Reading the World discussion

The book originally selected is not available in English. This second book for the month is a personal choice for each reader. Please post here what you read and the country it fills. We all love getting great ideas!

I am going to read A Stone is Most Precious Where it Belongs which I managed to find in the shared state library. I am also attempting to check off São Tomé and Principe with either Equator or Chocolate Islands: Cocoa, Slavery, and Colonial Africa

They sound good! I'm going to do "A Stone..." as well. And my open choice is for Kuwait - The Book Censor's Library

I started The Book Censor's Library today and am loving it! I've already determined that I would be considered a "traitor" because of all the attributes listed to get a book banned - well, I break the cardinal rule: Do NOT interpret. I think I have 30% of the first four chapters highlighted!

GailW wrote: "I started The Book Censor's Library today and am loving it! I've already determined that I would be considered a "traitor" because of all the attributes listed to get a book banned - well, I break ..." Sound great----I've requested a copy.

K wrote: "Sound great----I've requested a copy - ..."

I finished it very early this morning. Couldn't put it down. Has some vibes of Fahrenheit 451 but a much broader politcal description in this one. The ending is not a "feel good" but is appropriate to the entire storyline I believe. Hope you like it I gave it a 5. Any book that ends with me being incredulous and swearing in that incredulity (is that a word?) deserves a 5 in my "rules"...

Gail wrote: "I am going to read A Stone is Most Precious Where it Belongs which I managed to find in the shared state library. I am also attempting to check off São Tomé and Principe with either..."

I read that "Chocolate Islands" book and I thought it was quite good from a history perspective if you are thinking of reading that one, Gail.

For myself, I did read The Circle of Karma this week, and thought it was quite good and very much a book explicitly about Bhutan and it's religious culture. I'll add more thoughts later this month : )

Amanda wrote: "Gail wrote: "I am going to read A Stone is Most Precious Where it Belongs which I managed to find in the shared state library. I am also attempting to check off São Tomé and Princip..."

I'm glad you got to read The Circle of Karma. I just tried again on Internet Archive and it doesn't even show as an option that I'm not permitted to access. It's really strange. I can buy a brand new one from a bookstore in Colorado for $249.00 plus shipping through abebooks or a used book in "good condition" for $30.00.

I think I'm going to pass on this one unfortunately. So, yes, I'll read "vicariously" through yours notes as you post them! I'll also look into Chocolate Islands for later. Thanks for the rec there as well.

The Circle of Karma:

It's too bad this book isn't more widely accessible, because, as I mentioned above, this book really is kind of perfect for what we are looking for in this group as far as books that do give a window into the country they are about. 

This novel feels predominately about two major themes: Bhutanese interpretations of Buddhism and how that becomes that prevailing sociocultural force in most Bhutanese lives, and Patriarchal expectations in Bhutanese culture and how that unfairly shapes the lives of women. 

The basic plot follows the life of Tsomo, from her adolescence in an agricultural Bhutanese village until the death  of her mother, through her pilgrimage to light Buddhist butter lamps at notable temples to help move her mother's spirit from the Bardo (something of a Buddhist purgatory), which leads her across the country and through areas like Ladakh into India where she marries a 'mystic' and makes a semi-notable and affluent living by making tourist bags using traditional Bhutanese Thagzo weaving  (which I've looked up and is gorgeous and considered a big cornerstone of Bhutanese culture and pride), this goes wrong and eventually her house is burgled and she becomes destitute again, becomes a Buddhist monk, and returns to Bhutan where she spends her waning years living in someone's garage and reflecting on the Buddhist notion of 'emptiness'.

In this, the title and the plot structure reflect the Buddhist idea that intentional actions 'karma' drive the future and cycle of rebirth (while Tsomo's life is just one life without reincarnation, the rise and fall and return her life takes somewhat mirrors this). 

In the beginning of the book, there is an unwed mother in her village who has a pre-birth ceremony for her baby that is given in great detail about symbols painted on mats, words said by monks, and even a dough effigy made to stand in for her baby's father who will not claim the child (Tsomo's mother had such a ceremony for her before she later married Tsomo's  'father'). Tsomo, who has something like 13 siblings (not all have lived past infancy or childhood), also has a brother who is a monk in the first temple she makes a pilgrimage to and his devotional life is given in great detail as well. It felt very educational on Bhutan's predominate Mahayana Buddhism and it's strong focus on ritual, symbolism, mantras, ritual, and mysticism that feels much more disciplined and specific than I think the average Western vague Zen-Buddhism inspired view of Buddhism tends to be. 

But, underneath that, it feels very human as well. Tsomo's village friend has very understandable young-women's feelings of embarrassment but trying to rally pride about her ceremony. Tsomo and her friends talk about desire for boys and what their lives as wives and mother's, if they become them, will be like, and try to give each other pep talks in really universal and believable ways. The village is full of gossip. Her brother is devoted to enlightenment and tries to let go of his mortal attachments, but they miss each other terribly and hug and talk for hours when re-united. The humanity of the work gives you a sense that any faith really is just often part of the fabric of what cultural life is like for real human beings who live real lives anyway.

