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Mister Pip Gebundene Ausgabe – 31. Juli 2007
On a copper-rich tropical island shattered by war, where the teachers have fled with most everyone else, only one white man chooses to stay behind: the eccentric Mr. Watts, object of much curiosity and scorn, who sweeps out the ruined schoolhouse and begins to read to the children each day from Charles Dickens’s classic Great Expectations.
So begins this rare, original story about the abiding strength that imagination, once ignited, can provide. As artillery echoes in the mountains, thirteen-year-old Matilda and her peers are riveted by the adventures of a young orphan named Pip in a city called London, a city whose contours soon become more real than their own blighted landscape. As Mr. Watts says, “A person entranced by a book simply forgets to breathe.” Soon come the rest of the villagers, initially threatened, finally inspired to share tales of their own that bring alive the rich mythology of their past. But in a ravaged place where even children are forced to live by their wits and daily survival is the only objective, imagination can be a dangerous thing.
- Seitenzahl der Print-Ausgabe256 Seiten
- SpracheEnglisch
- HerausgeberDial Pr
- Erscheinungstermin31. Juli 2007
- Abmessungen12.93 x 2.46 x 19.76 cm
- ISBN-100385341067
- ISBN-13978-0385341066
Produktbeschreibungen
Pressestimmen
"Genuinely affecting.... A book with worthwhile thoughts to impart."—The New York Times
“Mister Pip is sheer magic, a story about stories and their power to transcend the limits of imagination and reside in the deep heart's core. Lloyd Jones is a brave and fierce writer, and he has given us Dickens brand new again.”—Keith Donohue, author of The Stolen Child
"Jones's prose is fautless.... With a mixture of thrill and unease, Matilda discovers independent thought, and Jones captures the intricate, emotionally loaded evolution of the mother-daughter relationship."—Publishers Weekly
“The novel is a paean to the transformative power of literature, particularly its ability to occlude an unpleasant reality with a fictional alternative and to expand an individual's sense of possibility.”—New York Sun
“Not just a delightful read, Mister Pip shows the cut and thrust of true multiculturalism.”—Atlantic Monthly
Über den Autor und weitere Mitwirkende
Leseprobe. Abdruck erfolgt mit freundlicher Genehmigung der Rechteinhaber. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.
EVERYONE CALLED HIM POP EYE. EVEN IN those days, when I was a skinny thirteen-year-old, I thought he probably knew about his nickname but didn't care. His eyes were too interested in what lay up ahead to notice us barefoot kids.
He looked like someone who had seen or known great suffering and hadn't been able to forget it. His large eyes in his large head stuck out further than anyone else's--like they wanted to leave the surface of his face. They made you think of someone who can't get out of the house quickly enough.
Pop Eye wore the same white linen suit every day. His trousers snagged on his bony knees in the sloppy heat. Some days he wore a clown's nose. His nose was already big. He didn't need that red lightbulb. But for reasons we couldn't think of he wore the red nose on certain days--which may have meant something to him. We never saw him smile. And on those days he wore the clown's nose you found yourself looking away because you never saw such sadness.
He pulled a piece of rope attached to a trolley on which Mrs. Pop Eye stood. She looked like an ice queen. Nearly every woman on our island had crinkled hair, but Grace had straightened hers. She wore it piled up, and in the absence of a crown her hair did the trick. She looked so proud, as if she had no idea of her own bare feet. You saw her huge bum and worried about the toilet seat. You thought of her mother and birth and that stuff.
At two-thirty in the afternoon the parrots sat in the shade of the trees and looked down at a human shadow one-third longer than any seen before. There were only the two of them, Mr. and Mrs. Pop Eye, yet it felt like a procession.
The younger kids saw an opportunity and so fell in behind. Our parents looked away. They would rather stare at a colony of ants moving over a rotting pawpaw. Some stood by with their idle machetes, waiting for the spectacle to pass. For the younger kids the sight consisted only of a white man towing a black woman. They saw what the parrots saw, and what the dogs saw while sitting on their scrawny arses snapping their jaws at a passing mosquito. Us older kids sensed a bigger story. Sometimes we caught a snatch of conversation. Mrs. Watts was as mad as a goose. Mr. Watts was doing penance for an old crime. Or maybe it was the result of a bet. The sight represented a bit of uncertainty in our world, which in every other way knew only sameness.
