Customer Reviews

The Age of Orphans: A Novel

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This is a bit of a hard book to review. There were times while reading it that I nearly stopped because it got a bit hard to swallow. But I persevered and I believe the effort was worth it.

Reza Pejman Khourdi is a Kurdish young boy who is violently conscripted into the Iranian army after his father and other male relatives are brutally slain in battle. For two years he drifts in a haze of service to his village's murderers, carrying out their every whim. He is the plaything of the soldiers who use him in every manner imaginable. Through it all he longs for his mother with whom he shared a close if strange bond. But his past life is now dead and buried and he must forge a new existence out of the life he is given. A brotherhood begins to form amongst the young soldiers who are all weapons in training for the shah. They share their loneliness and need to make sense of this new life alongside their hopes for the future. But that brotherhood quickly evaporates with one visit from the shah who extols the willing enlistees (usually boys from Tehran) over the conscripts(usually Kurds). The boys go from being allies to being competitors and adversaries.

Reza realizes the status quo very quickly and distinguishes himself as hardworking, brutal and willing to do anything to climb the military ladder. He disavows his Kurdish self, in one instance very violently, and does everything to show his superiors that he regards the Kurds with even more contempt than they could muster. His reward for this is his promotion to the rank of captain and being given charge of Kermanshah, a Kurdish region. He is tasked with controlling the people and bringing them firmly under the yoke of the shah. He gladly carries out the shah's vision of a new nation, Iran, built on veneration of the shah, centralization of the language and destruction of any dissenting voices. But in Reza's later years, there is a softening of his grip, it is as if he loses the struggle between his Kurdish and Iranian self and is lost from both identities.

There is so much violence, savagery and brutality in this book. Women are raped, children are killed and lives are destroyed. The language is many times very crass and that coupled with the aforementioned made me want to stop reading. But despite these facts there is something poetic in the way that the author uses language. You sometimes feel like you are reading a poem written in ancient times. The story is sad and speaks to a loss of identity in the face of a dominant culture. What effect does forced assimilation have on a people? At some point after denying your true self for so long, does this destroy you? This is definitely not a book for everyone. Some will take to it and some will be repulsed by it. This book is apparently the first in a trilogy about three generations of Kurdish men.

Tough and poetic. Clean and vivid writing. The vulnerable young boy you meet in the beginning doesn't get the life you'd wish for him, but he survives. He's shaped by the sweep of history and the clash of cultures.

Reza Khourdi is a typical Kurdish boy: traipsing among the rooftops of his hometown, wishing he were following in the footsteps of the older men of the tribe and longing for the comfort of his mother. All that changes when Reza joins the elder men on a trip out to the far desert for his circumcision. The procedure is normal for boys of his age, and Reza feels the typical conflicting emotions about it. What happens next in the boy's life is not so typical. Traveling back towards home in the dark, his people are attacked and killed by the Shah's men, leaving Reza to be captured and conscripted into the Shah's army. Reza must now be taught to fight against his own people and tribes, pushing them into submission and taking over their land and crops. As the boy becomes a man, his emotions and inhibitions begin to die, turning him into the perfect soldier: a man who is dead to his feelings and reactions, who willingly and almost fawningly strives to do the bidding of his commanders. As Reza catapults into higher and higher ranks, his loyalties to his army and to his former people are constantly in opposition to each other. He must forget everything about himself to push forward and destroy the Kurd enemy, an enemy that was once himself. After many years of the soldier's life, it is suggested to Reza that he take a Tehrani wife, which he does just as obediently as he can. Reza and his new bride struggle in more ways than one. Her hatred for his Kurdish roots and his silence are only some of the things that begin to cause problems. Soon Reza is promoted to Captain, and although his rank keeps advancing, his status in his household and among his men begins to plummet. He begins to find pockets of resistance within himself that he cannot expose, so he must try to alleviate the unhappiness and emotional clash in other ways. Reza's story is both disturbing and dark, a story of Iran that many have not yet heard, in a voice as trembling and horrifying as the events that surround his life.

This book was almost too much for me. The graphic violence was portrayed with such a dearth of emotion and such coarseness that I felt my spirit plummet every few pages. There were some instances of horrible child abuse in the book, such as the terrible way the soldiers treated young Reza when he was captured. It was almost terrifying to think about what a child's mind would do under those circumstances, and indeed those reactions manifested themselves all over the page in Reza's reactions. I also had a hard time with Reza's relationship with his mother before she died. I thought it was odd that a child of 7 or 8 was still so focused on suckling from his mother. I agree that different cultures have different timetables for most things, but his intense and insatiable desire for her milk seemed strange and a bit malevolent.

