Verre Cassé

by Alain Mabanckou

L'histoire « très horrifique » du Crédit a voyagé, un bar congolais des plus crasseux, nous est ici contée par l'un de ses clients les plus assidus, Verre Cassé, à qui le patron a confié le soin d'en faire le geste en immortalisant dans un cahier de fortune les prouesses étonnantes de la troupe d'éclopés fantastiques qui le fréquentent. Dans cette farce métaphysique où le sublime se mêle au grotesque, Alain Mabanckou nous donne à voir grâce à la langue rythmée et au talent d'ironiste qui le distinguent dans la jeune génération d'écrivains africains, loin des tableaux ethniques de circonstance, un portrait vivant et savoureux d'une autre réalité africaine.

Genres: Fiction, Africa, France, African Literature, Novels, Literary Fiction, Contemporary

208 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 7, 2005

About the author

Alain Mabanckou was born in 1966 in Congo-Brazzaville (French Congo). He currently resides in Los Angeles, where he teaches literature at UCLA, having previously spent four years at the University of Michigan. Mabanckou will be a Fellow in the Humanities Council at Princeton University in 2007-2008. One of Francophone Africa's most prolific contemporary writers, he is the author of six volumes of poetry and six novels. He received the Sub-Saharan Africa Literary Prize in 1999 for his first novel, Blue-White-Red, the Prize of the Five Francophone Continents for Broken Glass, and the Prix Renaudot in 2006 for Memoirs of a Porcupine. He was selected by the French publishing trade journal Lire as one of the fifty writers to watch out for in the coming century. His most recent book is African Psycho.

Reviews

[Kinga · Rating 4 out of 5]

When on our way back from Międzyzdroje we had to wait in an enormous queue to buy our train tickets, my sister volunteered to take first turn while the rest of us sat on benches in the shadow. When my friend went to relieve her, my sister acted mysteriously, she insisted she didn’t mind queuing and we could just go relax and leave her to it. It was only when we were on the train when she told us that she was eavesdropping on a group of friends who were discussing dramatic events of the night before. Occasionally real life with its unrestrained tales wins over literature because my sister preferred to be listening to their chattering rather than sitting on a bench and reading a book in peace.

Alain Mabanckou captured such free tale-telling in its essence. Broken Glass, the narrator of the novel, has been given a notebook by the owner of the bar he frequents and has been told to immortalise this drinking den for the benefit of the future generations. Broken Glass is not the one to worry about the form. Or punctuation. Or strict plot rules. He writes downs the stories as they come to him and as they are told by the man who wears Pampers, the man who once lived in France or the man who the won the pissing contest. In between all that we also hear Broken Glass’s own story, as sad as any story of a wasted life. Our narrator eventually grows impatient with the task he has been burdened with. With all the stories he is told to write and with all the people and their expectations. As any other writer he questions the point of it all and would probably become an alcoholic if he hadn’t already been one.

At a first sight the narrative looks like chaotic ramblings of a drunkard but under this thin surface there lies a true treasure chest of various literary, popcultural, political and historical allusions. It’s like a wink from the author to the reader which almost bypasses the oblivious narrator. There are so many hidden marvels that an average reader will probably pick up about one third of them. I noticed all the titles of Mario Vargas Llosa’s novels interwoven into Broken Glass’s stream of consciousness. My friend, who studied French studies right away picked up the references to the history of francophone Africa.

I recommend this little number. I enjoyed Mabanckou’s little rebellion against what the world expects from post-colonial African narrative.

[Marc Lamot · Rating 3 out of 5]

What is literature? "It should be about real life, the dirty side of it"—at least, that's what the narrator of this book, Verre Cassé/Broken Glass thinks, almost permanently glued to his bar stool. And that dirty side is presented to us in full force. In the first part, that comes in a succession of hilarious life stories from other "bar mates," each more miserable than the last. For we find ourselves in a town in Congo-Brazzaville, in the bar Crédit à Voyage (Credit Gone West), where the wreckage of postcolonial Africa apparently washes ashore. Many men, for example, have tried their luck in France ("I've done France"), but returned empty-handed. And their unfortunate fate is—as they say—usually their wives' fault. Clichés? Certainly, but this section, with its long, uncapitalized sentences and its accumulation of hyperbolic scenes, is almost pure Rabelais.

In the second section, Broken Glass focuses more on his own life, which, especially due to alcohol, has gone from bad to worse. This section has somewhat less suspense, and especially less satire. But our hapless narrator delivers it in such a way that you can't help but feel sympathy for him.

