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A Poet and Bin-Laden: A Reality Novel
Rating: 1.5 out of 5 stars
1.5/5
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The “reality novel” A Poet and Bin-Laden set in Central Asia at the turn of the 21stcentury against a swirling backdrop of Islamic fundamentalism in the Ferghana Valley and beyond, gives a first-hand account on the militants and Taliban’s internal life.
The novel begins on the eve of 9/11, with the narrator’s haunting description of the airplane attack on the Twin Towers as seen on TV while he is on holiday in Central Asia; and tells the story of an Uzbek poet Belgi, who was disappointed in the authoritarian regime in Uzbekistan and became a terrorist in the eyes of the world. His journey begins with a search for a Sufi spiritual master and ends in guerrilla warfare, and it is this tension between a transcendental and a violent response to oppression, between the book and the bomb, between Archipelago GULAG and modern Central Asia and Afghanistan, that gives the novel its specific poignancy.
In this book Hamid Ismailov masterfully intertwines fiction with documentary and provides wonderfully vivid accounts of historical events such as the siege of Kunduz, the breakout from Shebergan prison and the insurgency in the Ferghana Valley as witnessed by the Byronian figure of Belgi, who enters the inner sanctum of al-Qaeda, and ultimately meets Sheikh bin Laden himself.
The novel begins on the eve of 9/11, with the narrator’s haunting description of the airplane attack on the Twin Towers as seen on TV while he is on holiday in Central Asia; and tells the story of an Uzbek poet Belgi, who was disappointed in the authoritarian regime in Uzbekistan and became a terrorist in the eyes of the world. His journey begins with a search for a Sufi spiritual master and ends in guerrilla warfare, and it is this tension between a transcendental and a violent response to oppression, between the book and the bomb, between Archipelago GULAG and modern Central Asia and Afghanistan, that gives the novel its specific poignancy.
In this book Hamid Ismailov masterfully intertwines fiction with documentary and provides wonderfully vivid accounts of historical events such as the siege of Kunduz, the breakout from Shebergan prison and the insurgency in the Ferghana Valley as witnessed by the Byronian figure of Belgi, who enters the inner sanctum of al-Qaeda, and ultimately meets Sheikh bin Laden himself.
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Reviews for A Poet and Bin-Laden
Rating: 1.4375025000000001 out of 5 stars
1.5/5
8 ratings6 reviews
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5I feel duty-bound to write a few words about this novel having received a free copy via Early Readers. However, when my copy arrived and I opened it, my heart sank deeper than my boots as I realised I was unlikely to plough my way through such a profoundly difficult, almost impenetrable read.I am glad to see, reading other LT reviews, I am not alone in struggling. If I have done the author an injustice, then I hope he will realise it is also my shallowness and bewilderment, (i.e. not entirely his fault) that his book remains largely unread by me. I will try again one day, but I won't promise when that day may be.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I won't provide a summary of the plot, as other reviewers have already done this more than adequately. I, too, had problems with maintaining my interest, despite really wanting to read a book by an Uzbek writer about such topical, interesting, and serious issues. However, the narrative drive is missing; the characters were not given enough space to live fully on the page; there was too much exposition, not enough dialogue. I like experiments in fiction, and appreciate an author's attempt to do something different. Unfortunately, this mixture of fiction and non-fiction styles did not work for me, perhaps because there was not enough art-making and too much journalistic style? Thanks very much to the publisher for the opportunity to read this book, and I will try it again at another time.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I wanted to like this book better than I did. It appears to be two things juxtaposed. It's a fictional account of the poet Belgi's flight from Uzbekistan in the late 1990s; he ends up involved with the Taliban in Tasjikistan. This part on its own I might have read and enjoyed for its portrayal of men caught up in politics and the rise of Islamicism. But it is interspersed with (purported? real?) documents (transcripts, press releases, . . .) and I found the form jarring and confusing. Jarring in that the reader is tossed from narrative to dry reports and back again. And confusing because it's hard to tell what is "real" and what is "fiction."I know this could give rise to interesting discussions about reliable versus unreliable narrators, but I simply don't have the energy to plow through this one.For some it will be worth reading for its portrayal of individuals and the wave of Islamicism; anyone who doesn't know the history & culture of Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan in particular, will find it confusing without some reference material to set the context.1.75 stars
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5I had high hopes for this book. There is material here aplenty that could be turned into a very interesting, readable and valuable novel. Instead we have a very dry, near impossible to follow collection of accounts and transcripts. He said this, he said that, he said this etc. This read far more like a text book than a novel. If you are already familiar with the Uzbekistan Islamic movement you may get something from this book. Otherwise it is likely going to go well over your head like it did mine. I do have to say that some of the writing was wonderful. If 95% of the material could be dropped and a story weaved from what is left I would happily read that book.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5In these paranoid times any book with Bin Laden in the title is bound to draw a second glance. And some at least of the Taliban hark back to the eighteenth century effloresence of Urdu and Persian poetry as an example of Islamic culture before its contamination by the west.But this is not what this dense and complex novel is about. Rather, Ismailov blends reportage, fiction and magic reality to paint a portrait of the impact of the events of 09/11 and the subsequent war in Afghanistan on the peoples of central Asia where corrupt post-Soviet regimes were maintained in power as an act of political expediency by the west.It is a dispriting story of false friends, arbitrary arrests, the suppression of a cultural life just begining to re-establish itself in a post Soviet thaw, and the rise of fundamentalism in central Asia in the post communist ideological vacuum - at times Bulgakov, at times Gabriel Garcia Marquez.This not the easiest novel to read. But it is an important one. Bounded by Russia to the north, China to the east and Iran to the south,Central asia and Afghanistan have immense strategic significance, yet we know little of this region. This novel lets us understand the impact of the post Soviet changes and the war in Afghanistan on this turbulent region.
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5A Poet and Bin-Laden is a fairly impenetrable book. It's further muddled by the intertwining of fact and fiction when I think that it would have been better served either being a factual account of the rise of Islamic Fundamentalism in the former Soviet Central Asian republics or a fictional piece about Belgi/Yosir. Even reading it with my iPad nearby to look up historical facts or people that were touched upon in the narrative, I was often lost. I pushed through to the end because there is something important here in this book, but it is so wrapped up in the decomposition of fact versus fiction that while I can see there is something hidden in the prose, I just can't get myself there.Some of the scenes are quite moving - such as the final scene with Belgi, but for the most part, it is just a dry and confusing account of an area of the world that would benefit from having a clearer exposition.The second part is unnecessary. I'm sure it is an allegory in some way about the first part, but I was not clever enough to figure out exactly how. It is extraneous to the narrative except to demonstrate that Islamic Fundamentalism has always been an issue in Central Asia, but that could be detailed in one sentence; the reader hardly needs forty additional pages to detail that.Finally, one last go-through by a good editor was probably needed. The book is dotted with odd carriage returns breaking up the middle of paragraphs, small typos, and differences in spelling (for example, in the last section, Dekkan is spelled both as Dekkan and Dekan and occasionally the last a in Dara is left out).
Book preview
A Poet and Bin-Laden - Hamid Ismailov
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