December 2018
In 2013 I was still a member of a reading group which concentrated on translated fiction. (In Great Britain there is a prejudice, that translated fiction isn’t really like the original and that is why people do not read it so much. Unless it is a classic or a crime novel. Then it is not viewed as “translated”. They are crazy those Brits 😉 ). I had my old blog set so my book reviews on Goodreads were automatically posted to my old blog.
November 2013
Bundu by Chris Barnard
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I enjoyed this book even though I did not really know in the beginning what to think about it. It’s not clear to me if that is because I did not know the author or anything about the country and culture it was written in. Probably. There were also quite a few expressions which I had to look up because I could not make any sense of them.
What kept me reading was the woman the main character fell in love with. I think it is mainly a love story even though it is described as a hunger disaster and how the characters deal with it in the blurb of the book. But for me, Julia, who tries desperately to save the starving people in her vicinity, was the driving character and the one who kept me reading.
I wanted to know more about her. I wanted to know if those two would come together and if there would be a happy end. In the course, I learned a lot about South-Africa, about life in Africa and how crazy life, in general, can be.
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Oktober 2016
2013 war ich immer noch Mitglied einer Buchgruppe, die sich auf uebersetzte Literatur konzentrierte. (In Grossbritannien gibt es ein Vorurteil, dass uebersetzte Literatur nicht wirklich so ist wie das original und so wird sie nicht soviel gelesen. Es sei denn es handelt sich um einen Klassiker oder Krimis. Dann werden die Buecher nicht als “uebersetzt” angesehen. Die spinnen, die Briten 😉 ). Auf meinem alten Blog wurden meine Goodreads Besprechungen automatisch veroeffentlicht.
November 2013
Ich habe dieses Buch genossen, obwohl ich zu Beginn nicht richtig wusste, was ich davon halten sollte. Vielleicht kam das daher, dass ich den Autoren nicht kannte und auch nichts von dem Land und der Kultur ueber das es geschrieben wurde wusste. Vermutlich. Da gab es auch einige Ausdruecke, die ich nachschlagen musste, weil sie mir ueberhaupt nichts sagten.
Was mich am lesen gehalten hat, war die Frau, in die sich die Hauptperson verliebt hatte. Ich denke diese Geschichte ist in erster Linie eine Liebesgeschichte auch wenn sie oft als Hungerdesaster und wie die Charaktere damit umgehen, beschrieben wird. Aber Julia, die verzweifelt versucht, die verhungernden Menschen in ihrer Umgebung zu retten, war diejenige, die mich am Lesen hielt.
Ich wollte mehr ueber sie wissen. Ich wollte wissen, ob die zwei zusammenkommen und ob es ein Happy End geben wuerde. Dazwischen habe ich Neues ueber Suedafrika, ueber das Leben in Afrika und wie verrueckt das Leben general manchmal sein kann, gelernt.
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Find more of my book reviews on Butterfly-O-Meter.
the-bee-writes.com 
He is a wonderful writer. Painted our South Africa in words.
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Unfortunately, I haven’t read any other book by him. Any suggestions? 🙋
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I will scan which books are translated and give you a list. He is a master of Afrikaans prose. My mother tongue sings in his writing.!
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I know a little Dutch and have tried to read some of your Afrikaans posts. Your language sounds very poetic. Is it very different to Dutch or is it more a question of accent?
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Afrikaans is a young language – and is a mixture of Dutch, Khoi, Malay, French and so on. It is family, but also not. I am thinking of writing my posts in Afrikaans and English, will it help?
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Its a lot of work to do posts in two languages. I used to do it in German and English. And as I am looking to learn Dutch first might not help me particularly. But I think you write about interesting things in your country in Afrikaans so it would be great to be able to read that too. However, WP offers great translation tools (I have google translate on mine) and I am happy to use them 🙋
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🤗 then I will stick to my home lsnguage and do English posts when the spirit leads me. Best wishes from a sweltering heatwave drought stricken Polokwane, Limpopo, South Africa. Groete/ Greetings
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Oh dear, we had our own heatwave in summer. It’s always strange for me to think that it’s summer in your corner of the world now… 🙋 hope it gets better soon!
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Thanks that is great!!!! 😗😗🙋
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Google translate services for Afrikaans is scary…Maybe a good English/Afrikaans online dictionary is safer. I would think the English/Dutch/German translations are fine.
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LOL I know. My stepchildren and I used to play with it translating between German and English and the other way round. It was hilarious… What is the official language in Southafrica? Or do you have more than one like Switzerland?
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We have 11 official languages., English, Afrikaans, Zulu, Xhosa, Ndebele, Northern Sotho or Sepedi, Sotho, SiSwati, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, and . Most South Africans speak more than one language. I am of Afrikaans and English stock, bilingual and manage to help myself in Seswati and some Sepedi.
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Oh blimey, I didn’t expect that 🙃 the lady who led the choir I sang in in Germany lived in Southafrica for a year. We sang some beautiful Southafrican songs. Not sure if this is one if them https://youtu.be/_du_2p3ASoM. And nowhere near as good as an African choir but we tried 😁
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