Customer Reviews

Caravans

5 star:		(46)
4 star:		(29)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Don't be fooled by the "Harlequin Romance"-looking cover art. Caravans is a ripping good adventure/travelogue/history lesson, with some romance thrown in for good measure.

The story is simple: An American girl who married an Afghani man is missing in Afghanistan. Her family is frantic, and a military man stationed in Afghanistan in 1946 is assigned to find out what happened to her. The story veers into some unexpected territory, and Michener delivers a TON of Historical perspective on the people and places of Afghanistan without ever making you feel like you're back in History class. (This is a VERY illuminating book to read after September 11th...)

The characters are interesting, and the book just zooms along: I finished it in no time flat. My only complaint is the map in the beginning of the book: It's printed so dark that it's totally useless.

Michener, James A., Caravans (Ballantine Books, United States, 1963). 438. 1 map. 1 Note to Reader. 0-449-21380-3.

Caravans is the story of an American woman, Ellen Jaspar, lost in Afghanistan after marrying an Afghan engineer. The novel is told through the cooperation of American officials and Afghani leaders to find the missing woman at the pressure of a U.S. Senator. Michener touches upon various aspects of Afghanistan, including women's rights, religious fanaticism, foreign perceptions, and the character of the Afghani people.

James A. Michener found his inspiration for the novel in his personal experiences and travels through Afghanistan. He in fact met many European women who struggled for freedom from the confines of their marriage and Afghanistan. Michener is extremely well-traveled in the region, and furthermore has much diplomatic expertise lending to credible portrayals of Afghani leaders and people in the novel. Hence, his portrayal of the many facets of Afghani culture and politics are credible and well-researched.

The motive of Michener in writing this novel seems unclear at times, as it's adventure-style narrative can obscure the reader's vision of it as more than just a story. Yet, there is some hint of the author's desire to enlighten the world on the deeper character of Afghanistan. Michener strives to shed light on such a perplexing people and culture, that more often than not are judged solely by the negative qualities that appear on the surface (i.e. fanatical mullahs and repressed women). And, by incorporating both Afghani and foreign perceptions of Afghani people and culture continuously throughout the novel, Michener achieves this goal.

Although the novel was written in the 1950's, and Afghanistan did make many advances in human rights in the decades following its composition, the subject matter is sadly more pertinent today than ever. In a time when terrorism lends the outside world to focus only on the evils of Afghanistan, this novel could be extremely useful in explaining the development and perspectives behind such evils. When Americans look at Afghanistan, what comes to mind is terrorism, religious fanatics, and atrocious women's rights abuses. This solely negative view of Afghani culture causes people to view the entire nation and people of Afghanistan to be judged in this light. Michener helps to end this attitude and truly depict the majority of the Afghani population rather than let the minority represent them.

Overall, this book is not only very helpful on giving a reader an insightful look into Afghani culture and mindsets, but is also both politically relevant and useful. Now, more than ever, a true understanding of Afghanistan is need in order to stop the violence and pave the way towards cooperation and mutual acceptance between Afghanistan and the rest of the world. Yet, the reader must be mindful to not just focus on the story-level aspects of the novel and its trite subject matter, but rather delve deeper into Michener's depiction of the character and desires of the Afghani population.

Shirin Raza (002788950)

"Caravans" is the story of how Afghanistan's Islamic culture affects an American female student and a U.S. embassy male staffer.

Afghanistan's Islamic culture has desert roots. Desert survival requires a strong leader. This requirement has made Islam a patriarchal culture. Michener describes how Islamic culture fits the harsh desert environment. He outlines how an American woman and an American man adapt to Afghanistan's Islamic culture.

"Caravans" is an excellent novel. Michener's characters are well-developed. Michener lived in Afghanistan. He understands its people, its culture, and its environment. I recommend this book.

I've read several Michener novels, starting with "Hawaii." I first read "Caravans" some thirty years ago, and since Afghanistan is far from the "back-water" it once was, but has been a major foreign policy concern of the United States, and a focus of our military in a war that will likely exceed the other longest war, Vietnam, I decided to give it a re-read. There is also the personal connection; I once traveled across the country, by local transport, for 11 days in 1971; and my nephew is now with the Marines in Helmund province.

The most stunning aspect of the book is the date it was written: 1963! It is worth saying twice: 1963. At a time when not one American in 500 had heard of the terms "Sunni" and "Shia," and even the few that had may not have been aware of the difference. Yet Michener book is chock full of insights and predictions that came to pass. Consider: (the Afghan, Nazrullah is speaking) "When a thousand men like me have rebuilt Kabul and made it as great as The City once was, either the Russians or the Americans will come with their airplanes and bomb it rubble." Michener was wrong only on the conjunction: instead of "or" it should have been "and." Or consider: "You must not think of Islam as a religion of the desert," Nur warned. "It has much vitality and the world has not yet heard the last of it." Another is: "Don't be afraid of looking stupid, because one of these days we could be driven into war across this terrain, and you'd be the only American who'd ever seen parts of it." And yet one more: (the Afghan leader Shan Khan is speaking) "You Americans seem inordinately preoccupied with the "chaderi" (now normally referred to as the `burka').

