wat en wie?

The God of Small Things (1997) is de debuutroman van de Inidische auteur Arundhati Roy.

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waarom?

“Writer and political activist Arundhati Roy’s first novel, and it’s possibly one of my favorite books ever. I re-read it last year after coming across a secondhand copy, and it is as powerful each time. It tells the tragic story of twins Estha and Rahel, who grew up in Ayemenem in Kerala, India, with the politics, social inequities and the patriarchal system as the background to the story. Roy is trained as an architect, and I think it somehow comes through in the telling of the story, in the way she describes spaces, houses, and rivers, almost as if they embody the boundaries between social classes.

Here is a quote from her: “In buildings, there are design motifs that occur again and again, that repeat; patterns, curves. These motifs help us feel comfortable in a physical space. And the same works in writing, I’ve found. For me, the way words, punctuation and paragraphs fall on the page is important as well; the graphic design of the language.”

I love this connection she makes between writing and architecture. It reminds me of how architecture is also a process of imagination and “narration”. It’s such a joy to read, and I’d recommend not only her fiction, but also her political writings and essays on social and environmental justice.”