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What Are You Going Through
The New York Times– bestselling, National Book Award – winning author of The Friend brings her singular voice to a story about the meaning of life and death, and the value of companionship
A woman describes a series of encounters she has with various people in the ordinary course of her an ex she runs into by chance at a public forum, an Airbnb owner unsure how to interact with her guests, a stranger who seeks help comforting his elderly mother, a friend of her youth now hospitalized with terminal cancer. In each of these people the woman finds a common the urge to talk about themselves and to have an audience to their experiences. The narrator orchestrates this chorus of voices for the most part as a passive listener, until one of them makes an extraordinary request, drawing her into an intense and transformative experience of her own.
In What Are You Going Through , Nunez brings wisdom, humor, and insight to a novel about human connection and the changing nature of relationships in our times. A surprising story about empathy and the unusual ways one person can help another through hardship, her book offers a moving and provocative portrait of the way we live now.
A woman describes a series of encounters she has with various people in the ordinary course of her an ex she runs into by chance at a public forum, an Airbnb owner unsure how to interact with her guests, a stranger who seeks help comforting his elderly mother, a friend of her youth now hospitalized with terminal cancer. In each of these people the woman finds a common the urge to talk about themselves and to have an audience to their experiences. The narrator orchestrates this chorus of voices for the most part as a passive listener, until one of them makes an extraordinary request, drawing her into an intense and transformative experience of her own.
In What Are You Going Through , Nunez brings wisdom, humor, and insight to a novel about human connection and the changing nature of relationships in our times. A surprising story about empathy and the unusual ways one person can help another through hardship, her book offers a moving and provocative portrait of the way we live now.
221 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 8, 2020
1404 people are currently reading
39177 people want to read
About the author
Sigrid Nunez
34 books1,753 followersSigrid Nunez has published seven novels, including A Feather on the Breath of God, The Last of Her Kind, Salvation City, and, most recently, The Friend. She is also the author of Sempre Susan: A Memoir of Susan Sontag. Among the journals to which she has contributed are The New York Times, The New York Times Book Review, The Paris Review, Threepenny Review, Harper’s, McSweeney’s, Tin House, and The Believer. Her work has also appeared in several anthologies, including four Pushcart Prize volumes and four anthologies of Asian American literature.
Sigrid’s honors and awards include a Whiting Writer’s Award, a Berlin Prize Fellowship, and two awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters: the Rosenthal Foundation Award and the Rome Prize in Literature. She has taught at Columbia, Princeton, Boston University, and the New School, and has been a visiting writer or writer in residence at Amherst, Smith, Baruch, Vassar, and the University of California, Irvine, among others. In spring, 2019, she will be visiting writer at Syracuse University. Sigrid has also been on the faculty of the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and of several other writers’ conferences across the country. She lives in New York City.
Sigrid’s honors and awards include a Whiting Writer’s Award, a Berlin Prize Fellowship, and two awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters: the Rosenthal Foundation Award and the Rome Prize in Literature. She has taught at Columbia, Princeton, Boston University, and the New School, and has been a visiting writer or writer in residence at Amherst, Smith, Baruch, Vassar, and the University of California, Irvine, among others. In spring, 2019, she will be visiting writer at Syracuse University. Sigrid has also been on the faculty of the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and of several other writers’ conferences across the country. She lives in New York City.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 2,569 reviews
January 18, 2023
is there any better feeling than picking up a book for almost no reason and falling in love with it?
i bought this solely because it was on the remainder sale table at my very favorite bookstore in the world, and because i liked the title. i hadn't yet read a sigrid nunez book and figured i might as well start.
what i got was an immersive and emotive story, a beautiful capturing of some of life's most difficult to render themes, an evocative and eloquent rendering of a friendship and what we owe to each other. this book carries across what i think the world is and what i want it to be. it's gorgeous and it hurt me to read in more ways than one.
i'll be rereading, and it seems like pure luck i even read it in the first place. what a gift!
bottom line: might be 5 stars.
-----------------
tbr review
more books should have titles that sound like an invitation for me to rant
i bought this solely because it was on the remainder sale table at my very favorite bookstore in the world, and because i liked the title. i hadn't yet read a sigrid nunez book and figured i might as well start.
what i got was an immersive and emotive story, a beautiful capturing of some of life's most difficult to render themes, an evocative and eloquent rendering of a friendship and what we owe to each other. this book carries across what i think the world is and what i want it to be. it's gorgeous and it hurt me to read in more ways than one.
i'll be rereading, and it seems like pure luck i even read it in the first place. what a gift!
bottom line: might be 5 stars.
-----------------
tbr review
more books should have titles that sound like an invitation for me to rant
September 9, 2024
Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival 2024 for Almodóvar's movie version
This is a Rachel Cusk-esque brain twister slapping us with the fact that yes, we are all going to die. Playing on themes similar to her bestseller The Friend, Nunez gives us a first-person narrator who visits a friend with terminal cancer. While at the beginning, the novel reflects conversations with various people and stories the narrator encounters and recalls, all centering on the passage of time, grief and regret, the destiny of the cancer-stricken friend slowly emerges as the main narrative thread that will, around the middle of the text, set in motion a course of events that questions the meaning of death and by that, the meaning of life.
The text certainly requires a reader with some patience for complex story-within-story-within-a-story constructions that call for some work in order to establish parallels and juxtapostitions on the main themes. The effort pays off though, because it's the variety that conveys the complexity of the human experience - and in the end, this is also a book about the power of stories, mainly those which are shared from person to person. The narrator also refers to famous thinkers and artists to ponder issues like sadness and compassion - the titular question "What are you going through" can be found numerous times in the text, contemplating the ability (or inability) to grasp how another person feels, in how far we can empathize with experiences outside ourselves. Nunez particularly looks at the experiences of women, their specific roles and challenges, and the versions of sadness they undergo as a result.
A smart, haunting little book with an experimental feel that in all its wisdom is not easy to stomach.
You can learn more about the book in our new podcast epsiode (in German).
This is a Rachel Cusk-esque brain twister slapping us with the fact that yes, we are all going to die. Playing on themes similar to her bestseller The Friend, Nunez gives us a first-person narrator who visits a friend with terminal cancer. While at the beginning, the novel reflects conversations with various people and stories the narrator encounters and recalls, all centering on the passage of time, grief and regret, the destiny of the cancer-stricken friend slowly emerges as the main narrative thread that will, around the middle of the text, set in motion a course of events that questions the meaning of death and by that, the meaning of life.
The text certainly requires a reader with some patience for complex story-within-story-within-a-story constructions that call for some work in order to establish parallels and juxtapostitions on the main themes. The effort pays off though, because it's the variety that conveys the complexity of the human experience - and in the end, this is also a book about the power of stories, mainly those which are shared from person to person. The narrator also refers to famous thinkers and artists to ponder issues like sadness and compassion - the titular question "What are you going through" can be found numerous times in the text, contemplating the ability (or inability) to grasp how another person feels, in how far we can empathize with experiences outside ourselves. Nunez particularly looks at the experiences of women, their specific roles and challenges, and the versions of sadness they undergo as a result.
A smart, haunting little book with an experimental feel that in all its wisdom is not easy to stomach.
You can learn more about the book in our new podcast epsiode (in German).
September 12, 2020
I absolutely love Sigrid Nunez!!!!!
UPDATE:
Audiobook....read by Hillary Nunez
A short 5 hour audiobook that I listened to in a one day sweep, yesterday....hiking and then warm water pool soaking.
It was impossible to put down.
One of my favorite books this year!!!!
Sigrid Nunez should win another national award for it....as she did in “The Friend”.
The audiobook is excellent. My only regret is I’m now sick: lungs headache, and chills.....from ignoring the air quality risks. STUPID STUPID ME! I should never have spent 5 hours outside with our environmental conditions.
