genre: historical fiction
The Last of Earth is a story of Tibet in the 1860s, a harsh and rugged land that has forbidden outsiders to cross its border. But for two travelers from England, the belief that this rule does not apply to them means that they find themselves with tents and local guides helping them traverse this unfamiliar country. Told from two different points of view, we see the world through the eyes of colonialism, racism, and even classism. One of narrators is a the surveyor for a blustering English captain whose goal is to chart a particular river the runs through Tibet. He has a large band of paid labor to help him cart all his stuff and aide him with his surveying. The other narrator is a 50 something year old woman who just has desperate dreams of exploration.
I'm just not feeling particularly literary right now in my thoughts about this book. It was slooowww going for me, unfortunately. I appreciated learning about Tibet and some of the geographical features of the area. I liked when the two storylines would just occasionally intersect for a hot minute before going separate ways again. It definitely made me think about the impact of British colonization, both in huge and small ways - and then to see the flip side of it, where the Tibetans were having NONE of this, refusing to have their land and culture be Anglicized. The superiority complex of the British over the native people is so hard to look at, it's so deeply offensive, even though I know it is accurate to the time period.
Am I glad I stuck it out? I can't decide, honestly. The ending was rather blah and so the whole thing, while definitely a journey with a few lovely minutes, just leaves me feeling only spent, not exhilarated or redeemed or really anything other than meh.
No comments:
Post a Comment