I’ve been a bit quiet on the blogging front recently. I’ve started a new training course, adding a qualification for my day job, so time has been a bit pressured to say the least. I am delighted to say that I HAVE been reading though, and keeping on track with the Booker shortlist, so I have a few banked and ready for review. I wrote about If I Survive You a couple of weeks ago, a book I enjoyed, but can’t say I was wowed by. The next book on my list was This Other Eden by American author Paul Harding. This is Harding’s third novel in thirteen years, so he is not as prolific as some, but his debut novel, Tinkers, won the Pulitzer Prize in 2010.
This Other Eden is set on the fictional Apple Island, just off the coast of Maine, during the late nineteenth/early twentieth century. Apple Island is home to a small and quite insular community. Most are of mixed ethnic origins. The islanders are marginalised and keep themselves very much to themselves and there exists a mutual suspicion between them and the authorities on the mainland. Although financially poor and living without modern conveniences, there is a kind of purity to the way of life on the island. The people live modestly but are relatively self-sufficient and are untroubled by “normal” social conventions and behaviour.
The sense of ‘idyll’ comes under threat, however, when community and religious leaders on the mainland begin to express concern about what they perceive as the uncivillised way of life on Apple Island. At first they dispatch a young teacher, Matthew Diamond, to the island to educate the children in basic reading, writing, arithmetic and, most importantly, religious instruction. Over time, Matthew Diamond finds he grows fond of the children and finds a few of them to be unexpectedly talented, in art, mathematics and literature.
The mainland authorities are not satisfied by simply sending a teacher to support the children; it is as if they feel their own way of life, the social standards they are attempting to uphold, are gravely threatened by the islanders whom they see as little better than savages in their midst, particularly the adults. Soon enough, a party of experts is sent to examine the island’s inhabitants, take physical measurements and so on, as if this will indeed determine (confirm?) the extent of moral decrepitude present in the population. There is indeed some inbreeding, the history of the community is troubled, but the treatment of the islanders by the authorities, juxtaposed with their gentleness and love, invites the reader to question who is the more savage. Needless to say, it does not end well for the islanders, there is a certain inevitability building throughout the book.
This is a powerful and affecting novel and is based on real historical events which took place on Malaga Island in 1911 when an entire community was evicted from its settlement. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and listened to it on audio.
Recommended.
Julia's books 