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    The Man Who Spoke Snakish
    Unavailable
    The Man Who Spoke Snakish
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    The Man Who Spoke Snakish
    Ebook459 pages8 hours

    The Man Who Spoke Snakish

    By Andrus Kivirähk

    4/5

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    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    Unfortunately people and tribes degenerate. They lose their teeth, forget their language, until finally they're bending meekly on the fields and cutting straw with a scythe.

    Leemut, a young boy growing up in the forest, is content living with his hunter-gatherer family. But when incomprehensible outsiders arrive aboard ships and settle nearby, with an intriguing new religion, the forest begins to empty - people are moving to the village and breaking their backs tilling fields to make bread. Meanwhile, Leemut and the last forest-dwelling humans refuse to adapt: with bare-bottomed primates and their love of ancient traditions, promiscuous bears, and a single giant louse, they live in shacks, keep wolves, and speak to snakes.

    Told with moving and satirical prose, The Man Who Spoke Snakish is a fiercely imaginative allegory about a boy, and a nation, standing on the brink of dramatic change.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAtlantic Books
    Release dateSep 1, 2016
    ISBN9781611859607
    Unavailable
    The Man Who Spoke Snakish
    Author

    Andrus Kivirähk

    Andrus Kivirähk (Tallín, 1970), novelista, escritor, colum­nista, dramaturgo y guionista, es conside­rado uno de los escritores más fascinantes, prolíficos e innovadores. Comenzó a publicar en periódicos a los quince años, después estudió periodismo en la Universidad de Tartu y trabajó como periodista profesional y columnista humorístico, con un estilo provocador que desafiaba lo establecido. Ha recibido numerosos reconocimientos, incluidos la Lista de Honor del IBBY (2008), el Premio Friedebert Tuglas (1998), el Premio de Literatura Estonia (2001, 2007), y tres veces el Premio Nukits, que otorgan los niños lectores estonios. La obra infantil de Kivirähk es conocida por lo trepidante de sus historias, su rica fantasía y su particular sentido del humor.

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    Reviews for The Man Who Spoke Snakish

    4/5

    83 ratings9 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Very good, though maybe not for everyone. I enjoyed it and certainly would recommend it!
    • 5/5
      Lostinabook has summarised the story, thank you. This is an extraordinary book, about the death of cultures, the death of language, the resistance to imperialism. Does imperialism justify violence? It is like Pemulwuy, the Aboriginal warrior who violently resisted the British in colonial Sydney.
    • 2/5
      The Man Who Spoke Snakish is the story of Leemet, a boy in medieval Estonia who is confronted with colonization and a changing world. Leemet grows up in the forest, where he learns to speak Snakish, a language that enables him to talk to animals in the forest. His family has no need for hunting, as they are able to beckon deer to them for slaughter using Snakish. This lifestyle has been fading away for generations, as the forest dwellers stop learning Snakish and instead move to the village where they eat bread (which is almost a forbidden fruit among forest dwellers), grow their own food, and convert to Christianity. There are a lot of fantastical elements woven in: a giant frog who could ward off colonizers, bears that seduce women, and louse that has been bred to the size of a goat by the "Primates," two forest dwellers who live in the trees, refuse to wear clothing, and have remnants of a tail. I loved the first half of this book. It explores a lot of themes of what it means to be human, how to adapt to a changing culture while remaining true to yourself, and the role of religion and spirituality in society. About halfway though, I thought the book started to fall apart. There were strange plot twists, I found Leemet increasingly unlikable, and there was a lot of violence. At the time I was reading this, I was also telling stories with my four year old nephew, and somehow the book felt at times like it was being told in part by a four year old. The story would be going along, exploring some interesting themes, and then all the sudden it is the four year old's turn and the story veers way off course. At first, you laugh, adapt to the new direction the story is taking, and move on. The thought-out adult version continues, then the four year old jumps in again...it becomes harder and harder to get used to the senseless plot twists and sudden lack of meaning. Not that I don't appreciate the insertion of some of the imagination and creativity of youth, or understand that these elements create their own type of meaning...the story just somehow started to feel incredibly ridiculous towards the end. Apparently this book is really popular in Estonia, and I've read several reviews stating that this is a clunky translation and a lot has been lost. So maybe that is part of my problem with the book. I really did appreciate the themes explored at the beginning of the book. Leemet struggles because he knows he will be the last man living in the forest and speaking Snakish. When he looks at the lifestyle of the village he is frequently disgusted. Why should he spend all day working in the fields to grow food and raise domestic animals, when there is plenty of food for taking in the forest? Why is a spinning wheel necessary when you can use animal furs for clothing? At the same time he realizes that if he doesn't adopt this lifestyle, he will likely live and die alone in the forest. The book kind of stops exploring this theme, but I found it interesting. When confronted with societal change one finds distasteful, is it best to live a lifestyle you truly believe in alone in the forest, or to adapt to change, start eating bread, and move to the village?
    • 3/5
      Good solid story. Good characters
    • 2/5
      This is such a sad, sad book I hardly know how to rate it.
      Beautifully translated I can only imagine how much more powerful it must be in the original.
      Can I say I liked it- I can't really- it's so violent, like the end of the world should be violent.
      It's not for everyone.
      I'm giving it a two star rating even though it's an amazing book.
    • 5/5
      A wild fairy tale for adults.Andrus Kivirähk is known in Estonia for his children’s books such as the Lotte series, and perhaps especially for his parody novels “Rehepapp ehk november" (The Old Barny or November) and "Ivan Orava mälestused, ehk, Minevik kui helesinised mäedIvan Orava mälestused" (Ivan Orav’s Memoirs, or the Past as Light Blue Hills).“The Man Who Spoke Snakish” (orig. Estonian “Mees, kes teadis ussisõnu”) goes to a whole other level though. In some ways, it is patterned on the “Rehepapp” model, where aspects of Estonian folk tales and history are turned topsy-turvy to create a new world. In “Rehepapp” it was the Estonian serfs with their command of treasure-hunting goblins who made a mockery of the lords of the manor houses. TMWSS takes a villainous monster such as Friedrich Reinhold Kreutzwald’s “ Põhja konn“ (The Frog of the North) and makes it the mythical defender of the Estonian people. The Frog of the North & the Grandfather character between them take on various characteristics of the Son of Kalev from the Kalevipoeg: Eesti rahva eepos (Kalevipoeg: The Epic of the Estonian People) (e.g. the sleeping hero who can be called back into action by the people, the legless hero).If you have some knowledge of Estonian folk tales, you’ll have a whole extra appreciation for what Kivirähk does here, but it is not necessary to enjoy this entirely new epic which can also be read with a sub-text of the importance of cherishing your family and your heritage.To describe it another way: It is as if Frodo and Bilbo Baggins were trying to get together with Smaug the Dragon in order to defend some sort of primeval hobbit & dragon world from BOTH the Elves and the Orcs. That is how wild and upside down and downside up this story is and it is entertaining as hell.The English translation by Christopher Moseley is excellent and felt completely natural to read.
    • 5/5
      To categorize this book as "fantasy" doesn't do it justice. The story is strong and interesting, especially the "Snakish" element, but its core is an exploration of colonialism, modernity, faith, and inevitable change. When and why do a group of people change their way of life? And why do some cling to the ways of the past? Can either choice be seen as better? And does anyone truly understand their own roots?
    • 3/5
      Oh, kids, do I have some feelings about this book.

