The long night of the white chickens
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Loading... - Alice Barone
- 14 Jul 2022
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Roger Graetz, the narrator and protagonist, is - like Goldman - the product of two cultures. His mother is the daughter of a Guatemalan aristocratic family; his father, a Jewish American, university and liberal. Roger grew up and was educated in the United States, but he has spent long periods in Guatemala, and he also has friends, a past of teenage adventures, and strong roots in that country. In addition, he has grown up with Flor, a descendant of Mayan Indians, sent from Guatemala when she was thirteen years old to serve as a maid, but who was educated with Roger as one of the family, a beloved and fascinating older sister. Flor, after finishing her studies at an American university, returned to Guatemala in the terrible eighties, the bloodiest days of the military dictatorship and repression.
An exceptional novel, which forces us, with the seduction of the most splendid literature, to listen to voices from beyond our borders, voices stifled for too long» (Ariel Dorfman).
"A gorgeous first novel that is at once the coming-of-age story of a young man who has grown up straddling two cultures, the enigma of an unsolved murder, and a gritty, clever political novel" (Anne Whitehouse, The Atlanta Journal & Constitution ).
«An exceptional debut. Goldman has written a novel of mystery -and of unsolved deaths-, which is also a psychological enigma, a political novel, a family drama and a comedy of manners. Also a love story -several love stories, to tell the truth-, and an oblique, indirect, clever and terrible panorama of Central America in the 1980s» (Wallace Shawn, Village Voice ).
"A great historical and political novel, in the tradition of Joseph Conrad and Graham Greene" ( Vanity Fair ).
“Francisco Goldman synthesizes the literary traditions of two continents in one of the most ambitious debuts in recent years. Funny and sad, wise and full of surprises, The Long Night of the White Chickens is a complex novel that crosses the boundaries of genres and whose action takes place between Boston and Guatemala City, dragging everything in its path" (Jay Mclnerney ).
"An admirable first novel. The effects of tyranny on the human soul are explored with a balanced combination of intensity and grace, intelligence and imagination. I have admired many things in this book that tells an extraordinary story, never didactic, always rich in incidents and human tragedies. Read More…
