Because of the scope of it - all it had to say about the human condition and what we call progress. I loved the inventiveness of it, the way all the voices were so strong and different. I struggled to get into the first two sections but after that, I was away and I thought the two sci fi parts were riveting. And details like the pit with carvings in it that spanned time - it made me think what blips we are in the life of the earth.

I made some notes at the time - I'll see if I can dig them out.

<Added>

Well, rats. I wrote a piece on CA when I was on another, now defunct, site, and it's all disappeared into the ether. But it left me with a kind of fish-eye view of the centuries, and I thought how clever to get all that into one novel. Plus he was making the reader ask whether humanity was ultimately doomed or whether we can redeem ourselves, against the cyclic nature of civilisation.

<Added>

"But it left me" - the novel, I mean.

Well, that sounds like a lot of stuff to cover in just one novel! Very brave of him to set out to do that.
You've convinced me, I'll try it. I was afraid that it was one of those novels that goes for a complicated structure just to impress, not because the story calls for it. I don't like Paul Auster for that reason. (also his obscure, unreasonable characters)
Beloved is complicated but only because it needs to be.

That last sentence sounds like I'm telling you something you already know. I didn't mean it like that, what I meant was that I don't object to complicated structures or writing per se (like Beloved) but I do if it comes across as a form of showing-off.

I know what you mean. But I'd say the same about Cloud Atlas. There's this sense of mankind repeating mistakes and triumphs, and a query over whether time's linear or circular, and that's why the stories are inside other stories. All the conditions belong to all times, and all the stories are ours, if you see what I mean.

Thanks, it sounds great.

Beloved is complicated but only because it needs to be.

As Nick Hornby would say, 'She couldn't get it done any easier'...

I know exactly what you mean. I'm afraid I wimped out of Beloved not because of difficulty, but just as I wimped out of George Rodger's photographs of Belsen-Belsen, though he's one of my favourite photographers. I'm still ashamed of myself.

Emma

We walk a fine line between connecting ourselves with humanity and not shrinking from those in distress, and paralysing ourselves with horror (which is no use to anyone). It's no disgrace, Emma, to know your limits.

I was thinking about this recently, having got inordinately upset about a child-related story in the press (which I can't even bring myself to mention). This might be rubbish, but it struck me that because we are all writers, we construct a narrative around things in our minds. So we don't just hear the details of something terrible - we tend to imagine them in very great detail, including before and after. That might sound a bit pretentious and as though I'm suggesting we are more sensitive or something, but that isn't exactly it...
Does this make sense?

Yes, it is making sense. I think your skin has to be thin, at least in some places, to be a writer - how else would you pick up on the overtones and undertones and odd significances of orndianry life? And how would you convey them?

Funny how one moment you're being a chilly surgeon, dissecting others' passions and distress, and the next you're having to allow yourself to feel such things as nakedly as anyone else.

Emma

Yes, Emma, I know what you mean. I'm a very thin-skinned sort of person, but many times have found myself thinking what a great story someone's distressing situation would make!

I wimped out of George Rodger's photographs of Belsen-Belsen

I visited Dachau once and found it a very difficult experience. I left it not able to talk.
But one thing that struck me is that it is not signposted at all. It's walking distance from the train station (a decent 15 minute walk) but there's nothing to show how to get there. Although we were a bit embarrassed, we asked for directions but of the approx 10 people we asked (in German) none of them was able to tell us where it was even though it was obvious they lived there. I can only imagine how hard it must be for them to have to face that.
Inside the walls it has been converted into a museum and an enormous effort has been made to face the horrific truth of the situation.

I am going mad - I've just posted this on another thread...

George Rodger went and lived and photographed in tribal Africa for five years to recover. And I knew a man whose father was the first English journalist into Dachau. Aparently he went on a five-year bender afterwards.

If you're not deeply damaged before you become a war photographer, you certainly are afterwards.

Emma

If you're not deeply damaged before you become a war photographer, you certainly are afterwards.

Yes. But it's arguably more interesting than photographing wedddings.

That's what a war photographer once said to me. Well, not exactly to me. It was a reading piece in an English Language textbook I was using to teach with. So actually, not to me at all. I'm such a liar.

But it's arguably more interesting than photographing wedddings.

And a damn sight sexier. The chief erotic interest in TMOL is one.

Emma

Right, I'm ordering Beloved off Amazon now! Sounds incredible...