So keeping this short....( I just wrote another review- and with my head pounding - I’m spent)...
On top of that my kindle died this morning. HOURS on the phone with Amazon LOCATING the 3 year warranty. SIX PEOPLE I HAD TO TALK WITH.... BUT FINALLY THEY FOUND MY extended warranty purchase.
Whew!
So....a little - finally good news - in a basically one crappy day.
Bad time to write a review of a book I soooooo LOVE.....
The best thing I can say....is
JUST READ IT. ....or.... LISTEN TO IT as I did
The blurb is all that’s needed....
but for me....
One of the most affecting conversations was about the dying woman’s relationship with her daughter....( her only child), and their long standing troubled relationship. I agreed with the dying women’s choices not to include her with her death journey....( although she was the beneficiary of her will), - but damn - it’s sad.
And....I’m not just talking about death.....rather the many years of hopelessness.
Soooo powerful..... ( funny bone laughs too - an Airbnb scene - the farty- ex-Professor ......good laughs and eye rolling scenes too)
I felt like I was in the same room with the unnamed narrator and her friend while they were talking and planning their days ahead.
UPDATE:
Audiobook....read by Hillary Nunez
A short 5 hour audiobook that I listened to in a one day sweep, yesterday....hiking and then warm water pool soaking.
It was impossible to put down.
One of my favorite books this year!!!!
Sigrid Nunez should win another national award for it....as she did in “The Friend”.
The audiobook is excellent. My only regret is I’m now sick: lungs headache, and chills.....from ignoring the air quality risks. STUPID STUPID ME! I should never have spent 5 hours outside with our environmental conditions.
So keeping this short....( I just wrote another review- and with my head pounding - I’m spent)...
On top of that my kindle died this morning. HOURS on the phone with Amazon LOCATING the 3 year warranty. SIX PEOPLE I HAD TO TALK WITH.... BUT FINALLY THEY FOUND MY extended warranty purchase.
Whew!
So....a little - finally good news - in a basically one crappy day.
Bad time to write a review of a book I soooooo LOVE.....
The best thing I can say....is
JUST READ IT. ....or.... LISTEN TO IT as I did
The blurb is all that’s needed....
but for me....
One of the most affecting conversations was about the dying woman’s relationship with her daughter....( her only child), and their long standing troubled relationship. I agreed with the dying women’s choices not to include her with her death journey....( although she was the beneficiary of her will), - but damn - it’s sad.
And....I’m not just talking about death.....rather the many years of hopelessness.
Soooo powerful..... ( funny bone laughs too - an Airbnb scene - the farty- ex-Professor ......good laughs and eye rolling scenes too)
I felt like I was in the same room with the unnamed narrator and her friend while they were talking and planning their days ahead.
August 24, 2024
A dark book but not without humor of the gallows variety. Touches, I think, on the darkness we find in Thomas Bernhard—that is high praise—at times verging on but never quite getting to the full Bernhardian rant. But bleak, bleak. Just my sort of thing.
There’s no description of individuals, except in the briefest functional terms, just action, dialogue, and thought. There’s a talking cat, but this may be a dream of the narrator’s. At any rate it made me think of Natsume Soseki’s I Am a Cat. Interestingly, too, the book has its thumb in current events. But not in a relentlessly Monica Ali way.
The main story is of two writers, one of whom is dying; the other, a friend, is our narrator. No one’s named, just as no one’s described. The dying woman wants a suicide vacation. The narrator is talked into it. A beach house is rented through Airbnb from jet setting elders. The terminal one forgets her pills; they drive back to the city, get the drugs and return to the beach house. There’s another plot line, if we can call it that, which introduces the narrator’s ex, who lectures on the unlikelihood of our continuation as a species. He’s eschatological but without the religion. His arguments are steeped in science and logic. He’s quite a pistol.
The dying woman—said to be based on Susan Sontag—is cruel, and she wonders why she raised such a cruel (estranged) daughter. My thought is the fruit never falls far from the tree. Now the dying woman is reviewing her life as the narrator listens.
“You want to forgive all, my friend said, and you should forgive all. But you discover that some things you can’t forgive, not even when you know you’re dying. And then that becomes its own open wound, she said: the inability to forgive.” (p. 163)
If it is at times gruesome, it is entertainingly so.
There’s no description of individuals, except in the briefest functional terms, just action, dialogue, and thought. There’s a talking cat, but this may be a dream of the narrator’s. At any rate it made me think of Natsume Soseki’s I Am a Cat. Interestingly, too, the book has its thumb in current events. But not in a relentlessly Monica Ali way.
The main story is of two writers, one of whom is dying; the other, a friend, is our narrator. No one’s named, just as no one’s described. The dying woman wants a suicide vacation. The narrator is talked into it. A beach house is rented through Airbnb from jet setting elders. The terminal one forgets her pills; they drive back to the city, get the drugs and return to the beach house. There’s another plot line, if we can call it that, which introduces the narrator’s ex, who lectures on the unlikelihood of our continuation as a species. He’s eschatological but without the religion. His arguments are steeped in science and logic. He’s quite a pistol.
The dying woman—said to be based on Susan Sontag—is cruel, and she wonders why she raised such a cruel (estranged) daughter. My thought is the fruit never falls far from the tree. Now the dying woman is reviewing her life as the narrator listens.
“You want to forgive all, my friend said, and you should forgive all. But you discover that some things you can’t forgive, not even when you know you’re dying. And then that becomes its own open wound, she said: the inability to forgive.” (p. 163)
If it is at times gruesome, it is entertainingly so.
February 27, 2021
I just love this author. Her books are not flashy but she draws a reader in because she gets life, in all it's absurd realities and misfortunes. Conversational in tone, which gives it a personal touch. She could be speaking to any of us, anywhere. People that fill our lives, past and present, thoughts memories. Conversations, internal thoughts, on books, movie, Fox news, our political and climate crisis.
The main part of the book though concentrates on a favor she agrees to do for a dying friend she has not had a relationship with for years. It is a sad situation but the book, words do not come off as particularly grim. It's just life, life and death, realities.
Contemplative, identifiable, a short book in pages but it contains much food for thought. How do we live our days, our lives, who do we meet, think about How do we become involved in things we'd rather not. How one thing leads to another. How these experiences enrich us is ways not immediately apparent. Messy, messy life, full of friendship, love, joy but sorrows too. All making us the people we are.
The main part of the book though concentrates on a favor she agrees to do for a dying friend she has not had a relationship with for years. It is a sad situation but the book, words do not come off as particularly grim. It's just life, life and death, realities.
Contemplative, identifiable, a short book in pages but it contains much food for thought. How do we live our days, our lives, who do we meet, think about How do we become involved in things we'd rather not. How one thing leads to another. How these experiences enrich us is ways not immediately apparent. Messy, messy life, full of friendship, love, joy but sorrows too. All making us the people we are.
September 22, 2020
In What Are You Going Through, the narrator encounters the phenomenon that sometimes happens as you get older where you are past forming new relationships and your old ones have moved and changed. One friend is approaching death from cancer and she captures the absurdity and how a person changes during that journey so well - this is not a Lifetime movie.
At the same time I'm having a hard time letting this stick to my bones - it's probably too close to my actual experiences to feel all that memorable. I see truth here but it's truth I already know. Which in the end is a bit of a strange reading experience.
I had a copy from the publisher through NetGalley. This came out September 8, and I wanted to read it because I really loved her last book, The Friend. The style and themes are really quite similar but if I were to recommend a starting place it would be The Friend first.
At the same time I'm having a hard time letting this stick to my bones - it's probably too close to my actual experiences to feel all that memorable. I see truth here but it's truth I already know. Which in the end is a bit of a strange reading experience.