Mrs. Pop Eye held a blue parasol to shade herself from the sun. It was the only parasol in the whole of the island, so we heard. We didn't ask after all the black umbrellas we saw, let alone the question: what was the difference between these black umbrellas and the parasol? And not because we cared if we looked dumb, but because if you went too far with a question like that one, it could turn a rare thing into a commonplace thing. We loved that word--parasol--and we weren't about to lose it just because of some dumb-arse question. Also, we knew, whoever asked that question would get a hiding, and serve them bloody right too.
They didn't have any kids. Or if they did they were grown up and living somewhere else, maybe in America, or Australia or Great Britain. They had names. She was Grace and black like us. He was Tom Christian Watts and white as the whites of your eyes, only sicker.
There are some English names on the headstones in the church graveyard. The doctor on the other side of the island had a full Anglo-Saxon name even though he was black like the rest of us. So, although we knew him as Pop Eye we used to say "Mr. Watts" because it was the only name like it left in our district.
They lived alone in the minister's old house. You couldn't see it from the road. It used to be surrounded by grass, according to my mum. But after the minister died the authorities forgot about the mission and the lawnmower rusted. Soon the bush grew up around the house, and by the time I was born Mr. and Mrs. Pop Eye had sunk out of view of the world. The only times we saw them was when Pop Eye, looking like a tired old nag circling the well, pulled his wife along in the trolley. The trolley had bamboo rails. Mrs. Pop Eye rested her hands on these.
o be a show-off you need an audience. But Mrs. Pop Eye didn't pay us any attention. We weren't worthy of that. It was as if we didn't exist. Not that we cared. Mr. Watts interested us more.
Because Pop Eye was the only white for miles around, little kids stared at him until their ice blocks melted over their black hands. Older kids sucked in their breath and knocked on his door to ask to do their "school project" on him. When the door opened some just froze and stared. I knew an older girl who was invited in; not everyone was. She said there were books everywhere. She asked him to talk about his life. She sat in a chair next to a glass of water he had poured for her, pencil in hand, notebook open. He said: "My dear, there has been a great deal of it. I expect more of the same." She wrote this down. She showed her teacher, who praised her initiative. She even brought it over to our house to show me and my mum, which is how I know about it.
It wasn't just for the fact he was the last white man that made Pop Eye what he was to us--a source of mystery mainly, but also confirmation of something else we held to be true.
We had grown up believing white to be the color of all the important things, like ice cream, aspirin, ribbon, the moon, the stars. White stars and a full moon were more important when my grandfather grew up than they are now that we have generators.
When our ancestors saw the first white they thought they were looking at ghosts or maybe some people who had just fallen into bad luck. Dogs sat on their tails and opened their jaws to await the spectacle. The dogs thought they were in for a treat. Maybe these white people could jump backwards or somersault over trees. Maybe they had some spare food. Dogs always hope for that.
The first white my grandfather saw was a shipwrecked yachtsman who asked him for a compass. My grandfather didn't know what a compass was, so he knew he didn't have one. I picture him clasping his hands at his back and smiling. He wouldn't want to appear dumb. The white man asked for a map. My grandfather didn't know what he was asking for, and so pointed down at the man's cut feet. My grandfather wondered how the sharks had missed that bait. The white man asked where he had washed up. At last my grandfather could help. He said it was an island. The white man asked if the island had a name. My grandfather replied with the word that means "island." When the man asked directions to the nearest shop my grandfather burst out laughing. He pointed up at a coconut tree and back over the white's shoulder whence he had come, meaning the bloody great ocean stocked with fish. I have always liked that story.
Other than Pop Eye or Mr. Watts, and some Australian mine workers, I'd seen few other living whites. The ones I had seen were in an old film. At school we were shown the visit by the duke of something or other many years before in nineteen-hundred-and-something. The camera kept staring at the duke and saying nothing. We watched the duke eat. The duke and the other whites wore mustaches and white trousers. They even wore buttoned-up jackets. They weren't any good at sitting on the ground either. They kept rolling over onto their elbows. We all laughed--us kids--at the whites trying to sit on the ground as they would in a chair. They were handed pig trotters in banana leaves. One man in a helmet could be seen asking for something. We didn't know what until he was brought a piece of white cloth, which he used to wipe his mouth. We roared our heads off laughing.
