[.ca] Meatless Days (ISBN 0226779815)

Too academic:
This has got to be one of the most difficult books to read. It was like swimming through a river of debris. Now and then there would be some clarity in her prose. Overall, it was way too obtuse for my taste.

Masterful!:
This memoir is simply gorgeous. Suleri's utterly intoxicating account of growing up in Pakistan is one of the best examples of post colonial literature. Meatless Days captures the dizzying complexities self, family and nation in prose that is as lovely as it is heartbreaking.

Excellent:
Sara Suleri's memoir is a wonderful example of the kind of literary production our faculty memebers should be producing--inspired, original, and compelling. Her non-academic writing, like her literary criticism, moves me to believe there are still people in the academy who understand what it is all about. Suleri is definitely more cerebral than a lot of more mainstream novelists of the subcontinent, and that is to be expected. It is part of this memoirs charm that there is a pull between her intellectual curiosities/asides and the more narrative moments of pathos. This book does exactly what a memoir *should* do--it represent memories as the palimpsests that they are, all the while communicating the lingering feeling that the author associates with them. Really, a wonderful book.

Complex, but very rewarding:
I spent an entire week on Meatless Days, having picked it up after reading one of the book's chapters in an anthology of Indian writing. As a teenager, I'd just like to share my views about the book. Do note that it wasn't part of any required reading list, so I wasn't forced to complete it, nothing like that. Calling it her memoirs might not be completely accurate, because Ms Suleri has stated that not everything in the book actually happened, ie she did make up some of the events. However, she does insist that the language is a true reflection of the way in which she thinks, and speaks. If she is to believed, I think that makes her quite an extraordinary woman. Of all the Sub-Cont. writers whom I've read, no other writer quite matches up to the complexity of her language, and the intricacy with which she readily assembles metaphors for largely universal concepts such as 'the enigma of arrival' (to borrow a Naipaulian title) and gender in the Indian/Pakistani home. Her writing is a joy to 'decode', and it really amazed me how she often drops hints of a certain image early in a chapter only to develop it beautifully many paragraphs later. I found myself intrigued by her style. This is a book that requires, and deserves utmost concentration in the reading. Missing out on a single conceit might render whole sentences incomprehensible to the less-attentive reader. I actually plan to re-read Meatless Days, just to enjoy it from the perspective of someone who has already made initial acquaintance. I do recommend re-reading it to most who've have the opportunity to finish this book once. I also enjoyed Ms Suleri's fresh, and often satirical insights to such things as deaths, mourning, religion, and family. She certainly does put across her arguments very interestingly, and evocatively. There is a paragraph in which she cannot locate the graves of her mother and Ifat, and decides to leave the cemetery altogether, because she doesn't want to disrupt them from their restful peace. Not something that the reader might agree with, but the beauty of the book is that nothing is forced down the reader's throat. Ms Suleri certainly doesn't come across as someone who is philosophising at all. Very highly recommended!

A truly great book:
An evocative and moving memoir that was sometimes painful but ultimately very rewarding to read. Absolutely one of the best books I've ever read.