I had a copy from the publisher through NetGalley. This came out September 8, and I wanted to read it because I really loved her last book, The Friend. The style and themes are really quite similar but if I were to recommend a starting place it would be The Friend first.
September 13, 2020
A resonant, powerful, and unconventional novel, which barely possesses a plot. The writing is clean and unpretentious. Nunez writes about difficult truths and possibly the most difficult of experiences: accompanying a dying person. There really are times when nothing we can say or nothing others can say to us can make a situation better. I found this an intense reading experience, and, short as the book is, I was relieved to reach the end. The reader is committed to and endures the experience, much as the narrator does.
A couple of quotations from the novel:
“We talk glibly about finding the right words, but about the most important things, those words we never find. We put the words down as they must be put down, one after the other, but that is not life, that is not death, one word after the other, no, that is not right at all. No matter how hard we try to put the most important things into words, it is always like toe-dancing in clogs.”
“how hard it was for people to accept reality”
A couple of quotations from the novel:
“We talk glibly about finding the right words, but about the most important things, those words we never find. We put the words down as they must be put down, one after the other, but that is not life, that is not death, one word after the other, no, that is not right at all. No matter how hard we try to put the most important things into words, it is always like toe-dancing in clogs.”
“how hard it was for people to accept reality”
July 9, 2022
What Are You Going Through is a question we should perhaps ask more often of folks we care about. Because life is messy and there are no easy answers.
The unnamed narrator is a female writer who had never been married and did not have any children. When I first made her acquaintance in the opening pages, I did not like her. Her tone and critique of intellectual women sounded rude, dismissive, and even crude. That changed as I got to know her in her interactions with her fellow journalist friend who was dying of cancer. In her forthrightness was an unmistakable authenticity, which made her seem earthy and relatable.
A couple of times at the start of this novel, I struggled with the disjointed nature of her narrative. Her description of her visit to an unfamiliar town to visit her very ill friend was interspersed with seemingly incoherent episodes of her having attended a doomsday talk, snippets of a psychological thriller she was reading at the Airbnb, an Austrian documentary, memories of a previously slim woman she met at a gym in younger days, an elderly neighbor she regretted helping to babysit, a ‘bourbon-eyed silver-furred cat’ that belonged to the Airbnb host, conversations with her ex-boyfriend, etc. Where is the story going?
To digress, having read The Friend and Mitz: The Marmoset of Bloomsbury, I was not at all surprised to read the ‘soliloquy’ of the cat in this book. It had Nunez’s trademark compassion for animals.
I soon learned rightly or wrongly that this collage of things that flitted in and out of the narrator’s life reflects what life is like. Memories come crashing in at the oddest moments, but they surface for reasons known to us. As the narrative progressed, the central story is the narrator’s last days with her friend. The sureness of death brought them intensely closer to each other.
For readers, there is also discussion on writing and the role of writers. Apparently, in 1950 in Stockholm, Faulkner advocated ‘a return to the old universal truths - love and honor and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice. Absent, which, Faulkner warned, your story will last but a day.’
In What Are You Going Through are stories of people coping with life as it happens. Nunez explored the meaning of life with no attempt at ennobling the journey but keeping it real. Definitely recommended.
Below are some quotes I highlighted:
‘… no matter how sad, a beautifully told story lifts you up.’
'The only thing harder than seeing yourself grow old is seeing the people you’ve loved grow old.’
‘Is there anything more hygge than lying close to a loudly purring cat whose warm fur smells of woodsmoke, watching him knead the duvet?'
‘School, in general, made me feel loved… That somebody wanted to teach me things, that they cared about my penmanship, my stick-figure drawings, the rhymes in my poems. That was love… Teaching is love.’
‘It was life, that’s what. Life going on, in spite of everything. Messy life. Unfair life. Life that must be dealt with. That I must deal with. For if I didn’t do it, who would?’
The unnamed narrator is a female writer who had never been married and did not have any children. When I first made her acquaintance in the opening pages, I did not like her. Her tone and critique of intellectual women sounded rude, dismissive, and even crude. That changed as I got to know her in her interactions with her fellow journalist friend who was dying of cancer. In her forthrightness was an unmistakable authenticity, which made her seem earthy and relatable.
A couple of times at the start of this novel, I struggled with the disjointed nature of her narrative. Her description of her visit to an unfamiliar town to visit her very ill friend was interspersed with seemingly incoherent episodes of her having attended a doomsday talk, snippets of a psychological thriller she was reading at the Airbnb, an Austrian documentary, memories of a previously slim woman she met at a gym in younger days, an elderly neighbor she regretted helping to babysit, a ‘bourbon-eyed silver-furred cat’ that belonged to the Airbnb host, conversations with her ex-boyfriend, etc. Where is the story going?
To digress, having read The Friend and Mitz: The Marmoset of Bloomsbury, I was not at all surprised to read the ‘soliloquy’ of the cat in this book. It had Nunez’s trademark compassion for animals.
I soon learned rightly or wrongly that this collage of things that flitted in and out of the narrator’s life reflects what life is like. Memories come crashing in at the oddest moments, but they surface for reasons known to us. As the narrative progressed, the central story is the narrator’s last days with her friend. The sureness of death brought them intensely closer to each other.
For readers, there is also discussion on writing and the role of writers. Apparently, in 1950 in Stockholm, Faulkner advocated ‘a return to the old universal truths - love and honor and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice. Absent, which, Faulkner warned, your story will last but a day.’
In What Are You Going Through are stories of people coping with life as it happens. Nunez explored the meaning of life with no attempt at ennobling the journey but keeping it real. Definitely recommended.
Below are some quotes I highlighted:
‘… no matter how sad, a beautifully told story lifts you up.’
'The only thing harder than seeing yourself grow old is seeing the people you’ve loved grow old.’
‘Is there anything more hygge than lying close to a loudly purring cat whose warm fur smells of woodsmoke, watching him knead the duvet?'
‘School, in general, made me feel loved… That somebody wanted to teach me things, that they cared about my penmanship, my stick-figure drawings, the rhymes in my poems. That was love… Teaching is love.’
‘It was life, that’s what. Life going on, in spite of everything. Messy life. Unfair life. Life that must be dealt with. That I must deal with. For if I didn’t do it, who would?’
October 24, 2020
[4+] Like The Friend, this is a wise, deceptively simple novel. You would think that a story about a woman helping her dying friend would be heavy and ponderous. It isn't. For me it didn't quite have the emotional resonance of "The Friend" but still - a marvelous novel. There are many funny, unexpected moments. Nunez has a gentle way of cracking things open, guiding me to think more deeply.
July 31, 2024
This was perfect for audio given its tone of conversational vignettes. It felt like an interesting and clever friend was sharing various thoughts with me around the deeper, more troubling themes of aging, death, friendship and intimacy. It entertained as the true substance emerged. Sometimes those we know peripherally become our biggest allies.
I like the way Nunez writes. I first heard her read in person from The Friend, and I loved that. If you haven’t read her yet, that one was better for me. But her artistry is here, too, and I look forward to reading her again. And as much as her writing lends itself well to audio, it still makes a greater impact on the page.
I like the way Nunez writes. I first heard her read in person from The Friend, and I loved that. If you haven’t read her yet, that one was better for me. But her artistry is here, too, and I look forward to reading her again. And as much as her writing lends itself well to audio, it still makes a greater impact on the page.
July 4, 2020
Not a fan. I think it was the weird organization of the story and lack of a flowing plot. I get what the author is trying to do. I just didn’t care for it.
October 26, 2020
This follow-up to the National Book Award winning The Friend follows a similar formula to its predecessor. There is a loose plot - a writer agrees to assist a terminally-ill friend in ending her life. But it's really a framework for Sigrid Nunez to examine certain topics in her typically perceptive manner: mortality, old age and grief among many others.
