The Patience Stone [Import] [Hardcover]

Atiq Rahimi (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 12, 2010

Winner of France's prestigious Goncourt Prize for 2008, and set in modern-day Aghanistan, this explosive and moving short novel, with a shocking twist, takes a compelling literary look behind the veil, daring to confront taboos of female oppression and sexuality. A young woman sits at her husband's bedside, twisting her worry beads, reciting prayers. Shot in the neck by a fellow soldier, he is in a coma. The passage of time is measured by the sound of his breathing, the slow drip that keeps him alive and the calls to prayer in the streets outside. Consumed by her vigil and his medical care, the woman is alone and desperate for any sign of life from her comatose husband. As her mind appears to unravel, so it becomes intensely clear-sighted. Now is her chance -- her first ever -- to speak without being censored. Empowered by her husband's silence, she steps out of the shadows and begins her confessional...Soldiers raid the flat. In the room she acts out her fantasies and her revenge. But always she comes back to the bedside, to pour out her love and her hate and her sexual desires, as though to a sang-e-sabur -- the black patience stone of Persian mythology. Finally, spurred to new heights of daring, she spills out her most explosive secret.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Rahimi (Earth and Ashes) won the 2008 Prix Goncourt for this brief, melodramatic novel set amid factional violence somewhere in Afghanistan or elsewhere. It follows the circumscribed movements of a Muslim woman largely confined to the house where she nurses her comatose husband, who's been shot by a fellow jihadist. A humorless, inflammatory mullah pays the woman unwelcome visits, and sexually menacing soldiers break into her house. Though such events generate tension and drama, the novel's cultural and historical milieu lacks specificity, and Rahimi may have erred in sketching the story's political context vaguely. For some readers, his intimate attention to objects and spaces may compensate for the grating confessional tenor that develops later, when the narrator divulges damning secrets to her husband's unresponsive body and fulfilling the book's premise a little too obviously by referring to him as her patience stone. McLean's translation is faultless, but the narrator's reminiscences feel stilted; the patience-stone conceit borders on gimmickry; and incidents of a violent or sexual nature seem overdetermined. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Review

A hymn to liberty and love, The Patience Stone rises like a requiem, incantatory, unforgettable. Magic like the patience stone itself. Telerama 20080820 One thinks of Marguerite Duras, the plays of Sartre, the absurdity of Samuel Beckett, even of Ernest Hemingway. Strangely beautiful, poignant, by turns light and serious... The Patience Stone is one of those rare novels which make time elastic; too short, it can be read in one go, yet it never leaves you. Lire

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 160 pages
• Publisher: Chatto & Windus (April 12, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0701184167
• ISBN-13: 978-0701184162
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.7 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (46 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,570,226 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Powerful and unsettling, December 22, 2009

By 

Live2Cruise "Live2Cruise" (USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Patience Stone (Hardcover)

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It was difficult for me to think of a good word to describe this short novel, but "unsettling" seems to capture it. Great works of literature are great because they make us uncomfortable, challenge us, and broaden our horizons. "The Patience Stone" accomplishes this in a surprisingly short, but impactful book. I read through it in one sitting; it was so intense at times I wanted to pull away from it, but couldn't.

It's the story of a nameless Afghan woman who is tending to her husband. He is suffering from a wound he endured, apparently, in one of the ongoing tribal conflicts in the country. He is considered a hero, a soldier of jihad. His wound has left him alive, but silent and unmoving. His wife tends to him and prays for him, but progressively becomes more frustrated with the hopelessness of her situation.

The novel never leaves the room in which the man lies. The setting captures the narrow world of the Afghan woman as she is largely confined to the home. As the woman begins to lose her patience, she starts to confide in her husband as he becomes an embodiment of the legendary patience stone. She gradually unfastens the chains of expectation as she reveals her true thoughts and feelings to her husband for the first time-- sometimes sad, sometimes rageful, and sometimes with surprising secrets that she has kept. The volume of her emotion rises to a powerful crescendo and a climax that is ambiguous and thought-provoking.

The author wastes no words; each sentence is written with grace and precision. It's a powerful novel that seeks to give voice to women in Afghanistan. Very highly recommended.

18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting, metaphorical read, January 2, 2010

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Anna "Anna" (New York) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Patience Stone (Hardcover)

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I'm struck by two things with this short book. The first is that it would be a great book for a women's study class IF it were written by a woman. Unfortunately it is written by a man who is giving us a woman's perspective on one of the most brutal and oppressive societies. In a way, it kind of cheapens the reading experience. The second thing that struck me is that this is a good start for getting alternative voices heard in the publishing world. We need more literature like this from places like Afghanistan. I'm reminded of the writings that coincided with womens suffrage in the US begining in the 1800's, and the writings that came out of the sexual revolution in the 1960's (not that I embrace a lot of this later literature!)

If you like metaphorical writing, The Patience Stone is your treasure trove. Some of the symbolism was easy to catch, other things I could only guess at. It is so easy to see this produced as a play, but the subject matter is almost too disturbing to be experienced in anywhere other than your favorite place to read.

It is well worth the read for anyone who wants to be there as a pebble is dropped into a pond. If women are given a chance at freedom in Afghanistan, a tempest will arise that the world has not seen the likes of in a long while. This is perhaps a reason why the women are so oppressed...the oppressors fear reprisal.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This is made for a great play for broadway/westend, December 18, 2009

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Sincerely Yours - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Patience Stone (Hardcover)

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Could so little be said and yet you have lived a life time after reading this slim book? Wow, what amazing story telling, where the author kept the props very simple and everything was focused on what the woman revealed to us through her daily and repetitive routine, her conversation with her husband (who for all we know was paralysed by a flying bullet) and the background noise from the war. very powerful portrayal of life in a war torn city, religious observations, suppression of women's rights; more importantly, the explosion of emotions, guilt of past and present actions that came pouring out of the woman in a coherent and chronological order of her life. To do to stay alive and an ending you just could not believe: I jumped out of my skin. Gutsy and powerful.