Row Row Row Your Boat

... Gently down the stream.

Ok, ok, all jokes aside, I found Nam Le's work to be excellent, if a bit tedious in certain sections. Some of the things that struck me most about his writing, especially in contrast to that of other works we've read, included the (relatively, more on that later) format, intense detailing and depth of character, various points of view(again, more on that later) and the utter diversity in each and every story. I seriously doubt that any other author could manage to convince me in so few pages that I am in so many drastically different environments. From Hiroshima to Britain, New York to barrio's of Columbia, the levels of cultural immersion are staggering and heavily lend to a sense of believability.

(Some interesting things I'd like to start conversation on, in no particular order.

A constantly shifting perspective seems to permeate the pages of this novel, skipping idly from a person perspective in the initial three stories, to a third person perspective for the rest of the book. As to why Nam Le decided to do this, I'm completely unsure. However, I doubt that a wordsmith such as Nam Le, with his precise detail and exquisite control would lapse into another perspective without good reason. To me, this might have been a detachment from some of the characters, as opposed to embodying them with a first person perspective. Perhaps this serves as a metaphor for Nam's growth as a writer, an understanding of and acceptance of ideas that he cannot relate to on a personal basis, and therefore must express in a more narrator-esque way. Any ideas, anyone?

Furthermore, in an effort to illicit a sense of culture (I assume), Nam Le changes punctuation, sentence structure, and even the thought process's of each character. For example, the initial story rings of a hollow and almost dark/futuristic feel to me, with everything is properly indented, properly capitalized, and put in quotation marks. Most notably, however, the father speaks in Vietnamese, but it is seamlessly translated for us. The way in which the first story speaks is a tightly constructed narrative with concise and crisp analogies, similes, and metaphors appropriate to the character.

The next story, however, disregards all rules regarding distinguishing who is speaking, aside from indentation, and leaves us potentially puzzling over a number of words that we may or may not know. In a similar sense, the character's thought process and the writing itself changes to suit the situation and context again.

In the third story, a pattern seems to almost be forming, with the highly literate painter shifting back to compact and blunt prose defined by an abundance of punctuation. This pattern continues, as the thoughts and style reflected in "Halflead Bay" seem appropriate[to me, anyway] to the character of Jamie. The pattern continues with Hiroshima lacking punctuation OR indentation, etc. etc.

Why does Nam Le do this? Is it simply a matter of defining your character in their perspective space, or do the shifting styles speak to something deeper in the text? This strikes me as an, if not the most, interesting question throughout the text.

One more quick point: (Until I remember the one I forgot, anyway)

Water seems to play a role in a number of stories, but most significantly in the first, third, and fourth (the river, the bathtub, the bay). To what extent does water signify something, if anything? To me, water seemed to be a calming element for a number of characters, as Nam's father would often venture to the river, Henry would often submerge himself in a bath, and Jamie's nostalgia in the bay.