Mostly, though, I was watching out for my grandfather. He was one of the skinny kids marching by...
Produktinformation
- Herausgeber : Dial Pr (31. Juli 2007)
- Sprache : Englisch
- Gebundene Ausgabe : 256 Seiten
- ISBN-10 : 0385341067
- ISBN-13 : 978-0385341066
- Abmessungen : 12.93 x 2.46 x 19.76 cm
- Kundenrezensionen:
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Der neuseeländische Autor Lloyd Jones erzählt die Geschichte von Matilda (Ich-Erzählerin), die in der ersten Hälfte 13 bis 15 Jahre alt ist und die sich mit Pip, dem Ich-Erzähler aus den Großen Erwartungen, identifiziert, obwohl sie schwarz und ein Mädchen ist. Als Grund gibt sie an, dass ihr „das Buch, als sie es dringend brauchte, eine andere Welt geöffnet hat“(S.256).
Schauplatz des Romans ist eine abtrünnige Provinz von Papua-Neuguinea. Hier herrschte in den Jahren 1991 bis 1993, in denen der Roman spielt, ein blutiger Bürgerkrieg, der hierzulande nahezu unbekannt geblieben ist.
Matilda gelingt es schließlich, der Hölle zu entkommen. Sie wird zum Flüchtling und gelangt nach Australien, wo sie weiter zur Schule geht, studiert und später ihre Doktorarbeit über Dickens schreibt.
Das Buch ist in Teilen sehr spannend zu lesen und regt besonders über folgende Fragen zum Nachdenken an:
Macht und Ohnmacht der Literatur
Der Lehrer liest mit den Schülern den Roman von Dickens und ermöglicht ihnen damit, der grausamen Wirklichkeit auf ihrer Insel zu entfliehen. Der Lehrer, eine wichtige Figur für die Schüler, bleibt letztendlich ohnmächtig und wird auf grausame Weise zu Tode gebracht.
Blick des Emigranten
Als Matilda viel später die Schauplätze des Dickens-Romans in England besucht, betrachtet sie diese mit dem Blick der Emigrantin. Sie verfällt ebenso wie Grace, eine weitere Figur aus dem Buch, in eine Depression und macht sich Gedanken, warum.
Creative Writing: vermischt die Welt der Insel und des viktorianischen England
Der Lehrer lässt (ebenso wie der Autor, Lloyd Jones) die Verwandten der Kinder zu Wort kommen und die mündlich überlieferten Geschichten ihrer Insel erzählen. Dies vermischt sich mit den kreativ weiter entwickelten Geschichten aus den „Großen Erwartungen“. Dass Dickens auf moderne Autoren des „Creative Writings“ einen produktiven Einfluss hat, habe ich schon bei der Lektüre von T.C.Boyles „Wassermusik“ bemerkt.
Ein unbekannter, sehr brutaler Bürgerkrieg
Die Insel Bougainville, auf der eine australische Firma eine Kupfermine betrieb und dabei die Umwelt so zerstörte, dass sich eine „Revolutionäre Armee“ bildete und die Mine bekämpfte, war mir bisher unbekannt. Lloyd Jones hat nicht einfach ein Buch über diesen Bürgerkrieg geschrieben, sondern dieses Thema sehr interessant verpackt. Und trotzdem beschönigt er nichts.
Rassismus
Der Lehrer, Mr. Watts, ist der einzige verbliebene Weiße in Matildas Dorf. Die Schüler machen sich Gedanken, wie es wohl ist, weiß zu sein und bekommen darauf eine interessante Antwort. Das ändert nichts daran, dass Mr. Watts für einige zum Sündenbock wird. Seine Hauptwidersacherin verteidigt ihn aber schließlich als „guten Menschen“ und wird dafür umgebracht.
Fazit: Der Roman „Mister Pip“ ist eine sehr interessante zeitgenössische Adaption des Dickens-Romans und bietet viel Stoff zum Nachdenken. Ich bewerte ihn mit 4 Sternen.
Er ist in NZ und Australien angelaufen ... the POWER of STORY ist das thema ... eine traumwelt ...
