I am still just dipping my fingers into the world of fiction in general, whether its Arabic or English or any other for the matter of fact. I cannot say that I have built a longing to a certain genre of writing but there is a special place in my heart for coming-of-age novels specially the ones that belong to the 60’s to 80’s era. The amount of curiosity I have about that period is unmatched by any other.
Sigrid Nunez’s “Last of Her kind” novel feeds that curiosity a lot for a part of the world that was shaping itself and possibly many other parts of the planet in those years. The 60’s and 70’s spelled rebellion over there in the US in that time. You feel attached to some of the emotions the characters felt, envy for not feeling the same way when you were at their age, for the good or bad you never know rebellion was not on the table at that age for us in this part of the world.
A lot of what paused me to think revolved around the number of lost opportunities people at that age get exposed to but never take a moment to regret or give second thoughts. Couldn’t push the reflection of what those opportunities could have had on my life if they had presented themselves, or even on the lives of the characters.
But you also come out from the novel with a sense of gratitude that your heart never filled with hatred to that extent towards any person, group, or cause. It further cements the conclusion that you can achieve more with consensus, love, and shared understanding of the root cause of every issue from different points of view than with hatred, blame or self-righteousness.
Good post.