 |
|
Title: The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf: A Novel
ISBN: 0786715197
Author:
Mohja Kahf
Publicate Date: 2006-09-11
Publish: 2006-09-11
List Price: $15.95
Average Customer Rating: 4.5
Format: Paperback
 |
|
|
|
|
Amazon Lowest New Price: $7.45
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $5.82
Amazon Merchant Price: $11.65
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Customer Review: |
|
1: Muslim-America's Cisneros
If you like the work of Sandra Cisneros, then Mohja Kahf's The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf should be at the top of your reading queue. Khadra's story is one that is specifically Muslim-American, yet doesn't have to be. At the heart of a novel is a young woman trying to fit in to her surroundings, adapt to the changing world, and make sense of her roots, who she was, and who she wants to be. Yes, she is Muslim, but she could just as easily be from a conservative Baptist, Roman Catholic, or Jewish background. The brilliance of the novel is that the story is universal. We don't need to be Latino/a to like Cisneros, or African-American to appreciate Toni Morrison, or Irish-American to enjoy Frank McCourt, and we certainly don't need to be Muslim to become entralled with The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf. Merely being human and being curious about people and the world around us (especially considering the political/religious/economic environment of today) is reason enough to read and enjoy this excellent debut novel.
|
2: Smart and Sophisticated
My professor used this book in our Women in World Religions class, and I was also lucky enough to have the author come visit our college and do a reading. I found it to be a wonderful book, and when the author herself read it sounded as beautiful as her poetry collections.
This book is sophisticated in it's scope and view of the world, not narrowing things down to a dichotomy of good/evil or right/wrong. It provides a point of view, an example of a powerful, personal, experience. Mohja has said it is not meant to be autobiographical, but it is easy to imagine as the real experience of a woman growing up Muslim in the US. It is not always pretty, and I found myself elated or crying by a twist or turn of the plot. Khadra is an utterly compelling and interesting character, with a smart, independent streak that opens up her world into a myriad questions and possibilities. Some of these the book explores, but it is also powerful what is left unsaid and unexplored by the author, but merely pointed at.
The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf may be too much for some people to swallow or relate to however, since it provides perhaps a different world-view than many of us are used to. I would recommend it in a heartbeat though, just to broaden someone's world view and provide an interesting read. It starts off a little slow, but then grabs you and will not let you go until you've read that last page. I got way ahead of my prof's schedule for reading this one!
|
3: tough book
I found this book difficult to read. Being jewish gave me an alternative viewpoint to the main character and her ever changing ideaologies without an outlet to vent them. She seemed overly emotional and perpetually confused.
|
4: THe Girl in the Tangerine Scarf
It was a difficult book to get into but once past the beginning I enjoyed it quite a bit. A good window into how difficult it is for a Muslim to assimilate into American culture. I felt a glossary would have been a big help for the many Muslim words used in the text.
|
5: Positive Classroom Use
This year, I had my Freshman Comp students read GTS and write an essay in response to it. Many responded negatively to the opening chapters of the novel, with its apparent "America bashing," as one student put it, many characters, and frequent use of Arabic expressions. But by the end, the large majority were expressing an appreciation for the novel in harmony with the positive reviews posted here. The novel enabled great discussions of how our values are shaped and the degree to which we have recognized and dealt with cultural, religious, political, and racial prejudices.
One could indeed wish that there had been further editing of the book, but there is a link between the style and organization of the novel and Khadra's profession of photographer: the novel is like a photo album, with some pictures that we want to study in detail and others that will just receive a quick glance. Throughout the album, pictures are thematically linked by images of, for example, headscarves of different colors, insects in different stages, and modes of transport of varying power. While most of the pictures focus our attention on Moslems in America, their composition encourages linking them with photos in the albums of other Americans: for example, Sue Monk Kidd's dance as a dissident daughter, school bullies, Malcolm X's radicalism tempered by disillusionment with a religious leader and by haj, red pick-ups, a rabbi in a nation officially hostile to Israel, St. Paul's Damascus road experience, the City of Brotherly and Sisterly Love, Plato's liberated prisoner stumbling around after being in the light, and the Indy 500.
I am glad to have this novel for use in the classroom.
|
|
|
|
|