I wasn't familiar with Alain Mabanckou (born 1966), but apparently he's one of the most celebrated African writers of the moment. Born and raised in Congo-Brazzaville, he's clearly made his mark in both France and the US (he teaches French literature at UCLA in Los Angeles). That background is also noticeable in this book: it's an accumulation of direct and indirect references to well-known works and figures from Western literature. I can imagine that some will therefore no longer truly consider him an African writer, but I won't get into that debate: I thoroughly enjoyed this visit to the bar Crédit à Voyage.

[Pedro · Rating 4 out of 5]

"digamos que el dueño del bar El Crédito se fue de viaje me entregó un cuaderno que debo rellenar, y cree que yo, Vaso Roto, puedo parir un libro..."

Y así, Vaso Roto comienza a escribir (y contarnos) las historias, siguiendo el estilo burlón y desenfadado del autor que mueve sus hilos, que pasan por las peripecias para la apertura del bar, los disparatados comentarios sobre los (tal vez) más disparatados hechos políticos, las penas de amor y de alcohol, propias y ajenas.

El autor desliza comentarios satíricos sobre los que pontifican sobre como-debe-ser-la-literatura-africana. Y principalmente, lo hace a través de una perspectiva diferente de la literatura, que al igual que en Ají Picante (Petit Piment) les da voz a personajes comunes, marginales, a sus opiniones sesgadas o agudas, a su humor, y a sus inquietudes cotidianas.

A lo largo de su narración, Vaso Roto intercala entre sus palabras los títulos de diversas obras literarias; pude identificar varias, aunque por la particularidad en la oración, me pareció que había otras, que no conocía.

Mabanckou desdramatiza, le quita solemnidad a lo africano, para asimilar a sus personajes e historias a la vida cotidiana, salpicada de pequeñas alegrías, penas personales, miserias, humor y arbitrariedades de la vida, de la condición humana.)

[Adam McPhee · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wrote a bit more about Broken Glass here.

This was fantastic. Incredibly funny stuff, from the president's men trying to come up with a new slogan, to the Rabelaisian pissing contest between Robinette and Casimir High-Life. Then the second half takes a swerve, and just when you think it can't recover from the self-pity, you realize there's a reason for it, to display a bit of altruism and dive into explore the joys of reading. Really worth your time, and one of the few guys since Céline to make that run-on style work.

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a difficult book to read! It is bit stream-of-consciousness from a man who is supposed to be recording about his life in a journal but is busier drinking. It was originally on my Africa 2016 reading list because otherwise, the only book I've read set in the Congo is the typical Heart of Darkness. This book is the opposite of a colonial novel. The technology, the society, the politics, are all post-colonial, 21st century Africa, and for that reason I was glad to dip into it, even if I was a bit ungrounded most of the time.

[Jay Sandover · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this book on The Guardian's recent list of The 100 Best Books of the 21st Century. How lucky for me. How lucky for you if you pick up a copy. The book has a potent, comical energy that powers the long sentences and paragraphs. There's a 10-page set piece in the first half of the book that portrays some of the patrons of the Credit Gone West bar in Trois-Cents competing in a literal pi**ing contest. Has to be read to be believed. I won't spoil the second half. It has a ton of heart. It belongs on that Guardian list for sure.

[Mohammed Zaitoun · Rating 1 out of 5]

أحب سلسلة الجوائز كثيرا قرأت منها
الاحساس بالنهاية
قلب ناصع البياض
أعداء قصة حب
تقرير بردويك
الصائد صفر
استمتعت بأغلب الكتب التي قرأتها من سلسلة الجوائز ولكني لا أصدق أن "زجاج مكسور" رواية تصلح لأن تكون ضمن تلك السلسة الكثير من الثرثرة بلا هدف في بداية الرواية الكثير من الجمل التي تذهب في كل الإتجهات فجمل الكتاب حقا كالزجاج المكسور بل المهشم في ارجاء المكان ثم بعد 70 صفحة من الكتاب يبدأ الهراء المتماسك قليلا ولكنه هراء عن الجنس ولا شيء آخر

لم أتعد نصف الكتاب

[Nathaniel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Alain Mabanckou already knows most of what’s wrong with his book. After a hundred and twenty odd pages of his desultory jabbering he lays out, nice and clean:

“I’d write down words as they came to me, I’d begin awkwardly and I’d finish as awkwardly as I’d begun, and to hell with pure reason, and method, and phonetics, and prose, and in this shit-poor language of mine things would seem clear in my head but come out wrong, and the words to say it wouldn’t come easy, so it would be a choice between writing or life, that’s right , and what I really want people to say when they read me is ‘what’s this jumble, this mess, this muddle, this mish-mash of barbarities, this empire of signs, this chit-chat, this descent to the dregs of belles-lettres, what’s with this barnyard prattle, is this stuff for real, and where does it start, and where the hell does it end?’”

