Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Mister Pip
Book Review: Not Just Warm and Cuddly
Summary: 4 Stars
The narrator starts as a thirteen year old girl on a Pacific island that has just joined a civil war. One of the only whites who has not fled the island, Mr. Watts, decides to teach the children although he admittedly is not a teacher. His teaching consists of reading Great Expectations and bringing in the community's adults to teach whatever they know. The first third of the book is this warm and cuddly account, sure to bring a smile to the reader, especially if the reader loves books. The only tension is the narrator's mother's jealousy of the teacher.
Just as it begins to be too big a bowl of warm milk, the plot switches to the community suddenly being embroiled in the civil war. The conflict within the community comes to the fore and the book changes flavor. Mr. Watts, always trying to do the right thing, becomes the victim of subterfuge and then more. Mother and Watts' fates intermingle in surprising manner. As a side plot, the narrator also gets to know Mr. Watts and his wife and their tragic story.
Lastly, the book shifts to the present when the narrator is a doctoral candidate. She goes to the big city to get the lowdown on who Mr. Watts was before coming to the island. This portion fills in the blanks, especially in the story of Mr. Watts and his wife.
Each of the components of this book is different from the others and good. The shift prevents any one of the segmetns from getting bogged down and the novel moves quickly.
A combination of coming of age, and a study of loyalty, subterfuge and how to be a "gentleman" according to Mr. Watts, this book is highly recommended.
Book Review: Pip of the Pacific
Summary: 4 Stars
Your first really good book is a bit like your first cigarette, your first drink, your first lover. It's an experience that lodges within you, one you keep coming back to, so deeply unique and personal you cannot share it on anything but the most superficial level. "Mister Pip" is at once a really good book itself, and a book about reading really good books.
Matilda is a teenage girl growing up on Bougainville, a large island North East of Australia, during the early 1990's. A war of independence against the rulers on the neighboring island of Papua New Guinea is in full swing, causing the entire white population and many of the black, including the local schoolteachers, to flee the island. Only one white man remains, a lonely eccentric named Mr. Watts, who begins to teach the children of Matilda's village by reading from Charles Dickens' "Great Expectations."
At first glance, there's not much common ground between Victorian England and a tropical island, but the story of Mister Pip, the hero of "Great Expectations" who rises from poverty to riches, strikes a chord with Matilda and the other children, and their own dreams of escape. "It was always a relief to return to Great Expectations," says Matilda. "It contained a world that was whole and made sense, unlike ours."
Fantasy is not always healthy of course, and reality, if shut out, has a way of kicking in the door. At first there is resistance from some of the more religious parents, including Matilda's mother, who feel the Bible is the only book worth reading. The not-quite-battle of words between Matilda's mum and Mr. Watts is a triumph of understatement, a subtle thing that swims beneath the surface of otherwise placid encounters. Later, the war intrudes, as you knew if must from the beginning, with sudden, deadly consequences for the entire village.
Anyone who has ever felt affected by great literature will find resonance in the story. "Mister Pip" is a slim little thing, almost waif-like, weighing in at a hair over 250 pages. No Dickensian language or convoluted phrasing here: there is an economy of words and emotion in Matilda's voice, which only underscores the horror as events go from bad to worse. Yet in the end the novel's message is one of hope, if tempered by a realistic awareness of the limitations of what fiction can accomplish.
Much could be made of white guilt in the setting of this novel, of the exploitation of Bougainville's copper mines, which leads to the rebellion, and of the backing provided to the Papua New Guinean government's efforts to crush it. Mr Jones acknowledges these issues, but never takes sides nor lets them overwhelm the main story.
You might also be forgiven for feeling there's something a bit too "Dances With Wolves" about the story of a white teaching a black village, but Mr Watts is never presented as a heroic or wise figure, someone at the mercy of events rather than their master. The character of Matilda helps illustrate the interplay between the two cultures, with her fascination of Dickens balanced against her love of folk tales and stories, proving there is something for both sides to gain from the exchange. "We feel white around black people," says Mr Watts, uncomfortable with the truth, only to be answered with "We feel black around white people."
I like the book, really I do--see the rating I gave it at the top of this review--but allow me to let my cynical side show for a moment. It must be said there's something a little self-serving about novelists writing novels that tell you how wonderful novels are--a bit too close to patting yourself on the back, that one.
Still, with a work this accomplished Mr Jones can probably be forgiven for patting himself on the back a little. I can't say I will always remember it--the title of first great book is already taken for me--but it is one I will certainly be in no rush to forget.
Book Review: Reporter uses his experiences to create a unique novel
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a great book on many levels. The story, albeit fiction, revolves around the civil war in New Guinea in the 1990s that got little coverage in the media here in the West. The themes are numerous: mother/duaghter relationships, the impact of colonialism on a small island, poverty, war atrocities, the power of literature to transform lives, expectations, folk stories, mental illness, the impact a teacher can have on a child's life, and many more.
The book has a lyrical quality throughout and the narrator reports the changes going on around her with a keen eye--very balanced and dispassionate. Yet, the protagonist, Matilda, is a very sympathetic character and you will love her desire to transcend the circumstances of her life.
Book Review: Secrets and Heroes
Summary: 5 Stars
As well as Matilda's coming of age, this is a story of secrets and heroes. It is jounalistic in style, which seems appropriate since Mr James is a journalist, and that helps get the reader thru the violence and sorrow of war. I learned a lot about South Pacific recent history in reading this. It's a touching, lovely tale that has tales-within-the-tales also. A great book discussion novel!Book Review: Storyteller
Summary: 4 Stars
"I got this book recently, after seeing it stare at me in the bookstores for over a year. And I had a hard time getting into this novel. I'd read a couple of pages, leave it. Come back a few days later, reread and so on. Then, once I got to a certain chapter, I knew I would finish this novel.
A Blockade of Bougainville is the setting of this short novel, and Matilda, a young girl counting the days since her last school day is our wondrous story teller.
Pop Eye is the only white in Matilda's village and when he sees that all the other whites, school teachers, doctors have left the island he takes the stage as Matilda's teacher.
Going to school in the midst of all the turmoil gives the children a little bit of routine in their lives, and haveing Mr.Wats (PopEye) as their teacher proves to be very entertaining. He reads to them Great Expectations by 'Mr.Dickens' and Matilda and her peers are soon so engrossed in Pip's live. Great Expectation gives them the chance to see a life different than theirs, without the choking of their little island, without the rebels, and without the redskins.
I finished the novel and have this hankering to reread Great Expectations. But I know that certain events in this story will forever be lodged in my mind."