THE WHITE SHIP

by Chingiz Aitmatov ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 7, 1972

Unacceptably fatalistic by the standards of socialist realism (it created a tempest when first published in Novy Mir) and even a little unsettling when matched against our own expectations for juvenile fiction, the haunting parable of an orphan boy who dreams of becoming a fish so that he can join his father who, he believes, sails in the white ship on Issyk-Kul lake. The boy and his grandfather Momun, nicknamed ""obliging,"" are part of a small band of Bugu (Kirghiz) tribesmen under the domination of the petty tyrant Orozkul who robs the state by selling off logs from the Forest Preserve and violates the clan's totem, the Horned Mother Deer, by forcing Momun to shoot a doe. Seeing his grandfather humiliated and his last hope of prevailing against Orozkul crushed, the boy decides that the time has come for the swim to Issk-Kul and plunges to his death. The suicide is not handled realistically, but as a symbolic escape -- an act of affirmation in the context of a story which accepts both the Mother Deer tradition and the boy's feelings of being a stranger among his own people as utterly serious. It isn't necessary to decipher all the implications, political and otherwise (discussed in the introduction) to appreciate this blend of regional flavor and mythic reverberations as something special.

Pub Date: Aug. 7, 1972

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1972

Categories: FICTION