africa | SovietMen

A sad and strange history

Posted on November 10, 2020 by Nikolai Vladivostok

Review of I Didn’t Do It for You: How the World Betrayed a Small African Nation by Michela Wrong.

Every place has its story. Every tiny country, every little town has had its bizarre characters, unbelievable coincidences, moments in the spotlight and uncanny sagas that would make for a great novel, or series of novels.

Eritrea is no exception.

If it hadn’t already been taken, a more descriptive title for this book would have been A Series of Unfortunate Events.

Friend or foe? The strange case of J.M. Coetzee

Posted on April 8, 2020 by Nikolai Vladivostok

Book review of Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee, with reference to other books by him and some by Dostoevsky.

I have always felt that I ought to like Coetzee. Ever since I was in uni and the tutor pointed out that one bit in Foe where it seems like Character 1 is knocking on Character 2’s door but if you read carefully it’s the other way around, I’ve had an admiration for linguists like savage Papuans have for sorcerers. This led me to take Noam Chomsky seriously for too long.

But I didn’t actually trouble myself to Read More