To this Mabanckou astutely addends a well predicted complaint about his complete avoidance of full stop punctuation and other standard structuring tools. In a book full of convenient page breaks and awkward run-ons where full stops should have been, his avoidance of conventional punctuation feels totally forced and unsuccessful; he lacks the grammar and flourish to pull it off.

Since I let him begin his indictment, I’ll let him begin his defense:
‘this jumble of words is life, come on, come into my lair, check out the rotting garbage, here’s my take on life, your fiction’s no more than the output of old has-beens designed to comfort other old has-beens, and until the day your characters start to see how the rest of us earn our nightly crust, there’ll be no such thing as literature, only intellectual masturbation, with you all rubbing up against each other like donkeys”

Great. Are we done? I’m done. I can’t handle quoting him anymore. I’d just start compiling his ham-fisted and incessant literary “references” with which he woefully oversalts this narrative and then lining up a few gross-out passages full of poop or quarrelling just to make it clear how generally unpleasant the whole environment of this book manages to be.

Now, I’ve read the bulk of what he’s referencing. I’ve enjoyed works that swirl around confusing, failed autistic drunks (Becket); I’ve enjoyed the avoidance of punctuation in favor of punishing, psychosis-conjuring onslaughts of strange (Bernhard); and I’ve enjoyed the literature of the African ghetto: Ben Okri, Dambudzo Marechera, Ayi Kwei Armah—even the less well crafted, streetier efforts by whoever wrote “Going Down River Road” and some of the Heinemann African series stock and trade (to say nothing of the “Palm Wine Drinkard,” which was lovely in its over-ripe and fantastical, oral-tradition of story-telling conventionlessness). But Mabanckou doesn’t belong amongst these craftsmen, these story-tellers or these punters. He lacks the vision, the technique, the patience or the purpose. When he drops a reference (or twenty in a row), it is as if he is just going through a list of famous book titles and figuring out the quickest, easiest way to refer to them before crossing them from his list—sort of like Joyce figuring out how to include the name of every river in the world into “Finnegans Wake,” only Mabanckou’s references aren’t embedded bones deep in his language while evoking meticulously choreographed and dynamic themes.

I don't think Mabanckou tried hard enough; the book was too angry, too uninvested and too self-assured. "Broken Glass" seeks-shelter and validity in its references, only to sprawl around on the floor, throwing feces and trying to be shocking. It has nothing to do with “how the rest of us earn our nightly crust”. This book is not informed by social justice or the working poor and it fails to underscore the superficiality of the cultures which it wishes to charm by slightly offending (while paying constant obeisance via cultural reference).

Yes, I grant you, that somebody who has never set foot in Africa may finish this book with a small and somewhat authentic vision of what it can be like in certain places—of the local bar culture and its satellites; of how some folks quarrel and what a rant might sound like in Doula. But if that was its goal, the book got derailed at some point and becames something more scattered and less revealing, something frail and sorry.

I’ll read something else by Mabanckou, just to be sure. But if it is also hastily constructed of referential scaffolding and muck, it’ll be the last.

And now, lastly and with a charitable heart, I have to rank Mabanckou well ahead of the heavy-handed moralists and state-sponsored, legend-regurgitating recidivists that fall seamlessly into heavy-rotation in African lit classes and high school syllabi. Go ahead and read him before you read another nationalist/symbolist piece of mindrot. Definitely, some young people might like him.

[Marc Gerstein · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you aren’t scared off by the first page (where you realize the entire novel is written without capital letters or end-of-sentence punctuation and no paragraph breaks (the breaks that do occur are more like short chapters, you’re in for a real treat. To give you a preview of Mabanckou’s sense of irony, the novel — verbal jumble — is presented as a journal written by one who grew up as a voracious consumer of great literature, wound up an grammar teacher, and responded to a letter from a government agency by spending “whole day correcting the grammatical and syntactical errors in it.” And by the way, there are countless literary allusions in it few of which seem likely to be caught by all readers, but I expect most if not all readers to catch some of them, and if you don’t — no worries; once you get them and the way they’re used, you can get full enjoyment even knowing you missed some. I can’t imagine anyone, however, missing out on the guy named Holden reding a book for which the narrator can see only part of the title: ... in the Rye and irritating the narrator by asking where northern ducks go in the winter.

The setup is that Broken Glass, the narrator, is asked by Stubborn Snail, proprietor of the bar named Credit Gone West, to write a journal to memorialize the bar and its patrons. The novel is presented as the notebook Broken Glass fills. The characters and stories are hilarious. But this is not just a play fo laughs. There are serious things here as the art (the journal) collides with the reality of the characters and the reality of Broken Glass himself.

