Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
January 30th 2007 07:12
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Gilead is Marilynne Robinson's second novel published some 24 years after her first Housekeeping. Robinson is a bonafide literray genius working today and her seocnd novel was promptly awarded a Pulitzer prize. Some secualr liberals hav reacted tendentiously toward the novel simply because it includes Christianity in it; I found their ractions every bit as silly as the "Christianists" objecting to Harry Potter simply because there were spirits involved.
Gilead is a town in Iowa and the novel is a long letter by Ames who is seventy seven years old and has been told he has angina pectoris. Not having much to leave his wife and child, he is writing a letter to his son to serve hima s his "begats." The long letter however meanders through a 100 years and tell the the tale of fathers and sons of four generations. It is also a tale of war which starts with the Civil war and ends on the cusp of Vietnam. It is also the tale of America, as it winds through barren landscape and fallen towns and through the minds of people who are conditioned by living in such a big country.
Robinson writes a sublime prose in that quintessential American voice that rings in Hawthorne and Dickinson. It is one of the few books that you'd feel privileged and blessed after having the chance to read them.
It is a book that renews your faith in literature. I had wanted to write a longish review of this novel and so kep it on the bakcburner for a long time. This small notice will have to until I read it again and come up with the review.
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