      First of all, I was steered very, very wrong. I was looking at this book at the library book store, and the woman there (who is normally very conservative in her book recommendations for Jefferson) made it sound like it would be an appropriate book for him. An emerging author translated from the Estonian, an epic fantasy tale? Well, you'd better believe it was the next book in our bedtime story rotation.

      IT WAS SO NOT APPROPRIATE.

      I still don't know why we never gave up, why we read it to the very end. Partially we got so far into the book before it got REALLY vulgar. For a while it was the odd word choice that I'd "translate" as I read. Then all of the sudden I'd have to stop reading aloud, scanning through paragraph after paragraph, trying to decide how to gloss over these sections and rejoin the story. Vulgarity, extremely bloody violence, torture...

      And it was all so bleak. Maybe we kept trudging forward hoping for some respite or redemption, some silver lining, though I suppose it should have been obvious that it wasn't coming.

      Would I have enjoyed this book were I not reading it aloud to my eleven-year-old? Maybe. It was certainly something different than I'd ever read before, and I appreciated it in that vein. I appreciate a POV that gives voice to just how strange knight/Catholic culture must have looked when first encountered. But a bit bloody for my taste.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Leemet lives with his family in the forest and it provides them with everything they need –shelter, food, clothing. They ride and milk wolves, share living space with intelligent adders and lecherous bears, and hang out with ancient primates who keep lice for pets. And they speak Snakish, an ancient language from the time when men and snakes were brothers and which allows them to converse as well as control most animals, all except insects (except a few like lice). But almost everyone else has moved to the village where they eat bread for which they must till the fields and domesticate the animals, where they have converted to Christianity and obey the knights and monks, and where they are no longer able to speak snakish. Set in Medieval Estonia, The Man Who Spoke Snakish by author Andrus Kivirahk is a very hard book to categorize. It seems in parts like realist fantasy while I wondered if the author based at least some of it perhaps on Estonian folk tales. I was so intrigued to know more about the author and the book (which, trust me, means I liked it a whole lot), I learned that it is considered ‘the first Estonian eco-novel’ by many and, by others, an allegory for the problems small nations like Estonia are facing in a changing world. However you describe this novel, it is a completely unique story full of strange creatures, odd characters, and plenty of black humour. It is hugely entertaining and more than a little addicting and, for fans of fantasy who are looking for something completely different, this is one fun read. One caveat though: there’s a great deal of violence so, if you’re squeamish, this may not be for you. For anyone else, I can’t recommend it highly enough.

      2 people found this helpful