The dying woman has a daughter but they are not on the best of terms. Hence the reason our narrator is enlisted. She agrees as she feels as though she can't let her friend down, but as the time approaches, pressure begins to build. The practicalities of it alone are difficult to process. Should they be in the same room when it happens? What does she tell the police when she phones to report the death? The pair travel to a beautiful Airbnb in the countryside to carry out the plan, but things don't pan out the way they expect.
It's written in a casual, almost conversational style but it asks tough questions. Is it wrong to help end a friend's suffering? Is a parent allowed to admit that they don't love their child? Is it selfish to bring a baby into a world where there is so much torment? The book is short but it's full of hard-won insight and clear-eyed wisdom. Though the subject matter is often bleak, it left me with much to think about. A rewarding, enlightening read from a tremendously gifted writer.
Favourite Quotes:
"The only thing harder than seeing yourself grow old is seeing the people you’ve loved grow old."
"Youth burdened with full knowledge of just how sad and painful aging is I would not call youth at all."
"What are you going through? When Simone Weil said that being able to ask this question was what love of one’s neighbor truly meant, she was writing in her native French. And in French the great question sounds quite different: Quel est ton tourment?"
"This is how it is with people, she tells me now. No matter what, they want you to keep fighting. This is how we’ve been taught to see cancer: a fight between patient and disease. Which is to say between good and evil. There’s a right way and a wrong way to act. A strong way and a weak way. The warrior’s way and the quitter’s way. If you survive you’re a hero. If you lose, well, maybe you didn’t fight hard enough."
"There’s a certain kind of happiness, my friend said, that is open only to young children. I mean, as a child, it’s possible to be totally focused on just one thing. It’s your birthday. You asked for a bike, or a puppy, or a new pair of skates. As the day draws near it’s all you can think about. And then it happens, your wish fulfilled, your dream come true, and nothing to spoil it. In getting that one thing it’s as if you’d been given everything. But after a certain age, that feeling—that pure bliss—doesn’t happen, it can’t happen, because you never want just one thing anymore, once you reach puberty it’s no longer possible."
The dying woman has a daughter but they are not on the best of terms. Hence the reason our narrator is enlisted. She agrees as she feels as though she can't let her friend down, but as the time approaches, pressure begins to build. The practicalities of it alone are difficult to process. Should they be in the same room when it happens? What does she tell the police when she phones to report the death? The pair travel to a beautiful Airbnb in the countryside to carry out the plan, but things don't pan out the way they expect.
It's written in a casual, almost conversational style but it asks tough questions. Is it wrong to help end a friend's suffering? Is a parent allowed to admit that they don't love their child? Is it selfish to bring a baby into a world where there is so much torment? The book is short but it's full of hard-won insight and clear-eyed wisdom. Though the subject matter is often bleak, it left me with much to think about. A rewarding, enlightening read from a tremendously gifted writer.
Favourite Quotes:
"The only thing harder than seeing yourself grow old is seeing the people you’ve loved grow old."
"Youth burdened with full knowledge of just how sad and painful aging is I would not call youth at all."
"What are you going through? When Simone Weil said that being able to ask this question was what love of one’s neighbor truly meant, she was writing in her native French. And in French the great question sounds quite different: Quel est ton tourment?"
"This is how it is with people, she tells me now. No matter what, they want you to keep fighting. This is how we’ve been taught to see cancer: a fight between patient and disease. Which is to say between good and evil. There’s a right way and a wrong way to act. A strong way and a weak way. The warrior’s way and the quitter’s way. If you survive you’re a hero. If you lose, well, maybe you didn’t fight hard enough."
"There’s a certain kind of happiness, my friend said, that is open only to young children. I mean, as a child, it’s possible to be totally focused on just one thing. It’s your birthday. You asked for a bike, or a puppy, or a new pair of skates. As the day draws near it’s all you can think about. And then it happens, your wish fulfilled, your dream come true, and nothing to spoil it. In getting that one thing it’s as if you’d been given everything. But after a certain age, that feeling—that pure bliss—doesn’t happen, it can’t happen, because you never want just one thing anymore, once you reach puberty it’s no longer possible."
October 17, 2022
"No matter how hard we try to put the most important things into words,it is always like toe-dancing in clogs."
"There are two kinds of people in the world: those who, upon seeing someone else suffering, think, That could happen to me, and those who think That will never happen to me. The first kind of people help us to endure; the second kind make life hell."
How far would you go to help a friend? For example, if a friend was diagnosed with terminal cancer and planned suicide, would you stay with her during her last weeks if she didn't involve you with her actual death? Sigrid Nunez tackles this question in her latest novel, "What are you going through" and examines themes of friendship, empathy, loss, death, and dignity.
The story, told by a nameless narrator, depicts her relationship with her unnamed friend as her cancer diagnosis shifts. The two women, both writers, were very close in their youth but, while retaining contact, drifted apart. The first half of the book chronicles the narrator's initial visit: her time at the hospital, the airb&b at which she stays, her reading, observations, and most importantly, her attendance at a lecture given by her ex on the world's inevitable demise due to climate change.
In the second half of the book, the unnamed narrator moves from a wry observer to an initially hesitant participant as she decides to grant her friend's request. Their remaining time together, while sad, is also marked with humor, compassion, and shared moments of intimacy. What are you going through is a finely crafted story of considerable depth. Highly recommend.
"There are two kinds of people in the world: those who, upon seeing someone else suffering, think, That could happen to me, and those who think That will never happen to me. The first kind of people help us to endure; the second kind make life hell."
How far would you go to help a friend? For example, if a friend was diagnosed with terminal cancer and planned suicide, would you stay with her during her last weeks if she didn't involve you with her actual death? Sigrid Nunez tackles this question in her latest novel, "What are you going through" and examines themes of friendship, empathy, loss, death, and dignity.
The story, told by a nameless narrator, depicts her relationship with her unnamed friend as her cancer diagnosis shifts. The two women, both writers, were very close in their youth but, while retaining contact, drifted apart. The first half of the book chronicles the narrator's initial visit: her time at the hospital, the airb&b at which she stays, her reading, observations, and most importantly, her attendance at a lecture given by her ex on the world's inevitable demise due to climate change.
In the second half of the book, the unnamed narrator moves from a wry observer to an initially hesitant participant as she decides to grant her friend's request. Their remaining time together, while sad, is also marked with humor, compassion, and shared moments of intimacy. What are you going through is a finely crafted story of considerable depth. Highly recommend.
February 7, 2023
I had a hate- love- hate relationship with this novel. We meet the unnamed narrator- she is at an author’s talk. The presenter is a woman. This is how she is described: “ She is a familiar type: the glam academic, the intellectual vamp. Someone at pains for it to be known that, although smart and well educated, although a feminist and a woman in a position of power, the lady is no frump, no boring nerd, no sexless harridan. “ and she doe not stop there. She continues with a few more sentences this mental disparaging of a woman she has never met. This is on page 5! Needless to say, this book did not start on the right foot for me.
The basis of the story is a good friend of hers is dying of cancer and she has asked her to be with her at her death, which she has planned on her own terms. When the book focused on her friend and her, I was invested in the story. The rest of the time, it felt disjointed. Yes, everyone is going through stuff, even a cat it seems.
It lost me at times, other times it pulled me in.
The underlying message is good- be there for others, whether it be a friend, family or a neighbour. I know this of course. We all do deep down. I finished this book - a disjointed ending and felt very let down. Others have raved about this book. Maybe it’s just me, but it left me flat.
I read this book for a lecture series I attend. I’ll look forward to seeing what is said about the book. I may question why the author, a woman, had to be so disparaging of another woman, without knowing anything about her. Why was that necessary?
2.5 Stars
Published: 2020
The basis of the story is a good friend of hers is dying of cancer and she has asked her to be with her at her death, which she has planned on her own terms. When the book focused on her friend and her, I was invested in the story. The rest of the time, it felt disjointed. Yes, everyone is going through stuff, even a cat it seems.