I’m not usually a fan of artsy writing styles but here, it works and is, as we learn later, proper and justified in the context of the story. And relative to a lot of other African literature, this is, refreshingly, more human than political

[Naim Frewat · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book must be read in French. I read a couple of excerpts translated into English, and I honestly felt the rhythm, the flow of the words, the repetition of expressions, and most certainly the humor of the book lacked their charm.
Yes, it feels like the book of an erudite, but that's precisely what the author is; one would not deride Eco for writing the way he does.
At the same time, I was intrigued with this blurring of the truth; can we trust the narrator? Are the "heroes" of his stories victims or villains? This questioning extends to Mabanckou himself, and I ask myself how much of those stories are the work of fiction and how much of them are, at least, inspired by true events?
I highly recommend it; the humor is my style, precisely because of the narrative style, of the choice of words, and of this morphing of verbs and adjectives and phrases to portray such a powerful image of a micro-world; that of a poor, neglected African "quartier".

[Mona M. Kayed · Rating 3 out of 5]

تجربتي الأولى مع الأدب الكونغولي ، و أغلب الظن أنها لن تكون الأخيرة ، الرواية كانت إفريقية للغاية ، تشبه كثيراً القارة السمراء بتنوعها و مجاهلها و الشعوب التي تعجّ بها ، في هذه الرواية أنت تقرأ عن المجتمع و أفراده ، عن السياسة و مضحكاتها المبكيات، عن الاقتصاد و مصالحه ، و جميعها مقدمة في قالب ساخر كان غريباً عليّ ، السخرية الكونغولية فريدة من نوعها، سوداء قاتمة أحياناً ، مريرة لاذعة أحياناً ، و عصية على الفهم أحياناً أخرى .

في هذه النسخة اعتنى المترجم بالهوامش و أورد الكثير من الشروحات عن طبيعة الحياة في الكونغو و التي لا بدّ من الاطلاع عليها حتى نتمكن من فهم الرواية .

الرواية بشكل عام غريبة ، لا أدري إن كانت قد أعجبتني أم لا ، لكنني بالتأكيد سأبحث عن المزيد للكاتب .

[Ahmed Elkhatib · Rating 4 out of 5]

أحببت هذا النوع من الروايات الذي تتزاحم فيه القصص في ساح معارك قذر وأماكن موبوءة بطرائف الحكايا وعجائب الأقاصيص التي تحدث حتماً في بيئة خصبة مكتظة بالسفهاء، ممتثلة لعدد من التقاليد والمجاهيل المنقرضة كالكونغو.

القصص تبدو حقيقية، تحدث، وتأخذ حقها هنا بكل بساطة وسلاسة بين أذرع الكراس الذي يخربش فيه السيد "زجاج مكسور" بأمر من السيد "القوقع الحلزوني العنيد"....نعم إنها غريبة مأساة جهل مضحكة مبكية.

لقد تعرفت على مجتمع أخذ منه الجهل كل مأخذ، وضربت فيه العته لكي ترسم واقع مختلف متأكل الأركان، وما على الإنسان الغلبان إلا توثيق الصورة والتكيف مع القذارة.

المترجم رائع مميز، مُتفهم للنص...بمعنى أبسط "هو ركب النص، وقاده للجموح"

[Piret · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ühiskonnakriitiline teadvuse vool, mis avab su silmad, ajab nutma ja naerma ja paneb mõtlema. Kirjutatud voolavas stiilis, justkui olekski see Tchinouka jõgi, mis mind kui lugejat kandis. Selle vooluga tasus kaasa minna.

[Laura Bilíková]

román o stratených existenciách ti dáva nádej, že nie si taký trash ako si si myslel.

okrem toho má knižka dej pozliepaný z bizarných príbehov bytostí, ktoré sa zastavia v nemenovanom africkom bare.

v knihe nenájdeš bodky ani začiatočné písmená, je to súvislá zmes tragédie.

autor píše aj o písaní a nechuti písať, surovo a bez pretvárky zachytí aktuálny moment.

veľmi ma bavilo čítať túto absyntovku!

