Friday, December 29, 2023

Abdulrazak Gurnah, By the Sea *** 1/2

By the Sea is an earlier novel from 2021 Nobel laureate Gurnah, who most recent Afterlives I read a couple of months ago. It tells the story of two immigrants from Zanzibar who meet in a British seaside town and reluctantly discuss their shared history.

Gurnah's talent is telling stories about ordinary decent people living their lives, with major world events happening in the background around them. The first couple of chapters in By the Sea effectively convey the lonely sense of being a refugee by focusing on mundane details, with information about the British asylum system and Islamic rules of inheritance supporting Saleh's story rather than vice versa; Gurnah wants to tell the characters' story, not make a point.

I was engaged with the story throughout, but I felt the ending was too abrupt. The two main characters each know part of their shared story, but only Saleh gets to tell his full narrative, and the book ends before clearly showing us Latif's reaction.

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