It lost me at times, other times it pulled me in.
The underlying message is good- be there for others, whether it be a friend, family or a neighbour. I know this of course. We all do deep down. I finished this book - a disjointed ending and felt very let down. Others have raved about this book. Maybe it’s just me, but it left me flat.
I read this book for a lecture series I attend. I’ll look forward to seeing what is said about the book. I may question why the author, a woman, had to be so disparaging of another woman, without knowing anything about her. Why was that necessary?
2.5 Stars
Published: 2020
October 2, 2020
If, as Shakespeare wrote, life is "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing," then what is the meaning of life and why tell the tale at all?
The unmarried and childless narrator of Sigrid Nunez's latest book, who has reached the age where death is a possibility, reflects on it this way: "The writers who believe that the way they write is more important than whatever they may write about-these are the only writers I want to read anymore, the only ones who can lift me up."
Using that criteria, Sigrid Nunez's book lifted me up. This book can be read as a companion piece to her last book, The Friend, which was about a writer grieving the death of a fellow writer. Death looms large in this book as well. The narrator's good friend, who is very estranged from her own daughter, is dying of cancer. A request will be made and honored. And by doing so, the narrator will understand more about herself and her own mortality.
For those of us who have lived more years than we have allotted for the future, there are many pithy observations. In between the forward propulsion of the narrator and her friend, there are gems about so many things: the sadness of once being a beautiful woman and now just being old, the falsity of language in describing transformative moments, the incredulity of once knowing someone well and realizing that life has gone on and you really know very little about that person. The book is interspersed with tales: of being roped into visits with a crabby shut-in neighbor to alleviate the worries of her son, a cat's tormented tale of its life before adoption, for example.
This narrator, like the one in The Friend who is similarly unmarried and alone, derives meaning from connection - not with a dog (as in the Friend) but with a dying friend. Yet the book is not grim; rather, it fully captures the richness of living in ordinary moments and the humanity that connects us all. Sigrid Nunez, in explaining her title, quotes Simone Weil, who wrote, "the love of our neighbor in all its fullness simply means being able to say to him, "What are you going through?" Wryly, she says that the question becomes more powerful in French: "Que est ton tourment?" It is a question, she suggests, that ties us together.
The unmarried and childless narrator of Sigrid Nunez's latest book, who has reached the age where death is a possibility, reflects on it this way: "The writers who believe that the way they write is more important than whatever they may write about-these are the only writers I want to read anymore, the only ones who can lift me up."
Using that criteria, Sigrid Nunez's book lifted me up. This book can be read as a companion piece to her last book, The Friend, which was about a writer grieving the death of a fellow writer. Death looms large in this book as well. The narrator's good friend, who is very estranged from her own daughter, is dying of cancer. A request will be made and honored. And by doing so, the narrator will understand more about herself and her own mortality.
For those of us who have lived more years than we have allotted for the future, there are many pithy observations. In between the forward propulsion of the narrator and her friend, there are gems about so many things: the sadness of once being a beautiful woman and now just being old, the falsity of language in describing transformative moments, the incredulity of once knowing someone well and realizing that life has gone on and you really know very little about that person. The book is interspersed with tales: of being roped into visits with a crabby shut-in neighbor to alleviate the worries of her son, a cat's tormented tale of its life before adoption, for example.
This narrator, like the one in The Friend who is similarly unmarried and alone, derives meaning from connection - not with a dog (as in the Friend) but with a dying friend. Yet the book is not grim; rather, it fully captures the richness of living in ordinary moments and the humanity that connects us all. Sigrid Nunez, in explaining her title, quotes Simone Weil, who wrote, "the love of our neighbor in all its fullness simply means being able to say to him, "What are you going through?" Wryly, she says that the question becomes more powerful in French: "Que est ton tourment?" It is a question, she suggests, that ties us together.
October 4, 2025
O sentido da vida é que ela é finita.
Gostei muito deste livro! Li-o hoje, quase num piscar de olhos. Traz o tema da doença, em fase terminal, sem ser melodramático ou apelar à lágrima, e faz-nos pensar na forma como reagimos à doença, dos outros e nossa. Para uns, a abordagem do vai tudo ficar bem funciona, mas para outros, é preferível serem diretos e sem falinhas mansas ou metáforas que não ajudam em nada.
Gostei muito deste livro! Li-o hoje, quase num piscar de olhos. Traz o tema da doença, em fase terminal, sem ser melodramático ou apelar à lágrima, e faz-nos pensar na forma como reagimos à doença, dos outros e nossa. Para uns, a abordagem do vai tudo ficar bem funciona, mas para outros, é preferível serem diretos e sem falinhas mansas ou metáforas que não ajudam em nada.
January 17, 2021
Considering that the main theme of this novel is the relationship between two female friends, one who has been diagnosed with terminal cancer and the other is the narrator who's trying to help her friend navigate the turbulent times that come after this news, I thought the story was surprisingly witty, even funny at times.
I found myself alternatively laughing and crying as the unnamed protagonist describes the emotional rollercoaster she finds herself riding when her friend asks her to accompany in her final days after she decides to terminate her life on her own terms.
During those final weeks and days, the friends reminisce about their childhood, past relationships, politics, and the future of our planet.
There are many passages I enjoyed, but I found that this one, in particular, spoke to me on a more personal level:
“For me, said my friend, the first day of school was the happiest day of the year. I remember being so excited, that I couldn’t sleep the night before, we went to church every Sunday, but for me, school was the true holy place, the place of hope and thankfulness and joy. The worship of God once a week was completely abstract, but the love of learning? That was real”.
Mostly though, what this novel offers is a timely, intimate meditation on friendship, the difficulty of facing our mortality, and ultimately, the meaning of life.
Hillary Huber, the audiobook narrator, was an excellent choice to narrate this story, so 5 stars for her as well.
September 17, 2025
Al empezar a leer esta novela uno entra en un espacio íntimo donde la voz narradora habla con una cercanía que incomoda y reconforta a la vez. No hay urgencia en avanzar, no hay prisa por llegar a un final: la novela invita a demorarse en lo mínimo, en lo cotidiano, en lo que normalmente se pasa por alto.
Lo primero que impresiona es el tono. Frente a un tema que podría haber caído en el dramatismo o la solemnidad, Sigrid Nunez elige la claridad, el humor y una sensibilidad serena. Se habla de lo frágil y lo inevitable, pero siempre desde la vida: desde los gestos, las conversaciones, las risas que se cuelan en medio de la tristeza. Esa mezcla de ligereza y hondura convierte la experiencia de leerla en algo profundamente humano.
La estructura del libro puede descolocar: no es una narración lineal ni una historia “de principio a fin”, sino una serie de fragmentos, escenas y recuerdos que orbitan alrededor de una misma experiencia. A veces parecen desvíos, pequeñas historias que interrumpen lo central. Pero con el tiempo uno descubre que esas piezas dispersas conforman un tapiz, una manera distinta de contar: no desde la espectacularidad, sino desde lo lateral, lo discreto, lo que sostiene en silencio.
Lo que permanece al terminar la novela no es una moraleja, ni una lección de vida empaquetada, sino una emoción difícil de nombrar. Algo cercano a la gratitud, porque la novela recuerda que los afectos, sean esperados o inesperados, son lo que nos acompaña cuando todo lo demás se disuelve. Y esa compañía, aunque parezca pequeña, puede serlo todo.
Desde el punto de vista crítico, lo más admirable es cómo Nunez logra hablar de la muerte desde la vida, sin ceder a la tentación del patetismo ni a la frialdad distante. Su prosa, limpia y atenta, revela que lo verdaderamente literario está en escuchar, en registrar lo que ocurre alrededor, en preguntar con honestidad: ¿Cuál es tu tormento?
