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Summary: For people who like to consider the nature of their life
Review: Salim is a person locked by its own inertia in a country gone mad, Without any support by the rule of law, notion of community, or family group. Oddly enough he does not despair and during most of his life he is able to face such difficult circumstances. For him "The world is what it is; men who are nothing, who allow themselves to become nothing have no place in it". He does not have any high ideals nor any particular goals beyond surviving. But even if you do not want to gent involved in politics, politics get involved with you. The questions is: Are you prepared?Salim is Arab that belongs to a family merchants in the coast of Tanzania-Mozambique. They are deeply involved in their traditions, that they fail to perceive that the colonial times are about to end, and with them the status quo of everything the Africans might consider foreign, even if the family name has been part of their history for two hundred years. After a dramatic social unrest, they are forced to disband around the world and Salim ends up in Zaire, now Congo. For the author, if a society or an individual fail to meditate about the consequences of how they run their lives, the events that surround them will always overrun them, and no one will be willing to provide comfort and consolation. "If you look at a columns of ants on the march you will see that there are those who are stragglers or have lost their way. The column has no time for them; it goes on. Sometimes the stragglers die. but even this has no effect on the column. There is a little disturbance around the corpse, which is eventually carried off-and the appears so light. and all the time the great busyness continues, and that apparent sociability, that rite of meeting and greeting , which ants travelling in opposite directions, to and from their nest, perform without fail". So the novel will remind us in many, multiple, varied ways, be aware of yourself, and earn your right to live.
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Summary: Stunning commentary and stunning allegory
Review: A Bend in the River is stunning as a commentary on the third world. In a manner reminiscent of Conrad, Naipaul's narrator, Salim, migrates into the center of Africa. Whereas Marlow finds nothing but bestiality in the center of Africa, Salim finds a tenuous civilization, in which he can live reasonably well as a shopkeeper. However, a series of political shifts exposes the fragility of this civilization: Salim is first stripped of his shop by a nationalist leader and later utter chaos emerges. While this book is a poignant commentary on the plight of the third world, it is no less trenchant as a reflection on the human heart. Civilization, Naipaul implies, is the most fragile of human institutions, and if insufficiently supported gives way to mankind's inherent savagery. By portraying the human condition as a tumultuous struggle between civilization and savagery, Naipaul provides a most unromantic affirmation of Conrad's thesis. What makes this work a masterpiece is not so much its theme, which is most commonplace in Conrad, but rather its impeccable technique. Naipaul eschews Conrad's heavy handed manner (which is redeemed only by Conrad's imaginative brilliance), preferring instead to straightforwardly provide an account of his narrator's experience. Salim provides nothing more than a dry description of his life at a Bend in the River, but the accretive effect of his observations is a cohesive world view. It's Naipaul's subtlety and craft, as well as his message, that makes this work such a masterpiece.
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Summary: important corrective to the romantic view of the Third World
Review: In Bend in the River, V.S. Naipaul chronicles the descent of a Central African nation (Zaire) from postColonial disruption to New African corruption to utter chaos & hooliganism. All of these events are seen through the eyes of Salim, a Muslim Indian shopkeeper, whose store is in a town where, decades earlier, the faltering Arabs first confronted the ascendant Europeans. Just as the Europeans replaced the Arabs, indigenous movements are now sending the Europeans packing. Salim is in an especially tenuous position, neither European nor African, he is trapped in the collision between African Nationalism and a heritage of European colonialism. He is not an apologist for the West, but he does acknowledge that: Those of us who had been in that part of Africa before the Europeans had never lied about ourselves. Not because we were more moral. We didn't lie because we never assessed ourselves and didn't think there was anything for us to lie about; we were people who simply did what we did. But the Europeans could do one thing and say something quite different; and they could act in this way because they had an idea of what they owed to their civilization. It was their great advantage over us. The Europeans wanted gold and slaves, like everybody else; but at the same time they wanted statues put up to themselves as people who had done good things for the slaves. Being an intelligent and energetic people, at the peak of their powers, they could express both sides of their civilization; and they got both the slaves and the statues. On the other hand, he describes the natives as malins, humans who treat other humans as prey. Meanwhile Salim and his people are merely trying to get along: "My wish was not to be good,...but to make good." His willingness to look honestly at the deterioration of conditions in former colonies when the Europeans withdraw and his criticism of the natives of these lands has earned Naipaul the enmity of many. But his novels offer an important corrective to the romantic view of the Third World and they were especially useful at the time, the 60's & 70's, when they were published. This is not a Top 100 novel (Modern Library List), but it's a decent one. GRADE: C
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Summary: Where the Streets Have No Name (U2?)
