Reading 1001 discussion

Finished this one like a week ago, I ended up giving it 3 stars. I did find the execution quite a bit drier than I was hoping for, but I thought the structure and idea were novel, so I settled on 3 instead of 2.

The fact that the book largely fictionalized everything about the historical Khazars didn’t really bother me, because the book was really about how different cultures see the same events and other cultures through entirely different lenses. The structure of having a Christian, Muslim, and Jewish account of their history was a cool idea. I’m not sure about the “male” vs “female” version though. I’ve read the changed passage in both, and I get that it serves the purpose about how one changed decision can change the outcome of the future. The actual change didn’t seem that significant to the book though and makes me feel like this was largely done as a marketing ploy for novelty points.

Overall I’d say it was fine: cool structure idea, little boring in experience.

****

If you're a fan of Borges or Eco, then this is your territory. And the territory here is the medieval trading empire of Khazaria, nestled between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea and extending in southern Ukraine, parts of Russia and Kazakhstan. Not a whole lot is known about the Khazar culture (there are no existing documents in their language) or the details of their history. It is in this speculative environment that Pavic weaves his dictionary from three sources that would have contributed to the development of the Khazars history: the Greek (or christianity), the Islamic and the Jewish. But the dictionary becomes embued with fiction as we see the evolution through time of the theories about the Khazars from the repeated contacts of semi-evil characters, up to the 20th century. There is a bit of mystery à la Eco, some poetic passages; the story and the overall picture builds up gradually as you go through each of the sections. I've only read the feminine version (my copy didn't have both versions), but I take Amanda's word for the meaning of the changed section.

Myth and fantasy meet in the history of the fictional Khazar people who lived somewhere in central Europe and were wiped out – or perhaps assimilated – after representatives from the three major monotheistic religions competed to convert them to their faith.

The story - if it is a story rather than a fictional study - leaks out from descriptions of characters, actions, and dreams told from three different points of view in the three sections of the book: Christian, Muslim and Jewish.

I struggled when trying to read this in a linear way. I got on much better dipping in and out. I did read the three parts separately in the same order they appear in print, but I moved around within each part.

There are two versions of the book, known as female and male editions. There’s a big deal about one vital paragraph being different in the two. I had the female edition, and I looked up the male version online. I didn’t really get why the difference was so significant, but perhaps that was because I wasn’t reading in a straight line.