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About the author and blogger ...

Anne Goodwin’s drive to understand what makes people tick led to a career in clinical psychology. That same curiosity now powers her fiction.
A prize-winning short-story writer, she has published three novels and a short story collection with small independent press, Inspired Quill. Her debut novel, Sugar and Snails, was shortlisted for the 2016 Polari First Book Prize.
Away from her desk, Anne guides book-loving walkers through the Derbyshire landscape that inspired Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre.
Subscribers to her newsletter can download a free e-book of award-winning short stories.

TELL ME MORE

Migration past and present

8/6/2017

6 Comments

 
It’s my pleasure to introduce two recently published short novels about westward migration. The historical perspective of the first, driven by the aftermath of the Second World War, and the allegorical style of the second, with a contemporary and/or future orientation, shine a hopeful light on a phenomenon currently depressingly exploited by right-wing politicians. These novels remind us that no society is ever static and, wherever we are positioned on the immigration issue, humans and the communities we build are highly adaptive.

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The Photographer by Meike Ziervogel

Agatha, a dressmaker, harbours great ambitions for her daughter, Trude. So she’s far from happy when the girl becomes involved with Albert, a flirtatious photographer “from the gutter”. Despite her opposition, the relationship thrives: the couple marry and establish a successful business. But their son, Peter, enjoys
trading secrets with his grandmother. When he tells her his parents listen to the Black Radio – and even dance to a satirical anti-Hitler song to the tune of “Lili Marlene” – she takes that knowledge to the police. Having avoided conscription so far, Albert is packed off to the military. The war ends and, along with thousands of others, Agatha, Trude and Peter embark on an uncomfortable journey to the west to finally settle in a refugee camp near Hamburg. There they must learn to build their life anew.

Although set against a backdrop of terrible turmoil during and after the Second World War, The Photographer is a quiet novel about migration, family and life’s inevitable ups and downs. The voice, which flutters between points of view, is simple and understated, which suits the scenes showing Trude and Peter as children but at times I found it overly distancing from the main events. However, it works wonderfully in a later scene in which Albert recalls a disturbing task he undertook on behalf of the military in exchange for an extra bowl of soup. The memory comes upon him like a
PTSD flashback, merging with an activity in the here and now, and providing the reader with a possible explanation for his belligerence when he finally rejoins the family in the refugee camp. Zooming in on the what, the reader is left to ponder why Albert must spend several moonless nights raking the soil until the horrific reveal.

As the publisher of Peirene Press, Meike Ziervogel brings (translated) European novellas to Anglophone readers. Her own fourth novel, published by Salt who provided my review copy, is in a similar vein. I don’t think it tells us anything new about the experience of ordinary Germans during the Second World War, it’s an important story that needs to be continually retold, especially now as civilisation seems to have slipped into reverse gear.

Exit West by Mohsin Hamid


In an unnamed city, presumably in the Middle East, Nadia and Saeed meet at an evening class and develop a relationship. He lives with his parents and prays at least once a day; she, craving independence, lives alone and wears the black robe not for conservative or religious reasons but to discourage unwanted attention. Against the backdrop of social and economic disintegration as the country collapses into a brutal civil war, they become closer, considering marriage until escape into the West becomes a higher priority. At this point, the novel, like its characters, changes direction (p69-70):

Rumours had begun to circulate of doors that could take you elsewhere, often to places far away, well removed from this death trap of a country. Some people claimed to know people who knew people who had been through such doors. A normal door, they said, could become a special door, and it could happen without warning, to any door at all.


I initially read this as a metaphor for migration which, of course, it can’t be otherwise. But within the logic of the novel the doors are genuine portals to a safer space, bringing a layer of magic realism to the gritty tale of burgeoning love within an atmosphere of murder and mayhem. On paying their dues to people traffickers, the young lovers find themselves on the other side of one such door at a refugee camp in Mykonos. From there they make it to London, squatting with migrants from all nations in a luxury apartment block, supported by some “nativists” and the brunt of hostility from others.

Yet this is a surprisingly optimistic tale of identity, migration and adaptation. Both locals and migrants find ways to accommodate to the new reality, although not without some losses on both sides. Differences in their views on sex, religion and loyalty to their native country drive a wedge between Nadia and Saeed.

Narrated in simple language, Nadia and Saeed’s story is interspersed with short glimpses of the lives of unnamed others around the world. Assuming some connection with the overall narrative but failing to find this initially, or even to keep the fragments in mind, I found this an irritation until the final assertion that “We are all migrants through time”, a profound and original conclusion to this quirky parable about our modern world. Thanks to Hamish Hamilton for my review copy.

For my reviews of other novels about migration see
The Spice Box Letters; Born on a Tuesday; The Defections; The Fortunes; These Are The Names. For short stories, see breach.
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Her grandmother’s migration from Nazi Germany as a young child has shaped the character of Liesel, the girlfriend of Steve, the narrator my second novel,
Underneath. It’s one of the few themes I haven’t (yet) written about for the blog tour, now nearing the end. But you can check out other posts on Steve’s disturbance, the dynamics of his family and the importance of the cellar in the dual meaning of “underneath”, as well as reviews and author Q&As, by clicking on the image.
Thanks for reading. I'd love to know what you think. If you've enjoyed this post, you might like to sign up via the sidebar for regular email updates and/or my quarterly Newsletter.
6 Comments
Susan Osborne link
9/6/2017 02:11:18 pm

Great post, Anne. I agree, wholeheartedly, that these are stories that need to be 'continually retold'.

Reply
Annecdotist
12/6/2017 05:59:21 pm

Thanks, Susan, and I have another couple on the theme of my TBR shelf, as I imagine you have too.

Reply
Charli Mills
10/6/2017 06:05:50 pm

How interesting these two books are in comparison: the more historic event and the closer to current events. Yet we need both as you wisely point out: "it’s an important story that needs to be continually retold, especially now as civilisation seems to have slipped into reverse gear." We need to hear the modern stories to gain better understanding and not lose the perspective of past events, as well.

Reply
Annecdotist
12/6/2017 06:50:25 pm

Given how hopeless we seem to be about learning from the past there’s a lot to be said for opening up our thinking through imagining a different future. Not sure I think we’ll get one, though.

Reply
Norah Colvin link
11/6/2017 12:37:26 pm

Interesting books, Anne. I always enjoy your reviews and reflections. Thanks for the reminder of "Underneath" too. I had to put reading on hold for a few days, so must get back to it. I am always in awe of the reading you do, while still maintaining a writing schedule. Talk about power reading and writing.

Reply
Annecdotist
12/6/2017 05:58:02 pm

Thanks, Norah, but it doesn’t feel an effort to me. With no social life, right in the day and reading the evenings. Sorted!

Reply



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