Review: This work tells the story of a young businessman of indian descent who moves from the east of afica to Zaire to open a mercantile store in the boom atmosphere of a politically "liberated" former belgian colonial city. This character chooses to remain in what reveals itself to be a paranoid and murderous ministate even though he is aware that its dictator's hideous facade of progress is fast crumbling. Criminal insanity is passing for legitimate social order.The dictator grows more oppressive to disguise the fact that he cannot fullfill his promises of prosperity and fundamental dignity.Toward this end Salim's property is confiscated, he is spied upon by those with whom he formerly lived in peace,and is declared a "foreigner", unworthy and unwelcome. It becomes apparent that the his life and the lives of all people regardless of their color are in danger. Salim is a cold character in a barren and distressing story.What he came from,what sustains him, and to what he will go is not answered.But through him this novel examines two grotesque challenges which define life for far too many of the world's inhabitants: hatred and survival. The authenticity of the character and the palpable realness of his situation make it easy for one to ignore the complexity of the work's theme and the degree of artistry exercised in its expression. In judging and reading this work one must grant the author the license to merge plot and experience, and grant this consciously. For Salim these concepts register no disitintion.
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Summary: The Quiet African
Review: "A Bend In The River" is to Africa what Graham Greene's "The Quiet American" was to South East Asia; wise, prescient, and extremely dark. Naipaul's protagonist (hero is too strong a word) Salim is a young Muslim of Indian descent who leaves his home on the African coast to take over a shop in the centre of the Continent. The town on the bend in the river is never identified, neither is the country, nor the "Big Man" who looms unseen over everything. But we can take it to be Kisangani in Zaire in the early days of Mobutu. The town stands were the Arabs of the Indian Ocean coast met the European colonialists heading inland from the Atlantic. It is a place where everyone is from somewhere else, except for the local Africans. They have less power than anyone, but run to rhythms and fears that threaten always to overwhelm them all. Salim gets drawn into what appears to be a new intellectual life in the town when the Big Man establishes a centre for elites and Salim begins an affair with the beautiful young wife of a European academic. The liaison is written with piercing psychological clarity but seems - in the text - emotionally stifled. This is a product of Naipaul's writing. He lacks passion in the love scenes, but that same reserve perfectly suits him for the rest of the tale. It is the lack of sentiment that makes this book so terrifying. Things happen to his characters. It is neither here nor there; it is just the way of things. Africa cares nothing for their conceits. Ultimately it cares nothing for the conceits of any man or any woman - the Big Man included. It is utterly damning of outsiders who see this great and terrible continent as a "project." The Oxford Companion to 20th Century Literature talks of Naipaul's sense of despair. That is as may be. But Zaire/Congo's history since this book was published is more horrifying than even Naipaul's vision, although he hints at it at the end. The New York-based International Rescue Committee recently reported that 1.7 million people had died as a consequence of war and instability in Eastern Congo in the last five years. "A Bend In The River" is like a message in a bottle, carrying the last cryptic news before the darkness came down.
