What a truly amazing novel. I am not sure any review I could write would give it enough credit. Stretching over several generations, this novel begins with the theft of an important sketch by Chagall by Benjamin Ziskind, a once-child prodigy that has yet to find his way in the world. From there, we are taken back to an orphanage in Soviet Russia, in which Chagall taught, and up through the generations until we again meet Ben and his twin sister Sara as adults. Throughout the novel, art becomes the theme that holds everything together as a cohesive whole, beginning with the bestowal of that sketch onto an ancestor of Ben and Sara's, a boy who has seen horrible, awful things, and hidden in an open grave to save himself until he was found and taken to the orphanage, where Chagall becomes his art instructor. Each subsequent generation is subjected to terrible violence, and yet art and beauty is always there. Horn's writing is absolutely magnificent. There were several places in the novel where I thought I was reading something similar to The Book Thief by Zusak, due to the vivid imagery and the way in which all the senses are employed in unusual ways. In the midst of the section on Vietnam, in which I hated Horn a bit for the extremely vivid way in which she brought the horror of guerrilla warfare to light, she writes, "Later it would amaze him how vividly he would remember every detail from the next few moments, as if all his senses had been sharpened into knives of hearing, seeing, smelling, taste, and touch, carving every detail of those moments onto his skin and into his brain." Senses as knives... I love that image. But the best part of all for me was the very last chapter, in which the next generation is still in the womb. Horn stipulates a world in which all the babies yet to be born go to school for nine months to learn everything there is to learn before birth, yet just before they're sent down to earth, the angels press a finger to the babies' lips -- and they forget it all. In this prenatal school, they lounge in pools of love, eat paintings for sustenance, and drink books as if they contained alcohol. It's a really amazing world she paints; it is, indeed, the world to come.
In the beginning I had such high hopes for this book. The story got off to a very intriguing start when a man, Benjamin Ziskind, walks out of a museum with a Chagall painting he believes used to hang in his parents' house. The story then flashes back in time to Russia in the 1920s to begin to explain how the Ziskind family acquired the painting. I loved the parallel stories and though I sometimes found it hard to follow the connections, I figured it would be explained in time. And I grew to like the characters, each of whom had his or her own cross to bear. As the story proceeded it still didn't seem to be making much sense and the author launched into some strange tangents. Oh well, I thought, it'll work itself out. But no, it didn't. Instead the second half of the book degenerates into a muddled mess and the author's tangents become increasingly bizarre. How could any reader make sense of this? The author seemed to become so confused with her own story that in the end even she couldn't make sense of it. She certainly bit off more than she could chew. The last chapter, featuring the already-weres and not-yets, preparing baby Daniel for his arrival on earth (see what I mean?), is so painfully long and boring I thought I was going to scream. And to make matters worse, many very important things were left unexplained at the end. That's OK in some books but NOT in this one. I feel very cheated--this was so promising in the first half but I felt like I wasted my time on the dreadful second half.
What do You think about The World To Come (2006)?
An absolutely exquisite, beautifully written book! I loved the Yiddish folklore included throughout the book (especially the story of the already born returning to heaven to prepare the not yet born for their lives) and the ideas of the not yet borns "eating" art and "drinking" literature in heaven in preparation for their future life on earth. The author tells the story of a Chagall painting and the impact it has on all the individuals within three generations of the family who come to possess it. Ben is a 30 year old Jewish man recovering from divorce who recognizes a Chagall painting formerly owned by his family while attending an art reception as urged by his twin sister Sara. He steals the painting, setting off a series of events that will change his life and the lives of those around him. At times painful to read, the author traces the lives and circumstances of Ben, his sister, their parents and grandfather, who as an orphan in 1920's Russia, was taught art by Chagall himself. Absolutely stunning - one of the best books I've read in a long, long time. Read this book immediately!
—Christia
The World to Come is far and away the best work of fiction I have read in a very, very long time. It is beautifully written, with haunting characters and stories that will stay with me forever. Run, don’t walk, to buy this book - you should own it, not just check it out from the library.Other than that, I don’t really know what to say. I am still reflecting and absorbing the things Horn writes about, and the way in which she writes about them. This is the newest member of my “best books ever” list.
—Bethany
I finished this book several hours ago thinking about it ever since. Magical realism with Jewish-Russian themes. The color and light of a Chagall painting told in chapter, verse and fable. The horror and memory of countless acts of violence spanning from the destruction of the first temple and the diaspera of millenea. The savagry of the 20th century masked in political "isms", leading to the terror of today. This book is about all these things and much much more.The stories and the characters will live with me for a long, long, time. I loved the stories by "The Hidden One" an acquaintence and contemporary of Chagall whose many layered stories were later retrieved from the dustpan of obscurity and given new life as children's books complete with illustrations. I loved the characters of the fraternal twins and thier parents and the vivid retelling of the experience of Vietnam. And I loved the way the stories of the past and present echoed each other in a life affirming manner despite the horrors human beings inflict upon each other. The last chapter was a revelation to me. Without giving anything away I will say it captured my imagination and my emotions on a profound level. I am delighted to find a writer new to me who can paint pictures and stories with words that are both memorable and touching.
—Marsha
