My revolutions: A Novel

My revolutions: A Novel

Hari Kunzru



To all at 34.



My revolutions is a book about love. It is about the love that Chris had for Anna Addison. It’s about the love that he wished he had for himself. Up front, it is a political book. It is a political book that traces the killings, bombings and protests in 20^th Century London.


As a student who thought she knew fairly well about what happened in the cold war, I was surprised to see how easy it was for me to overlook complete revolutions that had taken place, revolutions that  real people brought; all of this hidden in plain sight by the all-powerful hegemonous politics of the States and the Soviet Union. There were real people who burned down buildings and real people who fucked to satisfy the thirst of patriarchy that resided within them.


Kunzru has always been my favourite author, even though it almost always takes me at least 3 reads to really get the particulars of his books, I am always, every single time, left with goose bumps. It’s maybe because I relate to his writing, the way his words lurch towards a completely different tangent, mid paragraph, I find myself doing the same more often than I realise. Just like him my words don’t make sense sometimes. I think so at least.


He said, that he doesn’t make a story when he is writing, he said he is writing the words that come to him, “ In whatever order” he said. I think that is what makes his books so much more special. I think, because there is no wall of pretence standing, can he really say what he wants to. Maybe what he said about all capitalists being Pigs was wrong, maybe the fact that he proudly says that Marxists-Leninists will one day rule the world is impractical;


But the way he forced Carver to make that phone call and tell the truth, it shows me that no matter how detached I feel from the book, there will always be some things that I will understand.


Sometimes I feel that like me, he, too, does not know where he is going with his words, but keeps going on because he knows that in the end he will make the right sentences. I do. And he does too. And that is what gives me comfort and hope, a lot of it. Comfort in the fact that I can hate and love and cry as profusely as I want to because in the end I will get the sentences right. He did.


P.S.
This is my second book this year and it falls under the challenge called 'Unread book by an author you love'. I know I am way behind schedule but it's all I can do right now. I'm about to finish another book in a day or so, so look out for the next post!!

P.S.S. I stole the book's font