Olga Tokarczuk, The Books of Jacob ****

Reading The Books of Jacob is a somewhat intimidating proposition. It is a 900+ page historical novel that takes place in eighteenth-century Podolia (then part of Poland, now Ukraine), about a real-life charismatic religious leader who lead his Jewish followers to convert to Christianity. It features hundreds of characters with (hard-for-Americans-to-pronounce) Eastern European names –– and these characters all change their names halfway through the book. Its heft, both literal and literary, supposedly won Tokarczuk her Nobel Prize. 

Especially in its early sections, The Books of Jacob is an immersive experience. Tokarczuk is excellent at describing towns and settlements in a way that captures how their residents experience them.

Nahman sees a little cottage, stooped beneath a cap of straw thatch, with tiny little windows, rotted boards; beyond it looms others with the same stoop, stuck together like the cells of a honeycomb. And he knows that there is a whole network of passages and walkways and nooks and crannies where carts of wood sit, waiting to be unloaded. And there are courtyards bordered by low fences, atop which during the day clay pots heat up in the sun. Beyond that lie passages that lead to other courtyards so small you can barely turn around in them, each faced with three doors that lead to different homes. Higher up are attics linking the tops of those little homes, full of pigeons that mark out time with layers of droppings––living clocks. In gardens the size of an overcoat spread out on the ground cabbage leaves struggle to coil, potatoes swell, carrots cling to their beds. It would be wasteful to devote space to flowers other than hollyhocks, which grow straight up. Now, in December, their naked stalks seem to support the houses. Along the little streets the trash heap extends to the fences, guarded by cats and feral dogs. And so it goes through the whole village, along the streets, through the orchards and the bounds of the fields to the river, where the women busily rinse out all the filth of the settlement.

The religious material is less clear, appropriately since Jacob's theology derives from the mystic Kabbalah. When Moses came down from the mountain to find the Israelites debauching themselves, he destroyed the God-given laws and replaced them with a new set designed to control his people. The remnants of the true law were spread across the monotheistic religions, to be reassembled by a Messiah as the end times approach.

If The Books of Jacob were a film, it would be presented almost entirely in scene-setting medium shots. Tokarczuk rarely favors characters with close-ups; this is not a psychological novel but a social one.

Inevitably, I had to drag myself through certain sections of this very long book. But every section has unexpected insights, perspectives, or turns of phrase. I admired the book more than loved it, but admire it I did.