Friday, May 23, 2008

Talking It Over In The Desert

My personal favourite of Julian Barnes' novels is Talking It Over. It is the story of a ménage a trois, in which the action is unfolded to the reader by the three characters, who deliver only monologues. It is fascinating how differently the same story can be told by three directly involved eyewitnesses.

However, some years ago, I gave this book as a first of many to Tigresa. Some weeks ago, she took it with her to the Sahara. Here is her eyewitness report:

Well, I took it with me to Morocco to read once again. But we began with Tokyo by Mo Hayder (a must read) and read it to each other. One of our guides in he Sahara, Hüsein, was very eager to be educated. His English was good enough to start reading talking it over, and although I felt guilty to hand a western divorce drama over to a muslim Berber, he seemed to enjoy it and liked the character of Oliver in particular.. well, long story short, your book is now in the desert, and I secretly took a picture of Hüsein with the book for you. The other one shows my camel Emelel and me.


2 comments:

Toño said...

Both are real beautiful pics, I love them.

The most interesting thou is Hüsein's hunger of knowing.

Ms Mac said...

I love that picture of Hüsein reading. Fantastic!

Of course, now Julian Barnes is going to be on my list to read one day.