Customer Reviews

A GUEST OF HONOUR

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This is Gordimer's greatest work. The 1970s review of the work in the New York Times noted that few people have read it but everyone has a comment on it. It is a shame that so few have read this because more than any of her other works, in this she connects Africa to the West.

The story concerns a man who clearly took a side during a fictional African state's colonial struggle and now post-independence must reconcile his beliefs with the individuals he has trained and befriended through years of fighting imperialism. During the story, one learns that the former colonial administrator is clearly an imperfect man with an ability to actively participate in events rather than merely watch them pass. She creates her own world and then populates it with very real, very memorable characters.

Throughout the work, Gordimer does a superb job of outlining the dilemmas many African leaders faced in the 1960s and 1970s -- particularly whether to retain ties to Western economic interests and find better ways of empowering the disenfranchised. Her descriptions of the PIP could stand in for descriptions of South Africa's ANC or Zimbabwe's ZANU-PF and how they struggled to work with trade unions or organized workers.

In "The Conservationist," she blew up "The Story of an African Farm." In "Burger's Daughter," she predicted what would happen following a generation of white liberals. In "July's People," she captured the urgency of South Africa into the 1980s. Here, she creates an entire world -- one that is all too relevant today, 40 years later.

The title pretty much says it all. Despite what the other review says, all of Gordimer's work is still relevant. It is the human feeling and emotion she uses to describe past events that make them understandable to us in the present day. Not only is this a book about historical events- it is an eternal story about human interactions and love. Gordimer has a rare gift that allows the reader to see these past events as representations of human actions, thought processes, and feelings that are repeated around the world today and across time. This book is a little hard to get into, but if you get through it and can understand it- it is a story you will never forget. Gordimer's ability to tell such a complex and human story is awe-inspiring. This one still haunts me, and I read it a long time ago.

My book club chose Guest of Honour for at our last meeting. We wanted to read something by Nadine Gordimer, and we found a site on her which described Guest of Honour as "arguably her best book." Ignoring our usual rule that choices be one-finger length classics, we went with Guest of Honour. When we managed to find copies of the 500+ tome, we were all immediately sorry. One needs waders to get through. Since I was the one who had proposed her name to my group, I felt honor bound to get through it. "Something must happen eventually," I thought, as I turned over page after page. Not that Gordimer isn't a fine writer. At no point does she lapse into the sentimental, the untrue, or the awkward. She deals with the world she creates at a subtle level. She is obviously a writer of great talent. I can only think that Guest of Honour no longer appeals because it is set in the 70s, and written about events in the late 60s. She describes British whites living with Africans. In the 70s, this would have been startling. Today, it doesn't mean anything at all. She describes the sad degeneracy of a hopeful young nation from rule of the people to chaotic government by a cruel few. So did George Orwell in Animal Farm. So did Arthur Koestler in Darkness before Noon. So, for that matter, did Hossein in Kite Runner.

I'd rather read Kite Runner. It's shorter, and things happen in it.