Wandering Star

This was my first Le Clezio novel, and I feel tempted to read more. I like the way Le Clezio makes politics personal; in this case the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Even though that is not literally the topic of this novel, it does seem to be at the heart of it.

The story centers mainly around Esther, a young Jewish girl growing up in southern France during the occupation. While the Italians are in charge life is more or less bearable, but once the Germans take over a dark period starts. Le Clezio takes a lot of time (and pages) to describe life in the occupied village, during spring and summer, the lovely nature, the children playing in the fields and at the riverside, the friendships. Life seems almost pretty, were it not that there is a continuous shadow of sentences foreboding great pain and misery in these chapters. When the Italians leave, most of the Jewish people try to flee across the mountains into Italy. Most of them don't make it. For Esther, her life as a refugee starts. She finds great comfort in religion, even if she was raised without it. Years later, she and her mother make it to Palestine, which soon becomes Israel.

The cynical truth is that while Esther thinks she is finding a home, her true and destined home, other people thereby become refugees. During a short moment Esther looks into the eyes of Nejma, a Palestinian girl, on her way to a refugee camp. Nejma is the second, though minor, protagonist of this novel. She arrives at a refugee camp, where she and her people are slowly forgotten by the international community. Her destiny remains unsure.

I thought this novel was very well written, though perhaps a little slow at times, and gave insight into a political conflict at a very individual level. Without putting blame on either party. I would recommend it. ( )

I’ve had a mixed experience with Nobel Prize winners that I’ve recently read. The Piano Teacher by Elfriede Jelinek was challenging to say the least, and Auto-da-Fe by Elias Canetti was bizarre. On the other hand, Beloved by Toni Morrison was a revelation, and The Double by José Saramago was very entertaining. But Wandering Star aroused intense feelings of melancholy about the Arab-Israeli conflict and of anger about international indifference to the persisting plight of refugees all over the world.

J.M.G. Le Clézio was awarded the 2008 Nobel Prize in Literature as an ‘author of new departures, poetic adventure and sensual ecstasy, explorer of a humanity beyond and below the reigning civilization’ – and I bought Wandering Star, the only one of his books available in English, shortly afterwards. Now that I’ve finally read it, I understand why he won the prize.

Alison Kelly’s review at The Guardian explains that Le Clezio wrote experimental fiction in his first phase as an author, but that Wandering Star reverts to using ‘conventional modes of storytelling complete with familiar devices such as characters, settings and plots’. Since I haven’t read any of his unconventional works, I can’t comment on the full scope of this author, but (despite the pedestrian translation) this book shows a writer in great command of his powers. In this novel he has tackled that most intractable of geopolitical issues, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from the point of view of two young girls, both of whom are ‘wandering stars’ in search of a home. Esther is a Jewish refugee in post-Holocaust Europe, and Nejma is a dispossessed Palestinian. Their parallel stories illuminate the anguish of exile.

To read the rest of my review, please visit http://anzlitlovers.wordpress.com/2011/07/10/wandering-star-by-j-m-g-le-clezio/ ( )

I just finished this book last night, and I think it will take a long time to finish absorbing it. First of all, Le Clezio's writing is amazing: sensual, vivid, lyrical. The impressionistic style lends itself well to descriptions of nature and human emotions (there's plenty of both in this book). However, it was a bit frustrating for me to try and get at the historical facts and geographical details from this writing style. I did end up doing a bit of my own research to fill in the gaps. One really interesting aspect of this book is that though the Jewish diaspora, founding of Israel, and subsequent regional unrest are major historical events, the storytellers (two teenage girls) clearly do not understand or appreciate the implications of these events. They are focused on the basics of survival, friendships, young love, etc. Extracting the individual human experience from the historical panorama was brilliant. A very quick compelling read, highly recommended. 4.25 stars ( )

Wandering Star is the story of Esther, a young Jewish girl who has been displaced by the war in Europe during WWll. Eventually, after the war, she emigrates to Palestine, which is soon to become the nation of Israel.

It is also the story of Nejma, a young Palestinian girl who has been uprooted by the conflict that was created by the founding of a new nation in that region.

Even though Esther and Nejma have met only for a brief moment, and were unable to communicate, that moment remains important to both of them for the rest of their lives.

Le Clézio's writing is strong. He does not focus on placing any blame, and tells each girls story in a straight-forward manner without being overly sentimental. Those factors, IMO, make the novel even more powerful than it might have been in the hands of a less skillful writer. ( )

This is one of the titles that came up when I did a search for the subject "journey" in my library catalog. (Journey is the Jan-March theme at Reading Globally.) It was a good read, & as I look back through it while trying to write about it, I think I may need to re-read it - I think there are things I missed the first time around.

The title comes from her father's nickname for the main chararcter, Estrellita (little star) otherwise known as Esther/Helene. In 1943 she and her parents are living in a mountain village in occupied France just north of Italy. Her father is a communist and they don't participate in the religious community, and she has little conscious identity as Jew. The story tells of Esther/Helene's adolescence in the mountain, her escape with her mother Elizabeth over the mountains further into Italy and subsequent illegal immigration to Israel. Esther and her mother travel from one place to another, and it seems nowhere are they wanted. Instead, they are forced to journey on toward Jerusalem, the place they hope will receive and welcome them.

The most poignant encounter takes place after they slip into Israel. Their convoy crosses paths with a group of Palestinians who have been evicted from their homes. Esther & Nejma, a young Palestinian woman, interact briefly before both groups move on. ( )