[Helin Puksand · Rating 5 out of 5]

Missugune maiuspala kirjandussõbrale! Tekst lausa kubiseb erinevatest viidetest ja pealkirjadest, mis on loosse peidetud. Lugedes mõtlesin lausa, kas tõlkimise jaoks on mingi teine fail, kus kõik viited on märgendatud, kuid kohtumisel tõlkijaga selgus, et see nii ei olnud. Igal juhul kiidan tõlkijat, kes on ilmselgelt väga laia silmaringiga, mida sellise teose tõlkimine nõuab.
Raamat räägib ühest baarist (Tuulest Viidud Krediit) Kongos, mille omanik Kangekaelne Tigu palub oma kliendil Katkisel Klaasil kirja panna ka teiste klientide lood. Katkine Klaas kuulabki erinevaid kliente ja kirjutab kaustiku täis. Lood ise on kurvad ja traagilised ning näitavad Kongo elanike elu sellisena, nagu see on.
Huvitav oli ka teose stiil, nimelt ei olnud selles raamatus ühtki punkti - kogu raamatu tekst oli nagu suuline jutustus, mida oli raske poole lõigu pealt katki jätta, sest polnud ju lauseid. :)
Igal juhul soovitan lugeda. :)

[Ahmed Louaar · Rating 3 out of 5]

أولا الترجمة دمرت الرواية.
رغم هذا فروح الرواية ظلت تصارع من أجل البقاء. الرواية ذات طابع ساخر، ذكرني أسلوبها ببوكوفسكي، حيث أن الكاتب ضرب بعرض الحائط كل مفاهيم الرواية، وقرر أن يطلق العنان للشخصية الرئيسية زجاج مكسور، ذلك السكير العجوز، الذي يتحول إلى كاتب الرواية، فيخط على كراسة كل الاحداث التي تصادفه في مخمرة، تقع في برازافيل، الكونغو برازافيل المستعمرة الفرنسية السابقة.
تجدر الاشارة أن الرواية كانت ثرية جدا بسماء كتاب وموسيقيين وسياسيين ورساميين وعناوين لكتب، وبدى واضحا تعارض هذا الامر مع السخافات الكثيرة التي جاءت في الرواية، كمسابقة أطول مدة تبول بين روبينات وهي امرأة سمينة من زبائن المشرب الاوفياء وأسطورة التبول برقم قياسي بلغ 10 دقائق، وبين كازيمير وهو الشخص المتحدي، الذي لم ينتصر فقط على روبينات، بل أنه أبدع في رسم خريطة فرنسا ببوله.
في الرواية أيضا تطرق الكاتب لاوضاع بلاده، والبيروقراطية والمحسوبية والفساد والسحر واستحكار الشعب من قبل المسؤولين ورجال الدين.. وكل تلك الامور التي تتشارك فيها دول العالم الثالث، خاصة مستعمرات فرنسا السابقة، كالجزائر.
قرأت سابقا مذكرات شيهم لآلان مابانكو، بالنسبة لي كانت أفضل من زجاج مكسور

[Catka]

Úprimne neviem, ako toto mám hodnotiť. Zo začiatku som bola úplne nadšená, zdalo sa mi to vtipné, inteligentné, aj keď trochu bazálne, malo to nadhľad a silnú pointu (prvé dva príbehy). Nevadil mi ani štýl bez bodiek, odsekov a veľkých písmen, sú tam čiarky, tie obstarajú všetko namiesto nich.
Potom ale začalo byť tých sračiek, šťaniek, chlastu a (ne)súloženia čoraz viac, a príliš, bolo to, ako keby sa človek viezol výťahom, niekam dolu do suterénu, s každým ubehnutým poschodím sa znižoval aj počet hviezdičiek, od piatich až niekde medzi dve a tri, a ešte som mala pocit, že keď sa otvoria dvere, tak ma to smradľavé bahno zavalí, tak sa tie postavy v tých svojich sračkách plácali a čičrali, až to pekné nebolo, stratilo to nadhľad a ľahký vtip, aj keď miestami prebleskovala inteligencia a humor, človek sa k nim musel prehrabať. Na konci sa to trošku zlepšilo, výťah sa pohol aspoň na prízemie, ako povedala Ivka, ale to namočenie členkov v tom blate zanechalo jemný nechutný závan.
(Mne sa ale nepáčila ani fekálna poviedka v Majlingových Ruzkých poviedkach, a pokazila mi celú knihu, takže ak je toto pre niekoho porovnávací bod, tak si môžete zvýšiť hodnotenie. Za mňa niekde medzi tri a štyri, neviem sa rozhodnúť.)
Čo naopak oceňujem veľmi, je prepracovaný poznámkový aparát - odkazy na literatúru afrických autorov, ktoré sú bežnou súčasťou textu a ktoré by som ako totálny neznalec nedokázala vylúštiť. Neviem, či to bolo súčasťou originálu, alebo je to práca slovenských redaktorov a prekladateľky, ale urobili to výborne. Ešte keby tie poznámky boli pod čiarou, a nie na konci knihy, bolo by to úplne super, ale predpokladám, že nechceli rušiť to plynutie textu, o ktoré autorovi išlo.
Tiež je to výborný preklad Márie Ferenčuhovej, čo je už bohužiaľ pri slovenských vydaniach taká výnimka, že sa o tom oplatí písať v recenzii a kvôli tomuto "fenoménu" sa mi už ani nechce čítať slovenské preklady. Takže Absynt, dobrá práca!

