Study for Obedience

Last updated

Study for Obedience
Study for Obedience.jpg
Author Sarah Bernstein
CountryCanada
LanguageEnglish
Publisher Knopf Canada
Publication date
2023
Pages208
ISBN 9781039009066

Study for Obedience is a 2023 novel by Canadian author Sarah Bernstein, published by Knopf Canada, a subsidiary of Penguin Random House. The novel tells of an unnamed narrator who moves to a secluded area of an unnamed northern country to care for her older brother. The narrator soon realizes that the townspeople revile her, an allegory for antisemitism.

Contents

The novel was shortlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize, [1] and was the winner of the 2023 Giller Prize. [2]

Narrative

The unnamed narrator moves to a remote part of an unnamed northern country to become her brother's caretaker after his divorce. A series of unexplained and bizarre events occur in the town shortly after her arrival, including a dog's "phantom pregnancy", a sow crushing her own piglets, a potato blight, and cattle becoming demented. She soon realizes that the townspeople blame her for these events. The townspeople revile and often fear her. They are seen crossing themselves at times when interacting with her, covering their children's eyes, and huddling behind counters at her presence. The narrator explains that she and her brother belonged to "an obscure though reviled people who had been dogged across borders and put into pits."

Reception

In a negative review in The Guardian , literary critic Chris Power criticized the novel's abstract plot and lack of detail as being inadequate to portray the immigrant or the Jewish experience. He states: "The nature of her crisis, withheld like so much else, is revealed as a generational form of survivor’s guilt, but its rapid resolution, and the vagueness of her engagement with its root cause, makes for an oddly frictionless, even privileged, journey into trauma." [3] Also writing for The Guardian, Miriam Balanescu states that "The narrator's encounters with modern-day antisemitism are captured acutely and absurdly." Balanescu concluded that "This masterly follow-up to her debut acts as a meditation on survival, the dangers of absorbing the narratives of the powerful, and a warning that the self-blame of the oppressed often comes back to bite." [4] The CBC stated that the novel is "a finely tuned, unsettling novel that confirms Bernstein as one of the most exciting voices of her generation." [5]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Giller Prize</span> Canadian literary award

The Giller Prize is a literary award given to a Canadian author of a novel or short story collection published in English the previous year, after an annual juried competition between publishers who submit entries. The prize was established in 1994 by Toronto businessman Jack Rabinovitch in honour of his late wife Doris Giller, a former literary editor at the Toronto Star, and is awarded in November of each year along with a cash reward with the winner being presented by the previous year's winning author.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anne Michaels</span> Canadian poet and novelist (born 1958)

Anne Michaels is a Canadian poet and novelist whose work has been translated and published in over 45 countries. Her books have garnered dozens of international awards including the Orange Prize, the Guardian Fiction Prize, the Lannan Award for Fiction and the Commonwealth Poetry Prize for the Americas. She is the recipient of honorary degrees, the Guggenheim Fellowship and many other honours. She has been shortlisted for the Governor General's Award, the Griffin Poetry Prize, twice shortlisted for the Giller Prize and twice long-listed for the International Dublin Literary Award. Michaels won a 2019 Vine Award for Infinite Gradation, her first volume of non-fiction. Michaels was the poet laureate of Toronto, Ontario, Canada from 2016 to 2019, and she is perhaps best known for her novel Fugitive Pieces, which was adapted for the screen in 2007.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Miriam Toews</span> Canadian writer (born 1964)

Miriam Toews is a Canadian writer and author of nine books, including A Complicated Kindness (2004), All My Puny Sorrows (2014), and Women Talking (2018). She has won a number of literary prizes including the Governor General's Award for Fiction and the Writers' Trust Engel/Findley Award for her body of work. Toews is also a three-time finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and a two-time winner of the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eden Robinson</span> Indigenous Canadian author

Eden Victoria Lena Robinson is an Indigenous Canadian author. She is a member of the Haisla and Heiltsuk First Nations.

<i>A Complicated Kindness</i> Canadian novel, 2004

A Complicated Kindness (2004) is the third novel by Canadian author Miriam Toews. The novel won the Governor General's Award for English Fiction, the CBA Libris Fiction Award, and CBC's Canada Reads.

