the pencil reads

The cover of this book is so pretty! And the pages have rough jagged edges. That is reason enough to read this.

Published in 1933, this is the first and last time Greene "set out deliberately to write a book to please". And it is quite a pleasing novel. All the action happens on a train rushing towards Constaninople:

In the rushing reverberating express, noise was so regular that it was the equivalent of silence, movement was so continuous that after a while the mind accepted it as stillness. Only outside the train was violence of action possible, and the train would contain him safely with his plans for three days...

The novel is full of such lovely detail and description. The characters are distinct and well-formed for a short novel; the plot substantial.

While pleasing, Orient Express isn't frivolous. It is about class, race, and political differences: yet it is never didactic or forlorn. It simply describes. Greene describes a self-conscious and rich Jew in this novel: it is troubling to read of the safety this Jew felt in Western Europe and to think that this was written in 1931, just a few years before the horrors of the Holocaust. Chilling.

I've read more novels by Japanese authors this last six months than I have in my entire life. The last time I was at Borders, I noticed that it had an entire section dedicated to Japanese authors, including works by Shusaku Endo. I was surprised to find Endo's work so prominently displayed actually, considering he wrote in the 60s and with a predominantly Catholic perspective. Well, as they say, every dog has it's day.

Which leads me to think, when I finally write a novel, my pen name shall be Sukiyaki Go, or perhaps Wasabi Tei. Look out for me okay? :)

Anyway, back to the book. I'm not sure how to write about this book without giving it all away. Mystery is probably the most compelling aspect of this novel, and if I take it away by telling too much, the novel simply does not work.

So I'll simply leave a quote that moved me:

"a new world coming rapidly. More scientific, efficient, yes. More cures for the old sicknesses. Very good. But a harsh, cruel world. And I saw a little girl, her eyes tightly closed, holding to her breast the old kind world, one that she knew in her heart could not remain, and she was holding it and pleading, never to let her go."

And a gripe that Ishiguro does not address religion in this story.

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