Kafka in Brontëland reviewed by Stevie Davies

None other than Stevie Davies herself, author of a good few books - many of them Brontë-related both in fiction and non-fiction - and whose edition of Jane Eyre will be released on June 29, reviews Tamar Yellin's collection of stories Kafka in Brontëland.

In the world of Tamar Yellin's dark and subtle collection, pariahs settle within spitting distance of one another. Complex, ambivalent and paradoxical, the landscape of her native Yorkshire is charted by discrepant maps. From the melancholy loner Mr Kafka, who has brought a disturbing name to Brontë country, to Mrs Rahim from Lahore who inhabits the "black town" in the valley (which looks rather like Keighley), neighbours are isolated from each other. They live astride invisible borders - expatriate, tragic settlers of a schismatic world to which sombre comedy seems the only sane and temperate response. The beauty of this remarkable first collection is its extension of Jewish diaspora literature, in recognising the ubiquity of diasporas: look back, and exile is universal. The Brontës themselves, symbols of Romantic rootedness, were Irish emigrants. [...]

Yellin's twisted characters reminded me of the "gaunt thorns" in Wuthering Heights, driven into crookedness by the winds "as if craving alms of the sun". Through it all, there moves a unifying spirit of kindness and intelligence which marks Tamar Yellin out as a short-story writer of rare distinction.

As usual, if anyone happens to read the book and feels like reviewing it for us from a Brontë perspective, you are more than welcome to forward it to us! :)

Categories: Books