Rachel Cusk is a British novelist and writer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Heather O'Neill</span> Canadian writer (b. 1973)

Heather O'Neill is a Canadian novelist, poet, short story writer, screenwriter and journalist, who published her debut novel, Lullabies for Little Criminals, in 2006. The novel was subsequently selected for the 2007 edition of Canada Reads, where it was championed by singer-songwriter John K. Samson. Lullabies won the competition. The book also won the Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction and was shortlisted for eight other major awards, including the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Governor General's Award and was longlisted for International Dublin Literary Award.

<i>Mating</i> (novel) 1991 novel by Norman Rush

Mating (1991) is a novel by American author Norman Rush. It is a first-person narrative by an unnamed American anthropology graduate student in Botswana around 1980. It focuses on her relationship with Nelson Denoon, a controversial American social scientist who has founded an experimental matriarchal village in the Kalahari desert.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Esi Edugyan</span> Canadian novelist (born 1978)

Esi Edugyan is a Canadian novelist. She has twice won the Giller Prize, for her novels Half-Blood Blues (2011) and Washington Black (2018).

<i>The Sense of an Ending</i> Novel by Julian Barnes

The Sense of an Ending is a 2011 novel written by British author Julian Barnes. The book is Barnes's eleventh novel written under his own name and was released on 4 August 2011 in the United Kingdom. The Sense of an Ending is narrated by a retired man named Tony Webster, who recalls how he and his clique met Adrian Finn at school and vowed to remain friends for life. When the past catches up with Tony, he reflects on the paths he and his friends have taken. In October 2011, The Sense of an Ending was awarded the Booker Prize. The following month it was nominated in the novels category at the Costa Book Awards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anakana Schofield</span> Irish-Canadian writer (born 1971)

Anakana Schofield is an Irish-Canadian author, who won the 2012 Amazon.ca First Novel Award and the Debut-Litzer Prize for Fiction in 2013 for her debut novel Malarky. Born in England to an Irish mother, she lived in London and in Dublin, Ireland until moving to Vancouver, British Columbia in 1999. The novel was also a shortlisted nominee for the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize.

<i>Ru</i> (novel) 2009 novel by Kim Thúy

Ru is a novel by Vietnamese-born Canadian novelist Kim Thúy, first published in French in 2009 by Montreal publisher Libre Expression. It was translated into English in 2012 by Sheila Fischman and published by Vintage Canada.

<i>All My Puny Sorrows</i> 2014 novel

All My Puny Sorrows is the sixth novel by Canadian writer Miriam Toews. The novel won the 2014 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize, and was shortlisted for the 2014 Scotiabank Giller Prize, the 2015 Folio Prize for Literature, and the 2015 Wellcome Book Prize. Toews has said that the novel draws heavily on the events leading up to the 2010 suicide of her sister, Marjorie.

<i>Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead</i> 2009 crime novel by Olga Tokarczuk

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead is a 2009 mystery novel by Olga Tokarczuk. Originally published in Polish by Wydawnictwo Literackie, it was later translated to English by Antonia Lloyd-Jones and published in 2018 by the British independent publisher Fitzcarraldo Editions. The book received a wider release in 2019 when it was published in the United States by Riverhead Books on 13 August 2019. A portion of the English translation was originally published in literary magazine Granta in 2017.

Mennonite literature emerged in the mid-to-late 20th century as both a literary movement and a distinct genre. Mennonite literature refers to literary works created by or about Mennonites.

<i>The Friend</i> (novel) 2018 novel by Sigrid Nunez

The Friend is a novel by the American writer Sigrid Nunez published by Riverhead Books in 2018. The book concerns an unnamed novelist who adopts a Great Dane that belonged to a deceased friend and mentor.

<i>The Son of the House</i> 2019 novel by Cheluchi Onyemelukwe

The Son of the House is a family saga novel written by the Nigerian author Cheluchi Onyemelukwe. Her debut novel, it was first published by Parrésia Publishers and Penguin Random House South Africa in 2019.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The White Book</span> 2016 novel by the Korean novelist Han Kang

The White Book () is a 2016 novel by the Korean novelist Han Kang which was short-listed for the 2018 Man Booker International Prize. The English translation by Deborah Smith was first published by Portobello Books in 2017.

The Wonder is a 2016 novel by Irish-Canadian novelist Emma Donoghue.

Sarah Bernstein is a Canadian writer and scholar. She was born in Montreal, Quebec, and now lives in Scotland where she teaches literature and creative writing. She has taught at the universities of Sheffield, Edinburgh and Strathclyde.

References