[Emma Deplores Goodreads Censorship · Rating 3 out of 5]

this is a novella written entirely without periods, or capital letters at the beginnings of sentences, because there aren’t any beginnings, an entire 10-page chapter can consist entirely of one run-on sentence, which makes it hard to put down because you can’t find a stopping place, though fortunately there are occasional line breaks, like maybe once every few pages

anyway this guy, Broken Glass, spends all his time at the bar, having drunk himself out of a job and a wife, and the bar owner convinces him to write, so he writes about the bar and the hard-luck stories of the other patrons and eventually his own, and he and the other guys seem like pretty unreliable narrators but it is engaging on the whole, with a distinctive voice and exaggerated and unlikely stories, and the technique while a bit gimmicky mostly works and didn’t drive me as crazy as you might imagine, because it is well-written, and the author has a lot of fun peppering the text with literary allusions and titles of famous books

but then at the end the narrator apparently drowns himself and I closed the book with a shrug, clearly not having emotionally invested in the story at all, and I can’t give more than 3 stars when a book doesn’t make me care about something like that, though I wouldn’t discourage you all from reading it if you can tolerate the style

[Fatima Mohamady.. · Rating 3 out of 5]

بسخرية ومرارة لاذعة يأتي الكاتب على كل المسلمات والقيم المتعارف عليها في مجتمعه وكثير من غيره .. السلطة الدينية والحاكمة، العلاقات الأسرية والمجتمعية، والثقافة السائدة، كلها لم يسلم من قلمه ونقمته ..
" في هذا العمل يقدم الكاتب صورة لمجتمع موبوء بالفساد والعفن الفكري والشعوري، ما يجعله أشبه بمستنقع أوحال طينية تسحب كل ما حاول الخلاص منها
أشكرك يا ملاكي، أنت أعظم من كل هؤلاء الذين يقذفونني بالأحجار، إنك الأعظم؛لأنك الوحيد الذي يفهم أن صليبي ثقيل ، ولكني سأحمله وحدي حتى نهاية الطريق بدون نواح ولا شكوى" .. ..
كانت البداية جيدة، من حيث الأحداث وتسلسلها، وفيها ما يدفع للتقدم في القراءة، إلى أن بدأ الحشو في الظهور فيما لم يكن له أي حاجة، ثم تعود الأمور للتحسن في الثلث الأخير، إلى أن يصل الأمر لنهاية مناسبة ومتسقة مع سير الأحداث والأفكار.. هذه الأخيرة التي عبر عنها الكاتب على لسان الشخوص وأهمهم البطل بشكل سلس وجيد، ورأيتها أهم بكثير من الأوصاف الفيزيائية التي كان عن الكثير منها غنى ..
ومن خلال الحوارات الداخلية تلك للشخصية الرئيسية قدم أفكاره الناقدة والناقمة لأغلب الأطر المتعارف عليها، وطرح لبعضها بدائلها الحقيقة بالاعتقاد في نظره ..
وبرغم قلة جودة الترجمة، فاللغة في كثير من الأحيان كانت جيدة على أنها مبتذلة في أخرى حيث رافقت الحشو والزوائد ..

وكما يبدو أنها سمة الطبعات الجديدة من الهيئة، فالنص يكاد يخلو من علامات الترقيم..

[Eyad alamin · Rating 5 out of 5]

لابد للموقع أن يوفر نجمة سادسة لمثل هذه الحالات الطارئة، ممتعة جداً، آلان كاتب ساخر بدرجة الامتياز. أتمنى أن تعاد ترجمتها مرة أخرى بطريقة أفضل.

[Marcin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ojcem chrzestnym tej powieści bez wątpienia jest Louis-Ferdinand Céline, którego obecność w tekście zaznacza się nie tylko bezpośrednimi odwołaniami do jego twórczości, ale również, gdy chodzi o pomysł, w jaki sposób Mabanckou ustami – czy raczej ołówkiem – tytułowego Kielonka powinien opowiedzieć tę historię. Zarówno stylistycznie, jak i leksykalnie kongijski pisarz chciał uzyskać ten sam efekt, który Céline osiągnął, wprowadzając na literackie salony argot. Poszarpany tok narracji, zapisany przy bardzo swobodnym podejściu do znaków interpunkcyjnych, nie stroniący od kolokwializmów czy miejscowej gwary wskazuje z jednej strony na wyczuwalne podskórnie zakorzenienie tej opowieści w afrykańskiej tradycji oralnej, z drugiej zaś – podobnie jak u Céline’a – zabieg taki służyć ma uwiarygodnieniu w czytelniczych oczach narratora jako człowieka możliwie blisko rzeczywistego życia, swojskiego chłopa, równego gościa, który niejedno już widział i doświadczył. Gdyby Kielonek nie był książką, tylko longplayem, to byłby krążkiem utrzymanym w stylistyce „MTV Unplugged”.

