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Bezig met laden... The Ruby in Her Navel (2006)door Barry Unsworth
Booker Prize (327) Bezig met laden...
Meld je aan bij LibraryThing om erachter te komen of je dit boek goed zult vinden. Op dit moment geen Discussie gesprekken over dit boek. A mediados del siglo XII, Palermo se había convertido en crisol de civilizaciones, razas, lenguas y religiones, donde musulmanes, judíos, griegos o normandos vivían en aparente armonía. Thurstan de Beauchamp, es hijo de una caballero normando pero trabaja para un musulmán al servicio del rey Rogelio de Sicilia; lleva años enamorado de lady Alicia, pero no podrá evitar caer en las redes de la bella bailarina Nesrin. Con el corazón dividido y en intenso debate interior, Thurstan se ve arrastrado a una perversa trama que amenza la vida de su mentor y de su rey en la que sólo uno saldrá indemne. Tensiones políticas y religiosas, erotismo, espionaje, soberbia recreación histórica, personajes fascinantes y una trama absorbente hacen de esta novela una lectural irresistible. I enjoyed this a great deal. It was an experience, not just a story and a telling, but all of that and more - a world, a mindset, an exploration - and deeply satisfying all up. The first thing that grabbed me was the strength of the first-person narrator. There's a deep and stark and involved style to his voice that helps seat the book in its time and place (more about this later) but also establishes the novel firmly as Thurstan-telling-his-story. I have endless impatience with books that a first-person without a reason - i.e. why and how is this person telling me their story? - but this one does it flat out with what appears to be bald-faced honesty, that later gains a layer of knowing extra meaning (which I love). And through the telling, the reader comes to understand intrinsically - so much more deeply than merely being told - some aspects of the 12th-century Mediterranean that underpin the book: that abstract thought is underdeveloped, and the concept of visualising and imagining one close to magic; that this is a world in which simplicity and complexity war, or at least overlap; and that while it could be said that the Dark Ages are ending, there has never been such hate as is now welling up. Amidst all of this, I found the entwined stories of political intrigue and Thurstan's emotional getting-of-wisdom to be deeply satisfying, in that way I like best where things reveal to have been just what I thought, but even more so and with added twists I had not seen coming. And while I had some slight distresses about the way Alicia was depicted at the end of the day, Nesrin was pretty magnificent.
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Set in the Middle Ages during the brief yet glittering rule of the Norman kings, The Ruby in Her Navel is a tale in which the conflicts of the past portend the present. The novel opens in Palermo, in which Latin and Greek, Arab and Jew live together in precarious harmony. Thurstan Beauchamp, the Christian son of a Norman knight, works for Yusuf, a Muslim Arab, in the palace's central finance office, a job which includes the management of blackmail and bribes, and the gathering of secret information for the king. But the peace and prosperity of the kingdom is being threatened, internally as well as externally. Known for his loyalty but divided between the ideals of chivalry and the harsh political realities of his tumultuous times, Thurstan is dispatched to uncover the conspiracies brewing against his king. During his journeys, he encounters the woman he loved as a youth; and the renewed promise of her love, as well as the mysterious presence of an itinerant dancing girl, sends him on a spiritual odyssey that forces him to question the nature of his ambition and the folly of uncritical reverence for authority. With the exquisite prose and masterful narrative drive that have earned him widespread acclaim, Barry Unsworth transports the reader to a distant past filled with deception and mystery, and whose racial, tribal, and religious tensions are still with us today. Reading group guide included. Geen bibliotheekbeschrijvingen gevonden. |
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Google Books — Bezig met laden... GenresDewey Decimale Classificatie (DDC)823.94Literature English & Old English literatures English fiction Modern PeriodLC-classificatieWaarderingGemiddelde:
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Thurstan's boss is aware of the increased feelings against him among those surrounding the King. The plot thickens as Thurstan is sent on a mysterious mission supposedly to uncover plots against the King. He meets a woman recently widowed whom he knew and loved as a young man; they swear their love to each other and Thurstan finds himself seemingly "climbing the ladder" to higher positions. However, he has been cruelly tricked as he is forced later to betray his employer.
The ruby in her navel refers to a group of musicians and belly dances who he finds on his mission. Nesrin is a beautiful belly dancer who he is attracted to in spite of his love for the first women.
I enjoyed almost all of the book; however, as the workings of the plot began to unfold it was hard to sort through (probably because I was just tired of reading). Still liked the writing and particularly the setting. Good author.
A lot of the tension between Moslem and Christianity demonstrates that things haven't changed and the quest for power and access to power remains just as strong as ever. ( )