BOOKS: Madeleine Thien's Do Not Say We Have Nothing
The world behind the words
Some books, in allowing us to glimpse life’s grace, potential and meaning, convey and emote the depth and textures of being. Do Not Say We Have Nothing is an extraordinary novel, filled with shadow and light, replete with contrasting chords of calamitous sound and mournful silence, soulful patience and intense action. China’s tumultuous, tragic 20th-century history is the setting for this epic of fateful personal sorrows. Spanning almost 70 years, from the 1949 civil war pitting communists against nationalists, to the present-day fallout from the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacres, in which possibly thousands were killed, Madeleine Thien has crafted an absorbing, provocative and visionary novel that is worthy of its accolades and nomination for the prestigious Man Booker prize last year. The plot revolves around a family of musicians. The patriarch, Ba Lute, is a dedicated communist soldier, and after the civil war he and his wife, Big Mother Knife, are committed party cadres. Their fa...
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