Jeśli upatrywać Kielonka jako powieści zanurzonej w nurcie postkolonialnym, to jest to postkolonializm krytyczny w tym sensie, że ten koncert w stylistyce MTV Unplugged (żeby trzymać się tej muzycznej metafory) nie jest grany wyłącznie na jednej, antykolonialnej, nucie. Pod tym względem Mabanckou zachowuje się wyjątkowo rzetelnie i pisząc między wierszami o afrykańskiej rzeczywistości nie wybiela win własnych. Owszem, francuskiej metropolii dostaje się po dupie za popełnione grzechy, lecz po pierwsze nie jest ona jedynym grzesznikiem pośród zbłąkanych owieczek, a po drugie wykazuje zdecydowanie większą chęć do odczynienia pokuty za popełnione przewiny. Choć złe ziarno zasiała polityka metropolii, to po odzyskaniu niepodległości byłe już kolonie nader chętnie zbierają plony posiane w myśl zasady sformułowanej przez La Fontaine’a, zgodnie z którą La raison du plus fort est toujours la meilleure. Bez mała wszystkich bywalców powieściowego baru łączy z Francją love-hate relationship. Była kolonialna metropolia wyznacza horyzont: zarówno przedmiotu ich narzekań i szyderstw, jak również nierzadko niemożliwych do spełnienia aspiracji. Sposobem na przełamanie tej uczuciowej ambiwalencji jest seks, najlepiej formalnie usankcjonowany związkiem małżeńskim z białą Francuzką, gdyż w patriarchalnym świecie przez kobiece ciało wiedzie droga do pozbycia się kompleksu niższości i zaspokojenia potrzeby rewanżu. Przykładem takiego nie do końca udanego awansu jest historia powieściowego Drukarza, który „zalicza Francję” i dwuznaczność tego czasownika jest tu świadomym zabiegiem stylistycznym.

Powieść Mabanckou skrzy się humorem, którego poziom niestety jest łatwo wyczerpywalny. Dla niektórych pewną przeszkodą mogą być użyte przez pisarza rubaszności, które można zrzucić na prymitywność narratora i otoczenie, w którym się obraca, lecz można w nich widzieć świadomy flirt autora z wielką tradycją literacką. Obecność tych rubaszności przywodzi na myśl Rabelais'ego, którego Gargantua i Pantagruel w społecznej satyrze nie stroniła od opisów drażniących zmysły smaku i powonienia, czemu naprzeciw wychodzi, jak się wydaje, Kielonek. Zresztą pod względem różnorakich odniesień powieść Mabanckou jest wręcz autoteliczna. Cały myk w tym, że o ile odniesienia do wielkich dzieł stworzonych przez białego człowieka są łatwo wyłapywalne, o tyle sporym zaskoczeniem dla mnie było, ile w Kielonku poukrywano cytatów z dzieł tzw. literatury frankofońskiej. Oczywiście można powiedzieć, że są granice przyswajalności literatury i nie sposób znać się na wszystkim, tyle tylko, że te literackie cytaty pochodzą z dzieł dla literatury frankofońskiej kanonicznych. I czy brak ich przekładów, w tym na język polski nie mówi nam czegoś o naszym podejściu do afrykańskiej tradycji literackiej? Czy nie jest to subtelna aluzja, jaką pod adresem wykształconego, inteligentnego białego człowieka wysnuwa Mabanckou?

Cieszę się, że Mabanckou koniec końców trafił na mój radar, bo mimo zgłoszonych uwag uważam, że między mną a Kielonkiem kliknęło, a pewnie kliknęłoby jeszcze bardziej, gdyby cała powieść była utrzymana w konwencji „Pierwszych kartek”. Zostawia mnie z podrażnionym literackim nerwem, w stanie zaintrygowania, które będzie domagało się więcej. Było więc po co pisać i po co wydawać.

