25. Gunter Grass “The Tin Drum”

Nominated by Sinead Morrissey

One Sentence Review-

Best read of the year so far; why has no one tied me to a chair and forced me to read Gunter Grass before?

Extended Review-

The Tin Drum is the best kind of conundrum. Not dissimilar to Rushdie’s magnificent, Midnight’s Children it narrates the history of Poland during the first half of the Twentieth Century through the experiences of a particularly odd and enigmatic man/child. Oskar, the tin drummer of the title, though blessed with the perceptions of an adult, refuses to develop physically beyond his third birthday. His diminutive appearance and a handful of special abilities allow him to form unlikely friendships, thrust him into odd situations and offer his readers slightly askew perspectives on Polish history. Meandering in nature, the novel employs almost every trick in the magic realist cannon to magnificent effect. Subtle wordery, folklore, unreliable narrators, religious symbolism, high culture, politics, history, sexuality and madness are all muddled together to create a novel which both carries itself across the grand scope of fifty years and almost 600 pages and stands up to scrutiny in the minutiae of each, individual sentence. I should have read this years ago.

Sinead also recommends-

Sara Waters “Fingersmith”

Sinead Morrissey lives in Belfast, Northern Ireland. She is a published poet with an amazing gift for capturing the flawed and the beautiful with warm precision. She teaches creative writing at the Seamus Heaney Creative Writing Centre at Queen’s where the calibre of her students testify to her sound advice and encouragement. Sinead Morrissey is a great person to drink coffee with; if you have the good fortune of sharing a conversation, I recommend you bring a notebook.