The novel is set in 1946, before Pakistan was a nation, and the British still ruled India. Kabul was the ultimate in remote diplomatic postings with virtually no amenities, and Michener depicts a realistic scene of the camaraderie among the expatriates there, which would ring authentic to an expat in Riyadh in the `70's. The storyline involves a young American Embassy official, Mark Miller, driven by the political concerns of a US Senator, to determine the fate of a young American woman, with a Bryn Mawr education, who married an Afghan, and is now "missing." In the process, he crosses the length and width of the country. Along the way, many a topic is tackled, from the developmental efforts of the "enlightened" Afghan elite vis-à-vis the religious conservatives represented by the mullahs; the alienation from upper-class American life of a young women who is seeking the authenticity of the "primitive"; the relationship of a Jew with a German who performed despicable acts on Jews as a Nazi; tackling the question of whether Americans would have been capable of the same barbarities with their own Negro population; how academia serves as a justifying adjunct to the power elites; the desertification of the country due to over irrigation, and how that might equally apply to Denver, CO; and there are also some beautiful descriptions of the Afghan topography. The insight I appreciated the most, and have seen time and time again, was when the American, sure of his knowledge, was showing the native the "correct" way of accomplishing a task, only to be gently remonstrated by the Afghan who pointed out that they had their own way of doing things, and sometimes they might be superior. The case in point was the bridges the Germans had built, that didn't work in the Afghan climate.

So what's not to like? Alas, plenty. With all the above wonderful subjects, the tale itself is highly improbable, with extremely unlikely personal dynamics. For his latter books, Michener hired a team of fact-checkers, and it would have been most beneficial if he had had with this one. I found his closing "Note to the Reader" most useful, because he states when he was in Afghanistan, and where he traveled, and that he witnessed some of the scenes depicted. When Miller and team are going to rescue an American engineer with a broken leg, Michener describes desert crossings with temperatures at 130 F; yet the month is March, with highest temperatures of 90 F. How did Miller learn Pashto, when he must have been in Burma during WW II, flying the "hump" into China? In fact, the principals, like the young American "missing" woman, Ellen Jasper, moved around like there was no WW II going on. It is unlikely the Kochi would have taken the circular route described to reach the Oxus, since there was virtually no vegetation for them to eat along the way. Why not go straight up the Khyber Pass from Jhelum? And there are numerous other problems, but the principal one is the interaction of the characters, and those interactions continue to deteriorate, so that finishing the novel was a relief.

For the subject matter, prescience of his predictions, and the "setting," I'd give Michener the full 5-stars, but the "connective tissue" of the storyline and characters rates a 1-star, so I'll average it out for a 3-star.

This is one of Michener's early books, when his style was still evolving. In it, we follow the sotry of an American woman who is lost in Afghanistan and the diplomat that seeks to find her.

I picked this book up after the US war on Afghanistan in order to try to better understand the history of the place without the more recent complications. It was a very good intorduction to the country and its people; we see the deep clash better the Kabul population, which is more "civilized" according to Western standards than the countryside, where the mullahs dominate. These happen to be the same mullahs that we get to see on CNN.

The story itself is told from the perspective of a westerner, so the striking nature of the local culture is highlighted. The mystical nature of caravans and local customs is dissected, which I found very interesting. Also there were many references to the country's history, enough to wet the appetite about reading further on Afghanistan, but not enough to make one knowledgeable about it.

Overall, it is clear this is an early Michener, and the author is evolving into the national novel model he adopts later on.

Although Michener's book was written 40 years ago and is set more than ten years before that, it is very pertinent in light of the last few weeks events, and perhaps those of the next month or two. I read Caravans more than 20 years ago and was struck at that time by the extreme contrasts of a semi-barbaric society seeking to take baby steps toward joining the civilized world. Knowing Michener's scrupulous research practices, I have little doubt that he portrayed the Afghans accurately in their attempts to step up to a Twentieth, or perhaps only a Nineteenth century level of civilization. Recent events demonstrate that they failed. Although not correct on every point, Caravans is fairly good at demonstrating that backwardness of the Central Asian Mohamadden society and the immense hurdle that its world view presented to cultural advances. Unfortunately, his optimism on the point has proven misplaced over the years, indeed for that very reason. I am not aware of a better introductory work on this part of the world, except perhaps some of Robert Kaplan's excellent essay collections.

I don't like Michener as a rule, however, Caravans is for the inquisitive and the seeker of fantastic places, a wonderful map of the country, its culture,the beauty of Islam and the sage tirany and power of the Muslem Prists (Mullahs). Even though published in 1962-63 and with the story taking place in 1946, the basics are as true today as 56 years ago! Michener made 9 trips to the country before writing this book and was fascinated by its fabulous beauty, the cruelty of its life-style and terrain, the fantastic legends of past cultures of the Silk Route, the intrinsic problems of its own-going self destruction and the ever changing magic of the Serais,the travellers and Caravans! The Story is easy and a fair yarn. It bespeaks of another time thru the interplay of its main characters and Helen who is one of the first of her generation to realize what now is common knowledge. Michener was a visionary of sorts here and don't be surprise if you pull out your dusty Atlas and search for the "Seventy Mile City," Kandakhar, Kabul, the Palmirs and the high valleys of the Hindu Kush and Khayber Pass. Any one can read this but you need imagination and a bit of the wonderlust for lost places and past civilizations. It makes a good book on tape also. Dead-heads stay away!