[Ward Khobiah]

الرواية جميلة جدًا من قلب المجتمعات الإفريقية التي تعاني التخبط كسائر مجتمعات ما بعد الاستعمار حيث يصاب أصحابها بأزمات نفسية عديدة كالنظرة الدونية للذات وتأزم "الهوية الوطنية" وضياع الاستقرار الذاتي الناتج عن التحقير المجتمعي لنفسه مقابل إعلاء الذات الغربية.

يصور الكاتب المجتمع الكونغوي -الكونغو- بكل اعتلالاته هذه فالأبطال لا يمتون للاتزان بصلة وكانت أن وقعت عليهم ألقاب مكان أسمائهم حصلوا عليها من ممارسات معينة أو صفات شكلية، كالحلزون العنيد ورجل البامبرز ورجل المطابع وآخرون..

نص واقعي حقيقي يعري كل أشكال اللاعودة التي قد يصل إليها الإنسان في إتزانه ووجدانه.

بنصح فيها بشدة

[Heba Tariq · Rating 5 out of 5]

" في اليوم التالي لن يكون هناك المزيد من الزجاج المكسور في مشرب لو كريدي و للمرة الأولي قد يكون الرب قد اصلح الزجاج الذي امضي حياته كلها مكسورا "

[Nada El · Rating 4 out of 5]

Postava Konvičky vo mne zanechala nezmazateľnú stopu.

[adelina gabriela · Rating 2 out of 5]

#85 congo
2.5*
a horse walks into a bar kind of thing

Mabanckou sums it up better:
I’d write down words as they came to me, I’d begin awkwardly and I’d finish as awkwardly as I’d begun, and to hell with pure reason, and method, and phonetics, and prose, and in this shit-poor language of mine things would seem clear in my head but come out wrong, and the words to say it wouldn’t come easy, so it would be a choice between writing or life, that’s right, and what I really want people to say when they read me is “what’s this jumble, this mess, this muddle, this mishmash of barbarities, this empire of signs, this chitchat, this descent to the dregs of belles lettres, what’s with this barnyard prattle, is this stuff for real, and where does it start, and where the hell does it end?”

[Ebenmaessiger · Rating 3 out of 5]

hard aversion to the modern “list poem,” in which a banal rundown of the contents of a purse somehow spontaneously generates some purported beauty or import. not buying it. strange of me, then, to consciously choose the prose equivalent. in other words, i might not be the most reliable star arbiter here.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

An ex teacher, denizen of Credit Gone West, a seedy bar in the Congo, is asked by the landlord to write down the stories of its patrons. He does so filling a notebook with pen portraits and accounts of their various adventures. It is scatological in the extreme - one of the regulars wears pampers because of the damage done to him in prison, the protagonist has flies following him after an unfortunate shitting incident, a woman challenges a man to a pissing contest - and there is a relish in the telling. Sex - usually cuckoldry - features largely too. Along the way acute observations are made on racism, colonialism, marriage, class and poverty. All this is interlaced with literary references, particularly, but not confined to, French literature (the novel is translated from the French). Many titles are interwoven in the sentences and Holden Caulfield makes an appearance towards the end asking where do ducks go in winter. I liked the first half, funny, high powered writing (no full stops, just part sentences btw), but the second part where the focus turns more to the narrator lost my interest a bit. 3.5 stars rounded up.

[Sylvia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is world literature! How I love this book and its story about Verre Cassé. The way it is written, without any punctation or capitals is weird in the beginning, but the longer you read the more you understand, that this is part of the story. The suppose writer, Verre Cassé, has some eduction - he even has been an instructor at a school, before he became addicted to alcohol - he is known as an intellectual.
The style is wonderful, with so many reference to world literature, which is a advance if you recognize the lines (they add something extra to the story). The numerous repetitions in expressions give something vivid to the stories of the regulars of the bar. You become part of their lives and their stories.
In the second part of the book Verre Cassé tells more about himself and what happened in his life. These parts are not always cheerful, rather sad.
A lovely read and more than worth its 5-stars.

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really liked this book. It was funny, it was tragic, but most of all it was insightful.

Broken Glass is a fixture in a Congolese bar, almost to the point that it is his home. The owner tells him that he should write a book, and gives him a notebook to encourage him. Word gets around that Broken Glass is writing a book, and everyone wants to tell him their story, so that they will be in the book.

To be honest, this will not be a book for everyone, because it is gritty. I loved the literary and cultural references, which kept me reading.

[Calzean · Rating 3 out of 5]

Maybe something was lost in the translation but a could have been great book became an OK one. Broken Glass spends his time drinking red wine in a bar, everyday for years. The owner of the bar asks him to write down his observations of the people and surrounds.
There starts a book with no capitals or full stops, some humorous episodes and reflections of Broken Glass's world. It started well but petered out when BG started to talk about the process of writing.