In addition there were many instances of vulgar imagery. The human body and all its sexual functions seemed almost completely devoid of taboo, which was strange, seeing as though other areas of the book were so reserved and cautious. On the other hand, once I got past the shocking aspects of the plot, I thought the book was very well written. At times the writing had a touch of stream of consciousness, and at times it arranged itself like good poetry, full of arresting and intricate imagery. The imagery was especially well done because it evoked a great sense of place. You could feel the aridness and brightness that surrounded the characters, and could see the barrenness of the desert in which they lived.

Another thing I liked was the way that various chapters were told from differing viewpoints. Though each narrator was only heard from once, this technique allowed a fuller picture of the story to be revealed and for more of a wholeness and fullness to exist in the narrative. I especially enjoyed the chapters from the women's point of view, because this remained mostly a masculine story, and these chapters exposed more of what the other side of the population was experiencing at the time. Reza himself as a character was a little hard to get used to. He didn't showcase any internal monologue, and it was only by outward factors that I could decipher just was must have been going on in his head. This wasn't really a problem in the beginning of the book, for as a child he was much more prone to display some types of behaviors and reactions, but when I reached the second half of the book, Reza's adulthood, it became very hard to know why he did most things and what his thoughts were surrounding the greater issues of his life. I can only think of one time in the latter half of the book when it was clear to me why Reza was behaving the way that he was. There is no denying that this was Reza's book; the other narrators and characters only really existed to showcase other aspects of his life and his military service. I also felt that the second half of the book was slightly superior to the first half. Maybe it was the fact that I had been holding the book at arm's length in the beginning due to it's graphic nature, or maybe I just engaged more with the more mature Reza's character. Whatever the reason, I felt that the first half of the book was slightly less well-shaped and polished than the latter half, though it didn't affect my overall enjoyment of the story.

Although there were some eyebrow raising moments in the book, I did ultimately enjoy the story that was told and very much appreciated the craftsmanship of the writing. I think that before reading this book, it may be important to some readers to know that the story is sometimes explicit and disquieting because it may hamper the enjoyment of some to come to these scenes unaware. By no means does this book delve into the disgusting or atrocious, but some may find the ideas inside a bit perverse. I admit, there were times when the book became disquieting, but I also freely admit that I think the author wasn't just pushing the envelope to be avant garde. I think that this story, in this form, needed to be told. I think the point of it all was not to make us squirm in discomfort, but to make us aware of the lives that may be lead on the other side of the world, and perhaps it was an attempt to explain the plight of those nameless Kurdish orphans who are so wholly sucked into the circumstances that envelop them. An interesting and thought provoking read, recommended.

I couldn't make it through more than 40 pages of this book. The frequent depictions of rape and murder were hard enough to stomach, but the author's cluelessness about Kurdish language and culture made it impossible to enjoy. Why read a book supposedly about Kurds, with a Kurdish protagonist, by someone who isn't Kurdish and has seemingly made no effort whatsoever to learn about the Kurds?

The author (a Persian who hails from a city at practically the opposite end of Iran from Kurdistan) frequently puts urban Persian words in the mouths of rural Kurds, which sounds awkward and out of place. It's a bit like writing about white farmers in rural Appalachia and having them speak with urban Spanish slang from Los Angeles or Tijuana. The Kurdish boy calls his mother "maman," a French word found in Persian but not Kurdish. She, in turn, calls him "jounam," a Persian word pronounced with an urban big-city accent. (The Kurdish equivalent would be "janim"). And so on, ad nauseum.

Abbas Kiarostami tastefully and thought-provokingly explored the contrast and interaction between rural Kurdish and urban Persian life in Iran in his film "The Wind Will Carry Us." Sadly, "The Age of Orphans" is neither tasteful nor well-researched. Laleh Khadivi has threatened to write two more books, forming a trilogy about three generations of Kurdish men. I hope she does her research before writing the next two.

I picked up Age of Orphans at our library. The cover pitch was tempting. I read a few pages and decided to take the book home. Overall, while I found the idea fascinating and the author's prose lyrical, I had mixed feelings about the main character who comes across as hollow and the complexity of his relationship with his wife baffled me. That he would go and poison her was when the author really lost me. Then I read the reviews here. I especially noted the "Iranian" scholar who pointed out incorrect words for a Kurd to use, etc. and started wondering what else the author might have gotten wrong. It is hard to write a historical novel and get all the details, or even most of the details, right. Rather than give us two more volumes on future generations of the same family, I wish the author would do narrative non-fiction about her life as an Iranian immigrant, memoir, because she does write very well.