The fictional first person account of a young American diplomat in 1940s Afghanistan, Caravans by James Michener weaves a compelling tapestry of adventure, history, and romance. Simultaneously the backdrop and main character, Afghanistan materializes before the reader's eyes with the turning of each page. The story revolves around Mark Miller, assigned to the U.S. embassy in Kabul, and his mission to discover what has happened to a young American woman in Afghanistan whose family has not heard from her in months.

The Afghan mosaic of culture and geography emerges through Michener's writing in one of his most enthusiastic works. Setting forth at an ambling pace, Caravans allows the richness of Afghanistan to permeate the story as the plot asserts itself. The middle portion of the book broadens both the story and the reader's understanding of this foreign land, while the plot accelerates toward the conclusion.

What Caravans leaves to be desired lies in the absence of an adequate treatment of the thousands of years of Afghan history preceding the 20th century. In addition, the conclusion's rapid onset jars the reader out of the book's lullaby rhythm. To be fair, however, doing justice to the entirety of Afghanistan's history would require multiple volumes, and the conclusion, while rapid, presents itself at the appropriate time.

For a reader seeking to understand more about Afghanistan in light of the events of September 11, 2001, Caravans is an especially palatable introduction the country. With no mention of the Taliban nor modern day terrorism, the book nonetheless convinces the reader of the severity of life in Afghanistan.

"Caravans" is one of James Michener's often-overlooked masterpieces. It deserves a wider audience, and not only because of the current war in Afghanistan.
The book is deceptively simple. Deceptive, because it can be read on several different levels. On the most surface level, it is an adventure story of a young American diplomat who travels in one of the world's last exotic places and describes people and scenery almost unimaginably foreign. On another level it is a deeply poignant love story of Mark Miller, the Jewish Yale grad, and Mira, the 17-year-old tribeswoman, that alone would justify the price of the book.
The underlying theme is the struggle between modernity vs. timelessness. The book is not a techno-thriller that moves at breakneck speed; it travels at a slow, deliberate pace that evokes the camel caravans of the centuries. American, Soviet, German, and native engineers may dot the landscape with paved roads, dams, and bridges, but these monuments are never far from cities and archaelogical sites that were old when Alexander the Great ruled Afghanistan, ancient when Muhammad was born.
Did the book help me understand the Afghan people and culture? I can't say. If anything, I think I realize that few Westerners will ever comprehend the Afghan people and culture. One senses that the Taliban may destroy the ancient Buddhas of Bamian and B-52s may level Kabul and Qandahar, Islam itself may be swept from the scene; no matter. The land remains, and the caravans move on.

This 1963 novel is set in 1946 Afghanistan. The plot centers on an American, 26 year old Mark Miller, a Yale graduate who is beginning his career in the foreign service assigned as a junior officer in Afghanistan. The first half of the book delves into Mark's life in Kabul, the limited social life the Westerners lead, the cat and mouse dealings with the local government but especially how the foreigners and the Afghan intellectuals try to work together to bring the country into the 20th century over the opposition of the mullahs. The American Embassy has been pressured by a Senator to locate a missing American girl, Ellen Jasper, who has married an Afghan man and not been heard from by her parents for 13 months.

Mark is assigned the task of tracking her down, no easy task since she has renounced her American citizenship when she married and the Afghan government therefore considers her strictly her husband's business. As Mark follows her trail he begins to get a picture of Ellen from the accounts of those who knew her, her parents, friends, teachers and ultimately her Afghani husband. He also begins to get more information about Afghan society and culture as well. When he finally meets Ellen he realizes that this is not simply a matter of an innocent girl who needs to be rescued but instead a matter of a clash of cultures, a clash that is quite evident throughout the country.

This is an early work of Michener and if the reader is expecting an epic in the nature of HAWAII or ALASKA they will be disappointed. This story does not go back to the beginning, nor does it trace several stories through generations. The action of this story plays out over a few months in 1946 and focuses primarily on Mark. In true Michener fashion we are given a portrait of an entire society, in fact we are shown two for Michener also depicts American culture before the feminist movement, before the Peace Corps, and before the hippies. Ellen is shown as an educated, idealist young woman coping with two societies that have no place for women like her. It is interesting to see how the two vastly different cultures have coped with women like Ellen in the ensuing fifty years. In Afghanistan the mullahs have won and women there today have even less freedom now than they did then. In America women are no longer relegated to the little jobs they held until they married they are able to use their educations in a society that addresses social ills both at home and elsewhere and is more open to other ways of life.