Leer esta historia es aceptar esa pregunta. Y aunque no siempre tengamos la respuesta, la lectura nos deja con la certeza de que compartir el silencio, la risa o la memoria con alguien más, también es una forma de amor.
Lo primero que impresiona es el tono. Frente a un tema que podría haber caído en el dramatismo o la solemnidad, Sigrid Nunez elige la claridad, el humor y una sensibilidad serena. Se habla de lo frágil y lo inevitable, pero siempre desde la vida: desde los gestos, las conversaciones, las risas que se cuelan en medio de la tristeza. Esa mezcla de ligereza y hondura convierte la experiencia de leerla en algo profundamente humano.
La estructura del libro puede descolocar: no es una narración lineal ni una historia “de principio a fin”, sino una serie de fragmentos, escenas y recuerdos que orbitan alrededor de una misma experiencia. A veces parecen desvíos, pequeñas historias que interrumpen lo central. Pero con el tiempo uno descubre que esas piezas dispersas conforman un tapiz, una manera distinta de contar: no desde la espectacularidad, sino desde lo lateral, lo discreto, lo que sostiene en silencio.
Lo que permanece al terminar la novela no es una moraleja, ni una lección de vida empaquetada, sino una emoción difícil de nombrar. Algo cercano a la gratitud, porque la novela recuerda que los afectos, sean esperados o inesperados, son lo que nos acompaña cuando todo lo demás se disuelve. Y esa compañía, aunque parezca pequeña, puede serlo todo.
Desde el punto de vista crítico, lo más admirable es cómo Nunez logra hablar de la muerte desde la vida, sin ceder a la tentación del patetismo ni a la frialdad distante. Su prosa, limpia y atenta, revela que lo verdaderamente literario está en escuchar, en registrar lo que ocurre alrededor, en preguntar con honestidad: ¿Cuál es tu tormento?
Leer esta historia es aceptar esa pregunta. Y aunque no siempre tengamos la respuesta, la lectura nos deja con la certeza de que compartir el silencio, la risa o la memoria con alguien más, también es una forma de amor.
June 23, 2025
Eu tentei. Escrevi uma palavra a seguir à outra. Sabendo que cada palavra podia ter sido diferente. Como a vida da minha amiga, como qualquer outra vida, podia ter sido diferente. Eu tentei. Amor e honra e piedade e orgulho e compaixão e sacrifício… Que importa se falhei.
Quando nos cruzamos com alguém com quem ficamos com uma impressão menos boa, raramente sabemos qual é a história daquela pessoa, o que a traumatizou, o que a aflige, até mesmo se disfarçar bem e apresentar um comportamento polido, o que oculta do resto do mundo. Qual é o tormento de cada uma delas? Qual é o tormento de cada um de nós? Na dúvida, é um bom exercício praticarmos a tolerância e a delicadeza, mas nem sempre é fácil.
Não sei quem foi, mas alguém, talvez Henry James, ou talvez não, disse que há dois tipos de pessoas no mundo: as que vendo alguém sofrer, pensam: Isto podia acontecer comigo, e as que pensam: Isto nunca me acontecerá. As primeiras ajudam-nos a sobreviver, as segundas fazem da vida um inferno.
“Qual é o Teu Tormento” é um livro tese em que Sigrid Nunez lista uma série de casos que exemplificam essa ideia de toda a gente carregar um peso e fá-lo seguindo a sabedoria de William Faulkner quando recebeu o Prémio Nobel da Literatura, com as “velhas verdades universais – amor e piedade e orgulho e compaixão e sacrifício.”
O que me atormentou nesta leitura e subsequente avaliação foi ter apreciado a empatia que a autora revela com as suas personagens e não tanto os exemplos escolhidos para ilustrar o seu enunciado, tal como já me tinha acontecido com “O Amigo”, onde também recorre a um artifício que, para mim, desvaloriza a narrativa. Em “Qual é o Teu Tormento”, surge uma meditação sobre temas como a velhice, a solidão, a ficção feminina, o assédio, a perda da beleza física e o luto, havendo também lugar para o tema do fim do mundo.
Cultivar o bem-estar pessoal, aliviar as angústias quotidianas, evitar o stresse: estes tinham-se transformado em alguns dos objetivos mais elevados da nossa sociedade, disse - mais elevados, ao que parece, do que a salvação da sociedade em si mesma. A moda da atenção plena não passava de mais uma distração, disse. É claro que devíamos estar tensos.
Nunez é claramente uma escritora de escritores, enriquecendo a sua exposição com citações de autores consagrados e incluindo referências aos livros que está a ler.
Memória: Precisamos de outra palavra para descrever a forma como vemos acontecimentos do passado que continuam vivos dentro de nós, pensava Graham Greene. De acordo. De acordo também com Kafka. E, ao mesmo tempo, com Camus. O sentido literal da vida é tudo aquilo que fazes para não te suicidares.
Aliás, é escritora e jornalista a amiga da narradora em torno da qual gira esta obra, que já sem esperança de recuperar do cancro, lhe pede que a acompanhe nos últimos dias de vida, até ela ganhar coragem de tomar os comprimidos que lhe garantiriam, como diria Simone de Beauvoir, “uma morte suave”.
Tinha querido ser forte. Tinha querido ter controle. Tinha querido morrer à sua maneira e com o mínimo incómodo possível para o mundo. Tinha querido paz. Tinha querido ordem. Paz e ordem à sua volta era tudo quanto havia desejado. Uma morte tranquila, limpa, até – porque não? – bonita. (…) Era o fim que a minha amiga havia escrito para si própria.
Esta mulher é uma pessoa inteligente e difícil, intimidante e frontal, cerebral até, com uma capacidade implacável de processar o sofrimento, incluindo a hostilidade com a que a filha desde muito nova a brindou.
Queres perdoar tudo, disse a minha amiga, e devias perdoar tudo. Mas descobres que há coisas que não podes perdoar, nem mesmo quando sabes que estás a morrer. E isso transforma-se numa ferida aberta, disse: a incapacidade de perdoar.
Tendo Sigrid Nunez sido assistente de Susan Sontag e vivido com ela quando esta estava a recuperar de uma mastectomia, pergunto-me até que ponto se inspirou nesta intelectual, que apelidou de “monstro de arrogância e indelicadeza”, ao construir esta personagem.
É então que, na segunda parte do livro, as duas amigas se instalam numa casa isolada, a conversar, a ver filmes, com a narradora a cozinhar e a ler-lhe em voz alta, visto que até a paciência para os livros ela perdeu, fazendo lembrar a dinâmica de “O Quarto de Hóspedes” de Helen Garner, ainda que mais pacífica e contida, visto a doente já se encontrar numa fase de aceitação, ainda que não livre de angústia.
Depois de uma pausa arrancou-me aos meus pensamentos gritando: Nunca na minha vida fui tão infeliz! Odeio-me!
Morrer de desespero. A frase veio-me à cabeça e toda a água do quarto se transformou em gelo. (…) Agora a minha amiga guinchava. Oh! Que é isto, que merda é esta.
Era a vida, só isso. A vida que continuava, apesar de tudo. A vida complicada. A vida com que é necessário lidar.
Quando nos cruzamos com alguém com quem ficamos com uma impressão menos boa, raramente sabemos qual é a história daquela pessoa, o que a traumatizou, o que a aflige, até mesmo se disfarçar bem e apresentar um comportamento polido, o que oculta do resto do mundo. Qual é o tormento de cada uma delas? Qual é o tormento de cada um de nós? Na dúvida, é um bom exercício praticarmos a tolerância e a delicadeza, mas nem sempre é fácil.
