Strange, mythic, delirious short stories ( )

I really hate adding books to my did-not-finish shelf unless I really dislike the book for some reason. This book definitely wasn't horrible. It's very atmospheric and moody, which isn't a bad thing in itself, but for that kind of book to work for me I need a story to work through - a light at the end of the atmospheric moody tunnel. The stories here are definitely not meaty enough for me, I'm afraid. So I'll need to put this back on the shelf. Perhaps I'll return to it someday when I'm in more of a slow mood.

"Why are there so many sick people?"
"Because it's easier to get sick than to look for one's right place in the world."
"Explain, explain."
"Yes," said the doctor. "We keep adding needless things, false things to ourselves, till we can't see ourselves and forget what our true shape is. And if we've forgotten what shape we are, how can we find the right place to be? And who dares pull away the falsities that are stuck to his eyelids, his fingernails, his heels? So then something goes wrong in the house and in the world, and we get sick."

This book has the bones and muscle of something good. It lionizes stories and story telling; it tells the history of a fantasy empire through the performances of various story tellers through time. But there's something sick and sad in its soul, and I just can't get past it.

On the one hand, this book was originally published in 1983. On the other hand, we knew it was wrong to blame sick people for their own illnesses in 1983. (At least, some of us did.) We knew better than to blame freedom for delinquency, divorce, and insanity. (Well, again, some of us did.) Mind you, I can understand why an Argentine writer would see some stability in government and succession as better than the upheaval and revolution, and I have no idea how I would feel about power and authority if I had lived through the junta, but I generally think both trend toward abuse now, and I can't imagine that experience would have made me think better. So I'm a little at a loss about the reactionary underpinnings of the book. I feel like I must have missed something, somehow. (It is of course dicey to attribute author voice to any one character in a book about overlapping story made of overlapping stories, but I would note that neither the Great Empress nor the wise doctor are contradicted, and both are presented in a rather heroic light, are really the main characters who are so presented.)

The other issue with the book is that there was much blather, but only one magnificent moment. The final story reached for some lovely intertextual transcendence, revealing the Empire to be the book itself, one in a succession of many books in a great war of literature, and that was fun. But it was one sparkling moment that absolutely depended on the 240 page slog that preceded it, and frankly it wasn't that sparkling. [a:Italo Calvino|155517|Italo Calvino|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1501975461p2/155517.jpg] died in 1985, after all. [a:Jorge Luis Borges|500|Jorge Luis Borges|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1537559279p2/500.jpg] died in 1986. You would be better served spending your time with their works. Or, if you really want a history of a great empire that never was (as I did), do yourself a favor and curl up with [b:City of Saints and Madmen|230852|City of Saints and Madmen (Ambergris, #1)|Jeff VanderMeer|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1390260432s/230852.jpg|522014] instead. ( )

https://tamaranth.blogspot.com/2021/04/2021049-kalpa-imperial-angelica.html ( )

I read this because Ursula Le Guin, obviously.
It was very good. I would go so far as to say it is the most intricate and imaginative fantasy I've read this year. The format is a collection of short stories which are feature a story or story being told - in one instance it's a story about a story being told in which many stories are told! This format works really well and is constantly engaging and fascinating.
It probably deserves five stars but I seem to prefer books with blatant, strong emotions at the minute, this one is pretty subtle with its feelings.
Highly recommended if you like thoughtful fantasy which isn't just blokes wandering about with swords. ( )