Word: saskiad
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...Award-winning fantasy The Golden Compass. Both of these books feature young women as the epic heroes of their own journeys of exploration and education, both were first released in Europe and both have a thing about Scandinavia and snow. Brian Hall's new coming-of-age epic, The Saskiad, has these things in common with the aforementioned books, but in all important respects it stands completely apart. Hall's book is a pleasurable read, a titillatingly sensual piece of prose and a fascinating intellectual journey...
...title suggests, The Saskiad is structured along the lines of classical epic: just as the Aeneid is about Aeneas, so is the Saskiad the story of Saskia White. Saskia, a twelve-year-old of fierce intelligence and a tendency toward literary agglomeration, lives with her ex-hippie mother and a horde of small children and quiet adults in a tumbledown former commune near Ithaca, New York. Busying herself during the day with school, the little ones and cooking duties, Saskia spends her off hours reading. The imaginary world she creates around herself is rich with the images and characters...
...Saskiad does bring up extremely adult issues: ecological activism and "ecofascism," the legacy of the communes and free-love systems of the 70s, the kinds of love that can form a home and the lies that family members tell each other, the "salty" nature of adolescent sexuality. Hall deserves commendation for apparently realizing that emerging adolescent awareness of sexuality is not a monolithic experience and for portraying it in Saskia in a way unique to and coherent with her character. Saskia has a homoerotically charged relationship with the beautiful Jane from the first, and discovery of sexuality, both same...
Hall turns out to be a Harvard alum--a 1981 summa graduate in English, thus giving English concentrators hope despite that bleak job market--but you shouldn't let that fact dissuade you from reading his book. The Saskiad may or may not be a worthy successor to Ulysses, but it is a terribly enjoyable read and it's studded with images and ideas that will make your mind sing. If you're in the mood, you probably won't regret splurging on the hardcover edition of The Saskiad--that format seems somehow most appropriate for a heroic epic...
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