In 1921, Iran is a new nation. In the Zagros Mountains a Kurdish boy is conscripted into the shah's army after his tribe is slaughtered. The un-named boy is re-named Reza Pejman Khourdi (Reza after Iran's first shah; Pejman for heartbroken; and Khourdi as an ethnic Kurd). Ashamed of his tribal heritage and their effortless slaughter by the modern Iranian army, Reza suppresses all things Kurdish within him. He marries a modern Iranian woman, Meena, in the hopes of becoming more Iranian. As a successful army officer, Reza is appointed to Kermanshah, a Kurdish region in northern Iran, where he mercilessly promotes assimilation. Eventually his internal conflict destroys his family.

In this disturbing first book of a trilogy, Khadivi excels with her symbolism. No characters are named during the first part of the book, reflecting the hundreds of the unknown Kurds who were killed by the Iranian army. Reza's internal conflict mirrors the external conflict of the Kurds and the budding Iranian nation. Reza and Meena's marriage symbolizes the demeaning, violent, and potentially doomed assimilation of the Kurds into the Iranian nation.

While the Kurds have a tragic and violent history, the reader expects a certain level of violence; however, the excessive sexual violence distracts from the storytelling and alienates the reader, reinforcing regional negative, violent stereotypes.

I've read 28 books this year and for me The Age of Orphans is the best of them all.
A beautiful novel that had me enthralled from the first page to the last.
I cannot wait to read Laleh Khadivi's 2nd book of her triology.
The publshing date cannot come soon enough for me.
Thanks Laleh for your time and effort.
Good Luck for the future!
Clive

The Age of Orphans, by Laleh Khadivi grabs you by the soul and leads you through a land of beauty and pain, wisdom and arrogance, histories lost and created. Where a boy's journey is measured by stolen love, memories forgotten, maps that circle upon themselves and back again. I was taken to unknown worlds and misunderstood cultures and could not catch my breath. This book delights the heart and then tests its resilience. I found myself as conflicted as the leading character and I could not put this book down. I look forward to reading more of Khadivi's work.

A young Kurdish boy, living in the Zagros Mountains in 1921, has always felt loved and protected, despite his family's "poverty." He enjoys "flying" from the roof of the family's hut, experiencing the soaring feelings of earth and heaven at the same time, and identifying with the falcons. In gorgeous and poetic language, author Laleh Khadivi, recreates the "gloried ground" to which the boy is connected by birth and culture. Soon after his initiation into manhood, at age seven, he accompanies the village men to a mountain lookout, where they wait for the shah's troops. In the ensuing massacre, the boy is orphaned, and he leaves the battlefield with the shah's army, without a backward glance, ultimately consoled by the fact that he will be getting boots, a whole new "family," and a new way of life.

Throughout the novel Iranian author Laleh Khadivi alternates points of view among the various characters, and, in the beginning of the novel, she even personifies nature--a tree, a falcon--in passages of great lyricism. With their echoing refrains and musical repetitions, some of these sections sound like psalms, a striking contrast to the brutality, bloodshed, and horrific rapes which follow soon after. Named Reza, for the shah, and Khourdi for his heritage, the boy conscript becomes an unthinking automaton, though he occasionally has moments in which his past overwhelms his present. Sent at fifteen to a Kurdish village, he and the army try to capture two Kurdish commanders, and they engage in terrifying brutality, Reza engaging in some of the most brutal acts of all to prove that he is one of the shah's men, rather than a "dirty Kurd."

As the action moves from the 1930s and into the period of 1940 - the 1970s, Khadivi shows Reza Khourdi continuing to be the perfect soldier, representing the wishes of the shah, but still suffering the inner conflicts of a brainwashed orphan. Khadivi's portrait of this man is intimate and carefully drawn, and she creates great empathy for him in his plight, despite his actions. His assignment to Kermanshah, a Kurdish city, in 1940, and his long residence there, bring his personal conflicts to a head.

The novel is primarily a story of character, well drawn and complete, and the violence and inhumanity are integrated as part of the author's thematic progression as "Reza" moves from an innocent childhood, through his attempts to find "family" within the killing machine of the army, his attempts to find love, and his final assessment of his own life. Reza represents many of the conflicts we read about today--specifically, the conflicts between Iran and the Kurds and between Turkey and the Kurds--and the novel is enlightening and absorbing, but Khadivi also includes broader themes--the use of boy soldiers, the brainwashing that takes place, and the reasons these boy soldiers are sometimes more brutal than their elders. Though the novel is not easy reading for people who live safe and comfortable lives, she opens such a world to examination and analysis. n Mary Whipple