found it an extremely well-written and interesting portrait of an emerging political leader. It also offers insight into issues of race in America, and African American culture, and is a worthwhile read for this reason alone. (
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270 pages
In Brother, I'm Dying Edwidge Danticat has written a book that is both a personal memoir and an homage to the two most significant male figures of her childhood: her father and uncle. Danticat was born in Haiti and raised primarily by her aunt and uncle after her parents left to start a new life in New York. At the age of twelve she and her brother were reuinted with their parents, and with two more brothers born in New York. Her memoir highlights the emotional impact of such an unusual childhood, but this is not a negative tell-all story. Rather, Danticat focuses more on Haiti's tumultuous political climate, its effect on her uncle and other relatives, her parents' struggle as immigrants, and the relationship between her father and uncle, which only develops when they are well into adulthood.
In 2004, just as Danticat was anticipating her first child, she also faced the responsibility of caring for aging parents. Her father had a life-threatening condition and was declining rapidly. Her uncle was still in reasonably good health, but was forced to leave Haiti during riots that same year. On arrival in the U.S., he became the victim of distressing acts of bigotry and prejudice, was held in a detention center, and died within days. Danticat matter-of-factly described the series of events that led to his death, in a way that made me feel simultaneously outraged and heart-broken.
Danticat is a talented writer; I enjoyed her novel Breath, Eyes, Memory (read my review), and look forward to reading more of her work.
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