' I love books about books and how good literature can change your life/provide an escape route in times of trouble and/or open up new worlds ('Great Expectations'),
' I love tropical island settings with their gorgeous fauna and flora (Bougainville Island)
' I love a young child narrator (Matilda)
' I love a strong mother-daughter relationship (Matilda - Dolores)
' I love learning historical facts (brutal civil war between local Bougainvillean rebels and government soldiers from Papua New Guinea involving the Australian-run copper-mine, followed by a blockade of the island).
It was all there but something did not quite work for me in the way the story was put together. At times it is almost boring and repetitive, at times it depicts the most unspeakable cruelty, at times there is too much local folklore and too much weirdness in the messages covering the room in the N.Z. house. And mainly, throughout the novel Mr. Watts remains an insubstantial and elusive figure. Even after Matilda discovers his and Grace's story they still remain the most vague and least fleshed-out characters in the book.
Erzählt werden die Ereignisse aus der Sicht der jungen Mathilda. Seit alle Lehrer von der Insel geflohen sind, verfügt sie über mehr Freizeit, als sie sinnvoll zu füllen vermag. Bis eines Tages der letzte Weiße auf der Insel die vakante Stellung übernimmt. Mr. Watts hat nicht auf alles eine Antwort, aber auf einem Gebiet ist er unschlagbar: Charles Dickens. Er liest den Schülern dessen Roman Große Erwartungen vor. Jeden Tag ein Kapitel, neunundfünfzig Tage lang.
Mathildas strenggläubige Mutter sieht mit wachsendem Unbehagen, wie sich ihre Tochter immer mehr Mr. Watts und dem Buch von Charles Dickens zu und gleichzeitig von ihr und der Bibel abwendet. Sie plant, Watts Einfluss zu brechen und stürzt damit das ganze Dorf ins Verderben. Zudem erfahren die Soldaten von dem rätselhaften Mister Pip und halten ihn durch eine Reihe von Missverständnissen für einen Rebellen, ohne zu ahnen, dass er die Hauptfigur von Große Erwartungen ist. Sie verlangen seine Auslieferung und drohen, das Dorf dem Erdboden gleichzumachen. Doch das Buch und damit der einzige Beweis für den fiktionalen Charakter Mister Pip, ist plötzlich verschwunden.
Man muss Große Erwartungen nicht kennen, um der Handlung zu folgen, aber man bekommt große Lust darauf. So wie die ganze Schulklasse den Abenteuern von Pip, Estella und Magwitch lauscht, so gespannt verfolgt der Leser dieses Buches die Ereignisse um Mathilda und Mr. Watts. Jones schafft es, die Faszination von Büchern zu vermitteln. Anstelle von Dickens' Roman kann jeder Leser sein eigenes Lieblingsbuch einsetzen und wird auf das angenehmste daran erinnert, warum wir Bücher lieben. Es zeigt die Macht der Phantasie und die Magie des Lesens. Als im Buch das einzige Exemplar von Große Erwartungen ein Opfer der Flammen wird, beginnt die Klasse ein einzigartiges Experiment. Sie fangen an, die Geschichte aus der Erinnerung neu zu erschaffen. Wie Puzzleteile tragen sie alles zusammen, ergänzen sich gegenseitig und Mr. Watts schreibt alles gewissenhaft nieder.
Mister Pip ist spannend, unterhaltsam und wirklich wunderschön. Allerdings kein Kinderbuch. Eine bittere Lehre, die man aus der Lektüre ziehen muss: Literatur kann uns ans bessere Orte entführen, Trost und Freude spenden und über ein freudloses Dasein hinweghelfen, aber sie kann nicht vor der Brutalität der realen Welt beschützen.
Spitzenrezensionen aus anderen Ländern
This novel is about the power of the narrative to not only entertain but to allow reflection on personal experience. Life is so full of many experiences, many of which we barely have time to remember, or analyze. The power of novels is their ability to help people, at a conscious or unconscious level, organize their experiences and put meaning or new meaning on life experiences. There is a wonderful passage in this novel where Great Expectations disappears and the students, with the help of Mr. Watts, reconstructions the story. The story is more than just a parable on the power of the narrative form, though this is certainly a characteristic of this novel. The scenes where the children reconstruct the novel from memory or the scenes where Mr. Watts agrees to tell the military insurgents the story of Mr. Pip every night for 6 nights are brilliant. The early chapters where island life and myth infiltrate the story line and dialogue are magical. The final chapters where Matilda is an adult and reflects upon her childhood are beautifully written. This novel is highly recommended.