Barbara Gowdy
Paperback | Pages: 336 pages Rating: 3.79 | 3083 Users | 338 Reviews
List Books To The White Bone
| Original Title: | The White Bone |
| ISBN: | 0312264127 (ISBN13: 9780312264123) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Literary Awards: | Scotiabank Giller Prize Nominee (1998), Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize Nominee (1998) |
Commentary Supposing Books The White Bone
A thrilling journey into the minds of African elephants as they struggle to survive.If, as many recent nonfiction bestsellers have revealed, animals possess emotions and awareness, they must also have stories. In "The White Bone," a novel imagined entirely from the perspective of African elephants, Barbara Gowdy creates a world whole and separate that yet illuminates our own.
For years, young Mud and her family have roamed the high grasses, swamps, and deserts of the sub-Sahara. Now the earth is scorched by drought, and the mutilated bodies of family and friends lie scattered on the ground, shot down by ivory hunters. Nothing-not the once familiar terrain, or the age-old rhythms of life, or even memory itself-seems reliable anymore. Yet a slim prophecy of hope is passed on from water hole to water hole: the sacred white bone of legend will point the elephants toward the Safe Place. And so begins a quest through Africa''s vast and perilous plains-until at last the survivors face a decisive trial of loyalty and courage.
In The White Bone, Barbara Gowdy performs a feat of imagination virtually unparalleled in modern fiction. Plunged into an alien landscape, we orient ourselves in elephant time, elephant space, elephant consciousness and begin to feel, as Gowdy puts it, "what it would be like to be that big and gentle, to be that imperiled, and to have that prodigious memory."
Identify Appertaining To Books The White Bone
| Title | : | The White Bone |
| Author | : | Barbara Gowdy |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | Deluxe Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 336 pages |
| Published | : | June 3rd 2000 by Picador USA (first published 1998) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Animals. Cultural. Africa. Canada |
Rating Appertaining To Books The White Bone
Ratings: 3.79 From 3083 Users | 338 ReviewsWeigh Up Appertaining To Books The White Bone
I can't do a "real" review, because it's been too long since I read it, but I wanted to write something. This is a work of fiction that is told from an elephants point of view, as it follows African elephant, Mud, and her family as they navigate perils that befall elephants, including drought and poaching, while they try to find someplace safe.I enjoyed reading this book especially through the perspective of elephants something different and quite good.
Warning: character deaths. These elephants live in a war zone - they are refugees. Massacre is the commonest death. Ive never read a novel that so constructs animal minds the way a science fiction writer constructs alien minds. This is a serious attempt to be inside the head of an elephant. To briefly outline what her elephants are like: they are big balls of emotion, intensely superstitious. Not too idealised half of them are more silly than wise perhaps. (But on idealisation, every species
I just finished a second read of the book (first one in 2003). Reading the book 13 years later, as elephant populations continue to dwindle due to poaching, I found it even more discouraging than I did the first time. It is a unique book - written from the perspective of elephants - and it may not be for everyone. I am a natural history fan and an unmitigated species geek, so appreciated the level of detail and accuracy in terms of elephant life history and behaviour. The author has obviously
I was so disappointed in what I thought would be a great book and clearly I am not in the mainstream with my opinion of this book that so many are giving 5 stars to. The story was quite boring and even in this short book, took too long to tell. Elephants being slaughtered by humans are looking for their promised land. That's it. The song-singing and mythology did not work in this short, linear plot line. Songs, maps, glossaries and family trees should be reserved for epic books and this was not
This is an absolutely fantastic novel. The fact that the author managed to even *attempt* to get into the mind of an African elephant is astonishing. The work itself, however, an epic world of myth, belief, hope, and sacrifice, is what makes it more stunning. And beyond comprehension. In the top five books I've ever read.
Chose to read this for our uni assignment. It opened up another world. It is obvious the author researched the plight of elephants in Africa but she didn't leave off there. Barbara Gowdy created a language befitting the elephants which takes the reader inside the minds of these large animals. A worthwhile read and I recommend The White Bone to all and sundry
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