Não sei quem foi, mas alguém, talvez Henry James, ou talvez não, disse que há dois tipos de pessoas no mundo: as que vendo alguém sofrer, pensam: Isto podia acontecer comigo, e as que pensam: Isto nunca me acontecerá. As primeiras ajudam-nos a sobreviver, as segundas fazem da vida um inferno.
“Qual é o Teu Tormento” é um livro tese em que Sigrid Nunez lista uma série de casos que exemplificam essa ideia de toda a gente carregar um peso e fá-lo seguindo a sabedoria de William Faulkner quando recebeu o Prémio Nobel da Literatura, com as “velhas verdades universais – amor e piedade e orgulho e compaixão e sacrifício.”
O que me atormentou nesta leitura e subsequente avaliação foi ter apreciado a empatia que a autora revela com as suas personagens e não tanto os exemplos escolhidos para ilustrar o seu enunciado, tal como já me tinha acontecido com “O Amigo”, onde também recorre a um artifício que, para mim, desvaloriza a narrativa. Em “Qual é o Teu Tormento”, surge uma meditação sobre temas como a velhice, a solidão, a ficção feminina, o assédio, a perda da beleza física e o luto, havendo também lugar para o tema do fim do mundo.
Cultivar o bem-estar pessoal, aliviar as angústias quotidianas, evitar o stresse: estes tinham-se transformado em alguns dos objetivos mais elevados da nossa sociedade, disse - mais elevados, ao que parece, do que a salvação da sociedade em si mesma. A moda da atenção plena não passava de mais uma distração, disse. É claro que devíamos estar tensos.
Nunez é claramente uma escritora de escritores, enriquecendo a sua exposição com citações de autores consagrados e incluindo referências aos livros que está a ler.
Memória: Precisamos de outra palavra para descrever a forma como vemos acontecimentos do passado que continuam vivos dentro de nós, pensava Graham Greene. De acordo. De acordo também com Kafka. E, ao mesmo tempo, com Camus. O sentido literal da vida é tudo aquilo que fazes para não te suicidares.
Aliás, é escritora e jornalista a amiga da narradora em torno da qual gira esta obra, que já sem esperança de recuperar do cancro, lhe pede que a acompanhe nos últimos dias de vida, até ela ganhar coragem de tomar os comprimidos que lhe garantiriam, como diria Simone de Beauvoir, “uma morte suave”.
Tinha querido ser forte. Tinha querido ter controle. Tinha querido morrer à sua maneira e com o mínimo incómodo possível para o mundo. Tinha querido paz. Tinha querido ordem. Paz e ordem à sua volta era tudo quanto havia desejado. Uma morte tranquila, limpa, até – porque não? – bonita. (…) Era o fim que a minha amiga havia escrito para si própria.
Esta mulher é uma pessoa inteligente e difícil, intimidante e frontal, cerebral até, com uma capacidade implacável de processar o sofrimento, incluindo a hostilidade com a que a filha desde muito nova a brindou.
Queres perdoar tudo, disse a minha amiga, e devias perdoar tudo. Mas descobres que há coisas que não podes perdoar, nem mesmo quando sabes que estás a morrer. E isso transforma-se numa ferida aberta, disse: a incapacidade de perdoar.
Tendo Sigrid Nunez sido assistente de Susan Sontag e vivido com ela quando esta estava a recuperar de uma mastectomia, pergunto-me até que ponto se inspirou nesta intelectual, que apelidou de “monstro de arrogância e indelicadeza”, ao construir esta personagem.
É então que, na segunda parte do livro, as duas amigas se instalam numa casa isolada, a conversar, a ver filmes, com a narradora a cozinhar e a ler-lhe em voz alta, visto que até a paciência para os livros ela perdeu, fazendo lembrar a dinâmica de “O Quarto de Hóspedes” de Helen Garner, ainda que mais pacífica e contida, visto a doente já se encontrar numa fase de aceitação, ainda que não livre de angústia.
Depois de uma pausa arrancou-me aos meus pensamentos gritando: Nunca na minha vida fui tão infeliz! Odeio-me!
Morrer de desespero. A frase veio-me à cabeça e toda a água do quarto se transformou em gelo. (…) Agora a minha amiga guinchava. Oh! Que é isto, que merda é esta.
Era a vida, só isso. A vida que continuava, apesar de tudo. A vida complicada. A vida com que é necessário lidar.
June 10, 2023
Sigrid Nunez has a talent for writing deep introspective works claiming to be novels, but which address so much, presenting them against backgrounds that give gravitas to the matters. The framework here is a writer who has agreed to remain at a friend's side as that friend faces her cancer-driven mortality. But there are so many threads interwoven through an ill-attended lecture, many conversations that end up being meaningful with people who leave the stage soon after, and of course, between the two unnamed protagonists -- conversations about the big issues of today between two friends of such long standing that you'd think they had nothing more to say to one another. Proof of the enduring power of long time friendship.
October 20, 2020
edit: 2 stars because I TRULY cannot remember ONE thing about this book.
I am pleasantly underwhelmed. If this would've been longer, I would have put it down. But it was a quick read. I was just so ... unimpressed. I would consider reading this again though - maybe I missed something?
I am pleasantly underwhelmed. If this would've been longer, I would have put it down. But it was a quick read. I was just so ... unimpressed. I would consider reading this again though - maybe I missed something?
December 2, 2020
I tried to like this but it just seemed like there was no point. Just rambling.
November 26, 2020
I read Nunez's The Friend a few months back and greatly admired it. Ordered What Are You Going Through from the local library and it's also wonderful. It has a quality of wisdom tinged with graceful and generous humour, which is exactly what we need in our strange and disconcerting times.
The book returns to themes of friendship and compassion addressed in the Friend but this time the narrator, a woman with a background in literature and academia, supports an old friend through her final days with terminal cancer and a decision to end her life through euthanasia. The narrator compassionately bears witness to this end of life.
Interestingly the book opens with an account of a public lecture given by the narrator's ex-partner: a male, now older acclaimed literary writer, who is giving forth on the end times of humanity due to climate change etc. in a somewhat prophetic tone. He sees no hope for turning things around and very little redeemable about the crises. The book plays on this tension of finding hope, grace, generosity in the very face of painful endings (the end of a life, perhaps the end of ways in which humanity is living due to climate change). But Nunez doesn't flinch from the pain and terrible consequences of these crises: it isn't panglossian, sentimental or especially nostalgic. If anything she directs gentle but sharp humor at such responses.
Through the shared experiences of the two central women, the compassion and respect that comes through, I think we also see a particularly gendered critique of masculine responses to crises, especially from a certain type of privileged white male (and I'm thinking of myself here) as we process and confront the various catastrophes playing out globally and for which we bear some responsibility.
There's also a fascinating meta reflection weaved through the book in the form of discussions between the women about the significance and value of art and culture, including literary forms, in the midst of all this. Have they wasted their lives in a commitment to literary culture, what difference has it and can it make? It is just a comfort or is it something more. There's no trite or easy answers offered. But for me if there's an answer it's in the qualities of the generous, wise and funny prose. There's a value here that pierces our pretensions and points to something more, something humane (friendship, compassion, care, love) that we can cherish even in the very midst of catastrophe and crises. Oh and also laughter! A wonderful read.
Here's a passage that for me gleams with that vein of wry and humane wisdom that's Nunez's voice for me:
"Golden hour, magic hour, l'heure bleue. Evening when the beauty of the changing sky made us both go still and dreamy. Sunlight falling at an angle across the lawn so that it touched our elevated feet, then moved up our bodies like a long slow blessing, and I found myself a breath away from believing that everything was as it should be. See the moon. Count the stars. There all the time without you: and ever shall be, world without end (Joyce). Infinitely rich, infinitely beautiful. Everything was going to be all right".
The book returns to themes of friendship and compassion addressed in the Friend but this time the narrator, a woman with a background in literature and academia, supports an old friend through her final days with terminal cancer and a decision to end her life through euthanasia. The narrator compassionately bears witness to this end of life.