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Summary: This is not really fiction
Review: Naipaul's "A Bend in the River" is almost as much reportage as fiction. The town in Kisangani, on the Zaire/Congo River in Zaire/Congo. I have never seen an account as to what Naipaul's experience in Zaire were exactly, but he manages to tell the truth of the early days of Zaire's independence. (The same is the background for the more recent "The Poisonwood Bible"). To recommend Achebe's "Things Fall Apart" over "A Bend in the River" only makes sense if you can only read one single book about Africa. Achebe's novel is set in Nigeria; Naipaul's is about Zaire. It's like saying don't bother with "Brothers Karamozov", read "Great Expectations" instead. I should hope a serious reader would turn his attention to both.
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Summary: This is not really fiction
Review: Naipaul's "A Bend in the River" is almost as much reportage as fiction. The novel is set in the city of Kisangani, on the Congo River in Congo (formerly the Zaire river in Zaire) -- though interestingly, the author never says this explicitly. I have never seen an account as to what Naipaul's experiences in Zaire were exactly, but he manages to tell the story of the early days of Zaire's independence, after colonial rule as the Belgian Congo. The protagonist is a young Indian from the Eastern coast. ("Indian" in the sense of his ethnicity, his family has been in Africa longer than they can remember.) He has purchased a shop in Kisangani, and trys to build up his business as the "big man" consolidates power in the newly independent country. Things go from bad to worse, for the new shopkeeper and the country. Though this is fiction, every word is true. Naipaul writes beautifully, and has many insights into Africa, colonialism, history, and life. This is one of the few books that I have read and enjoyed more than once. Some people recommend Chinua Achebe's "Things Fall Apart" to readers looking for an "African" novel. But to recommend "Things Fall Apart" over "A Bend in the River" makes sense only if you can read just a single book about Africa. Achebe's novel is set in Nigeria; Naipaul's is about Zaire. It's like saying don't bother with "Brothers Karamozov", read "Great Expectations" instead. I should hope a serious reader would turn his attention to both. (The last days of the Belgian Congo is the setting for Barbara Kingsolver's "The Poisonwood Bible". Many good nonfiction stories from this time and place are found in "A Doctor's Life: Unique Stories" by William T. Close. A literary approach to the early days of the Belgian Congo is Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness".)
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Summary: Naipaul's journey into the heart of darkness
Review: I suppose it's inevitable that readers will compare Naipaul's view of the bush to Joseph Conrad's. Naipaul portrays an ancient African civilization coming to grips with the intrusion of modern society thrust by economic boom into its midst. So the merchants and business traders take the steamer up the river to a bend where the New Africa is emerging. However, deep and primitive aggressions always seem to surface perhaps because they are so imbedded into man's warrior instincts. And the New Africa cannot seem to get beyond this to create a society in which peace and justice prevail. The irony is that such qualities exist elsewhere among more advanced societies, as well: society can't seem to transcend its own penchant for violence. Perhaps, that's because beneath the veneer of the human persona there lies a heart of darkness. Mankind's inability to cope with its brutality and baser instincts represent a challenge not only in the bush. It's a universal battle royal that Naipaul's insightful and brilliantly written novel epitomizes. This author should be given serious consideration as a Nobel laureate: his work over a period of decades is worthy of it.
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Summary: Where's the plot?
Review: This book is plotless, aimless, and has hardly a sentence that doesn't contain the word "I." Of course it is written by an incredibly gifted author, and is an easy, fluid, enjoyable read for that reason alone. The story is about an Arab who goes to live in an unnamed republic in central Africa. There is no point to anything that he does, and his narrative betrays an insight and depth that, pasted onto the character of a merchant, are hardly believable. To its credit, this book is one of the better representations of Africa written by a non-African, though that's admittedly saying little. A much better and more powerful read is Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe. Worth reading, but that's about all.
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Summary: Old is Gold
Review: This is a very well written book exploring life of an non-african in torn Africa of some years ago. Basically the book revolves around the main character. But the most beautiful part of this book is its subtle humor and ironies of those times. Also, the situations in the book appear very truthful and close to those of developing countries. The book is a simple read and yet very rich in literature. The author has a very distinct writing style and one can also tell that the book was written long time ago. I found the book slow and boring at times.
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