This was the first book that I'd lined up to read for my project: 1974's best-selling, 1000+ page -long book (mine, the edition pictured above, came in at just over 900 pages - not sure what's up with different edition lengths). It's a beast. It made me question whether the task I've undertaken is physically possible within given time constraints.
The fact that it took me a week and a half to finish it proves that this is going to be tough on occasion. However, I've already started the next book and, as it comes in at an comparatively cute 300 pages, I feel like the scales will balance out in the long run.
I knew nothing about this book going in, though I remember seeing his book Hawaii on my parents' bookshelf when I was younger. I tried not to learn anything about Centennial before picking it up from the library, but I did catch the word "sprawling" in a synopsis.
Well, yeah, that's a good word for it. Any sprawling epic that begins with the Earth's formation has already got my respect and attention. Moving through the emergence of life, dinosaurs, horses, and beavers before settling in to offer story after story of people who share connections through generations, either familial, geographical, or circumstantial, Michener spins a tale so broad in scope yet with such specific characters that it's quite unlike anything else I've read.
Oh, he has problems with being a white man embodying the spirit of several different cultures, but as least he paints American cowboys with as much caricature as he does Mexican cooks. It also seems pretty clear that he respects all of the peoples that he's writing about, and his research doesn't scream out any lack of depth - he's just prone to using what were surely worn-out stereotypes even in 1974.
The stories, though, are king, and after spending so much time in his world I found myself a little sad to close the last chapter. I don't have any time over the next year, but I'll look forward to diving into another work of his later on. Might as well be Hawaii.
No comments:
Post a Comment