 It also demystifies Bhutan in a lot of ways, I feel. What little outsiders often no about it is the romantic 'still living traditional Kingdom with gross domestic happiness' (I'll admit to having been this person before learning more about their Hindu minority refugees this year). In the beginning, Tsomo's life in the village does feel somewhat mystical and out of time: the family has the largest house in the village because of number of children, not income. Her father is a 'successful' man because of his perceived religious learning and devotion, which he does not seem to share in care for his wife and children in practical ways. They work the land largely without him to live (as someone who grew up under North American Capitalism, all of this seemed so unusual and novel to me). As a girl, Tsomo is told she couldn't possibly understand the enlightenment and literate life he does. Life is full of harvest and ritual. It's almost jarring when you hear, after Tsomo's mother dies and she leaves the village, that many pilgrims are in Bhutan and leaving Tibet because the "communists have captured it and do not allow Buddhism anymore", which places the start in the 1950s.  It felt weird at first to have her then discuss trucks and plastic bottles.

Life on the land is difficult and unromantic (though social rich), so is finding functional things like food and shelter, and actual money, on her pilgrimages (which in some ways I thought undermines her inherent faith in the idea of the emptiness and non-materialism of things, but that's just my beliefs). There are some great send ups about how her 'common' weaving skill in her village becomes 'holy' and fetishized by hippy tourists and Indian hipsters later on (in what I'm assuming is the 60s), and how the nonsense spouted by her 'enlightened' husband seems to reflect a long chain of abuse of Buddhist principles by many man across cultures who are far from enlightened. Near the beginning of the novel, Tsomo notes that the Mahayana practice of Chöd- which involves tantric rituals around places like graveyards to 'cut through the ego' to perceive the emptiness of things and access enlightenment- was conceived of by a woman- the nun Machig Labdrön, and therefore, why should she be subjected to any double standards for women in faith and life? 

I know I wrote a lot here, but for it's simple and clear prose style, it felt like a dense book that taught me a lot of things and looked at female liberation from a novel Buddhist values angle. I gave it 4 stars. If it becomes more accessible to others, I do deeply recommend reading it. 

Thank you so much Amanda. I really appreciate the time you put into writing this review. I will start a wider search for the book. I can usually find almost anything if I go out to the university libraries, you just can not tell when they will give you access.

Gail wrote: "Thank you so much Amanda. I really appreciate the time you put into writing this review. I will start a wider search for the book. I can usually find almost anything if I go out to the university l..."I agree, great review and I thought the book was quite good. It showed both her internal life of observing and questioning and the struggle to meet basic needs of food,etc. in such a subsistence economy. Also how Bhutan is landlocked and people migrate/travel and interact w/neighboring cultures.

Gail wrote: "Thank you so much Amanda. I really appreciate the time you put into writing this review. I will start a wider search for the book. I can usually find almost anything if I go out to the university l..."

Good luck with your search! It was a good book.

Also great point K about how geography of Bhutan in this case does lend to cultural interactions.

Amanda wrote: "Gail wrote: "Thank you so much Amanda. I really appreciate the time you put into writing this review. I will start a wider search for the book. I can usually find almost anything if I go out to the..." And of course, Patriarchy w/ a capital P!

Yes, alas, always that too.

Gail W---and all---Are you reading "The Book Censor's Library"? I've finished it----OK,I also saw a community theatre production of "Fahrenheit 451" recently,too. lol, my bad & subversive

K wrote: "Gail W---and all---Are you reading "The Book Censor's Library"? I've finished it----OK,I also saw a community theatre production of "Fahrenheit 451" recently,too. lol, my bad & subversive"

I did! Didn't I put anything here? I have to check. I gave it a 5. The vibes so completely fit today's life here that it sometimes scared me.
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

I finished reading Equator and as I had already read Chocolate Islands: Cocoa, Slavery, and Colonial Africa, I was able to see what was non-fiction and what was pure fiction in this novel about Sao Tome and Princípe. If you have not "done" Sao Tome and Principe, Equator is a good option for you. Both books are about the British investigation and ultimate boycott of the superior quality chocolate coming from Sao Tome and Principe, small islands off the coast of Africa under Portuguese colonial rule. The investigation is around whether the Portuguese are using slave labor to grow, harvest and process their cocoa. The Main Character in Equator is the Governor of the islands. The king has asked him, a shipping merchant and essayist who has used his pen to fight slavery and conservatism, to put into action what he has been writing about. There is also a British consul and his beautiful wife who the Governor starts an affair with. So, the romance gets all entangled with whether the laborers actually have the ability to leave when their contract is up. Illiterate, do they even know what their contract said? Having been forced out of Angola, would they really even want to go back there only to be rounded up again? It is a very interesting book and the romance adds some spice to the mix.

Gail wrote: "I finished reading Equator and as I had already read Chocolate Islands: Cocoa, Slavery, and Colonial Africa, I was able to see what was non-fiction and what was pure ..."---Thanks, Gail. I just requested "Equator" & lookin' fwd. to it.