Interestingly the book opens with an account of a public lecture given by the narrator's ex-partner: a male, now older acclaimed literary writer, who is giving forth on the end times of humanity due to climate change etc. in a somewhat prophetic tone. He sees no hope for turning things around and very little redeemable about the crises. The book plays on this tension of finding hope, grace, generosity in the very face of painful endings (the end of a life, perhaps the end of ways in which humanity is living due to climate change). But Nunez doesn't flinch from the pain and terrible consequences of these crises: it isn't panglossian, sentimental or especially nostalgic. If anything she directs gentle but sharp humor at such responses.
Through the shared experiences of the two central women, the compassion and respect that comes through, I think we also see a particularly gendered critique of masculine responses to crises, especially from a certain type of privileged white male (and I'm thinking of myself here) as we process and confront the various catastrophes playing out globally and for which we bear some responsibility.
There's also a fascinating meta reflection weaved through the book in the form of discussions between the women about the significance and value of art and culture, including literary forms, in the midst of all this. Have they wasted their lives in a commitment to literary culture, what difference has it and can it make? It is just a comfort or is it something more. There's no trite or easy answers offered. But for me if there's an answer it's in the qualities of the generous, wise and funny prose. There's a value here that pierces our pretensions and points to something more, something humane (friendship, compassion, care, love) that we can cherish even in the very midst of catastrophe and crises. Oh and also laughter! A wonderful read.
Here's a passage that for me gleams with that vein of wry and humane wisdom that's Nunez's voice for me:
"Golden hour, magic hour, l'heure bleue. Evening when the beauty of the changing sky made us both go still and dreamy. Sunlight falling at an angle across the lawn so that it touched our elevated feet, then moved up our bodies like a long slow blessing, and I found myself a breath away from believing that everything was as it should be. See the moon. Count the stars. There all the time without you: and ever shall be, world without end (Joyce). Infinitely rich, infinitely beautiful. Everything was going to be all right".
January 27, 2024
"Those writers who believe the way they write is more important than whatever they may write about--these are the only writers I want to read anymore, the only ones who can lift me up."
This is why I love Sigrid Nunez, because she is exactly that kind of writer. This is my 4th book by her and I have loved them all. They are thin on plot, just a basic storyline to speak to the reader. She speaks to me as though we are in conversation. Not only am I interested in her ramblings, I agree with most of them. I have seen and heard the same things and interpret them just as she does.
The story here is our unnamed narrator (who shares a lot of characteristics with the author herself) trying to stay loyal to a dying friend. The friend is also unnamed, and their conversations are sometimes deep, sometimes verging on utter nonsense, but always fascinating.
"And what the movie makes clear is that, if there really was a Supreme Being who had to listen to people's prayers all the time, he would go out of his mind."
Now there's a concept! Agree or not, that sentence will make you think.
Loved, loved, loved this novel.
This is why I love Sigrid Nunez, because she is exactly that kind of writer. This is my 4th book by her and I have loved them all. They are thin on plot, just a basic storyline to speak to the reader. She speaks to me as though we are in conversation. Not only am I interested in her ramblings, I agree with most of them. I have seen and heard the same things and interpret them just as she does.
The story here is our unnamed narrator (who shares a lot of characteristics with the author herself) trying to stay loyal to a dying friend. The friend is also unnamed, and their conversations are sometimes deep, sometimes verging on utter nonsense, but always fascinating.
"And what the movie makes clear is that, if there really was a Supreme Being who had to listen to people's prayers all the time, he would go out of his mind."
Now there's a concept! Agree or not, that sentence will make you think.
Loved, loved, loved this novel.
December 6, 2020
This is a very slim book that took me far too long to finish and I really don't know why. It was sadder than I expected, and a bit disjointed. I didn't do myself any favors taking long breaks between reading. Maybe this is meant to be read in one sitting? 3 stars
February 11, 2021
Meh
Rozczarowanie spore
I ten tytuł koszmarny
Rozczarowanie spore
I ten tytuł koszmarny
October 30, 2020
A perfect follow-up to The Friend and very similar in some ways: again we have the disparate first-person musings of an unnamed narrator compelled to help a friend. In Nunez’s previous novel, the protagonist has to care for the dog of a man who recently killed himself; here she is called upon to help a terminally ill friend commit suicide. The novel opens in September 2017 in the unfamiliar town she’s come to for her friend’s cancer treatments. While there she goes to a talk by an older male author who believes human civilization is finished and people shouldn’t have children anymore. This prophet of doom is her ex.
His pessimism is echoed by the dying friend when she relapses. The narrator agrees to accompany her to a rental house where she will take a drug to die at a time of her choosing. “Lucy and Ethel Do Euthanasia,” the ex jokes. And there is a sort of slapstick joy early in this morbid adventure, with mishaps like forgetting the pills and flooding the bathroom.
As in Rachel Cusk’s Outline trilogy, the voice is not solely or even primarily the narrator’s but Other: her friend speaking about her happy childhood and her estrangement from her daughter; a woman met at the gym; a paranoid neighbor; a recent short story; a documentary film. I felt there was too much recounting of a thriller plot, but in general this approach, paired with the absence of speech marks, reflects how the art we consume and the people we encounter become part of our own story. Curiosity about other lives fuels empathy.
With the wry energy of Jenny Offill’s Weather, this is a quiet novel that sneaks up to seize you by the heartstrings. “Women’s stories are often sad stories,” Nunez writes, but “no matter how sad, a beautifully told story lifts you up.” Like The Friend, which also ends just before The End, this presents love and literature as ways to bear “witness to the human condition.”
Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.
His pessimism is echoed by the dying friend when she relapses. The narrator agrees to accompany her to a rental house where she will take a drug to die at a time of her choosing. “Lucy and Ethel Do Euthanasia,” the ex jokes. And there is a sort of slapstick joy early in this morbid adventure, with mishaps like forgetting the pills and flooding the bathroom.
As in Rachel Cusk’s Outline trilogy, the voice is not solely or even primarily the narrator’s but Other: her friend speaking about her happy childhood and her estrangement from her daughter; a woman met at the gym; a paranoid neighbor; a recent short story; a documentary film. I felt there was too much recounting of a thriller plot, but in general this approach, paired with the absence of speech marks, reflects how the art we consume and the people we encounter become part of our own story. Curiosity about other lives fuels empathy.
With the wry energy of Jenny Offill’s Weather, this is a quiet novel that sneaks up to seize you by the heartstrings. “Women’s stories are often sad stories,” Nunez writes, but “no matter how sad, a beautifully told story lifts you up.” Like The Friend, which also ends just before The End, this presents love and literature as ways to bear “witness to the human condition.”
Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.
January 23, 2023
Damn damn damn…you work, you plan, nothing ever turns out the way it’s supposed to.
This wasn't the right time for me to read a book with the subject matter Death. I wonder if it will ever be.
This wasn't the right time for me to read a book with the subject matter Death. I wonder if it will ever be.
December 5, 2020
This is fantastic - deceptively simple writing that's sharp and funny, insightful and incisive, wise and clear-eyed. Nunez is tackling big topics: death, of course, but also friendship and memory and grief and life. I wasn't completely won over by The Friend or The Last of Her Kind, but this is the book that has convinced me.
January 20, 2021
Sigrid Nunez is such an amazing writer. I loved her previous novel The Friend, and this is every bit as good. I'm gobsmacked at how such a compact book with very little plot can contain so much truth and empathy, how it can encompass so much of humanity, how Nunez can say so much about life and death in our world so succinctly and with so much warmth. To me, that's what sets Nunez apart - the warmth she is able to convey without ever crossing over into sentimentalism. Ultimately I don't know how she does it, but I hope she never stops.
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