paperback, 384 Seiten
Sprache: English
Am 10. Juli 2016 von Grove Press veröffentlicht.
The Sympathizer is the 2015 debut novel by Vietnamese American professor Viet Thanh Nguyen. It is a best-selling novel and recipient of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Its reviews have generally recognized its excellence, and it was named a New York Times Editor's Choice.The novel fits the expectations of a number of different novel genres: immigrant, mystery, political, metafiction, dark comedic, historical, spy, and war. The story depicts the anonymous narrator, a North Vietnamese mole in the South Vietnamese army, who stays embedded in a South Vietnamese community in exile in the United States. While in the United States, the narrator describes being an expatriate and a cultural advisor on the filming of an American film, closely resembling Platoon and Apocalypse Now, before returning to Vietnam as part of a guerrilla raid against the communists. The dual identity of the narrator, as a mole and immigrant, and the Americanization …
The Sympathizer is the 2015 debut novel by Vietnamese American professor Viet Thanh Nguyen. It is a best-selling novel and recipient of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Its reviews have generally recognized its excellence, and it was named a New York Times Editor's Choice.The novel fits the expectations of a number of different novel genres: immigrant, mystery, political, metafiction, dark comedic, historical, spy, and war. The story depicts the anonymous narrator, a North Vietnamese mole in the South Vietnamese army, who stays embedded in a South Vietnamese community in exile in the United States. While in the United States, the narrator describes being an expatriate and a cultural advisor on the filming of an American film, closely resembling Platoon and Apocalypse Now, before returning to Vietnam as part of a guerrilla raid against the communists. The dual identity of the narrator, as a mole and immigrant, and the Americanization of the Vietnam War in international literature are central themes in the novel. The novel was published 40 years to the month after the fall of Saigon, which is the initial scene of the book.A sequel, entitled The Committed, was published on March 2, 2021.
4.5 really! read for the new sociology book club! It was very very good, gripping, incredibly harrowing at times. The bits on Hollywood and representation really hit, and I hope to think through them some more. I thought it was funny that the sympathizer had to remind us that he had a big penis at least two or three times, including when he was about to get horribly tortured.
Came to this one late: I remember when everybody seemed to be reading or talking about it. Really enjoyed Nguyen’s immigrant short stories in “The Refugees”. This is much more politically sophisticated as the title says, but not what I expected. Nor did it go where I thought it would—more espionage than I normally like. While the sequel is also on my list, the TV show isn’t anymore. Too dude-focused.
4 stars: loved this book, would recommend
I read this in like two days, first book in a while I've had trouble putting down. It had the constant tension I associate with a spy novel, but was a lot more introspective. I found it to be a pretty quick read for its length and for its literary-novel-ness, though the lack of quotation marks tripped me up a few times.
I saw some review describe it as "cynical" but I thought it was actually fairly optimistic, given the subject matter. I think it accurately describes the state of the world and am surprised that anything in there would be surprising in the year 2024, but there is a theme of a strange kind of hope in it. Every character is deeply flawed, but not absolved of the responsibility to do the right thing. The spy as protagonist, the "sympathizer", also lets …
4 stars: loved this book, would recommend
I read this in like two days, first book in a while I've had trouble putting down. It had the constant tension I associate with a spy novel, but was a lot more introspective. I found it to be a pretty quick read for its length and for its literary-novel-ness, though the lack of quotation marks tripped me up a few times.
I saw some review describe it as "cynical" but I thought it was actually fairly optimistic, given the subject matter. I think it accurately describes the state of the world and am surprised that anything in there would be surprising in the year 2024, but there is a theme of a strange kind of hope in it. Every character is deeply flawed, but not absolved of the responsibility to do the right thing. The spy as protagonist, the "sympathizer", also lets you look at and understand the motivations of all the different sides in this war, not just as ideologies but also as people, and even when the motivations are actually deeply unsympathetic, most of the characters do seem very human (my one criticism is that this is a lot more true of the men than of the women). I also saw a review describe it as "funny" and that is probably not the first adjective I'd use, like it's not wrong but it is not the type of book you read if you want something funny.
It touched on a lot of subjects that I now consider kind of cliché in immigrant stories, but which were done so well that I did not feel that at all. Like the whole "stuck between two worlds" thing felt a bit more fresh, maybe because it did not buy into the model minority myth at all or discuss it at all. I guess making the protagonist a communist helps there, no pressure to be a doctor or lawyer. Some other reviews on other websites said it dragged in the middle part, but that was my favourite part. It was also a rare example of a mixed race Asian protagonist, and while some things did not quite ring true to my experience (though my background is otherwise quite different), its tendency to lean on stereotypes there didn't bother me too much and overall I thought it was much better written than such things usually are.
I haven't read a lot of spy novels and usually think of like, James Bond. I like that the protagonist is not a particularly tough guy and that he struggles with every aspect of being a spy in the ways that I think a real person would. In particular I liked the theme of the careful managing and splitting of identities. An obvious theme in a spy novel but I think one that also rings true to anyone who finds themselves, as the cliche goes, between worlds in some ways.
It is pretty graphic, though it only felt gratuitous in a few places - one particular scene I kind of rolled my eyes at.
Content warnings: some fairly graphic sexual assault, torture, murder, implied child sexual abuse. Racism (aimed towards the protagonist), misogyny (largely from the protagonist). Uh. bestiality?
