Winner 2018 Man Booker International Prize
https://mailchi.mp/fourcolmangetty/the-man-booker-prize-2017-longlist-announced-...

Not of my interest, generally. Main theme: travel, in different aspects. Very original, but I was disappointed, as I've read other works by this author and enjoyed them. Of what I read; entries consisted of vignettes of a few lines to short stories of 30 pp. I abandoned after about 1/4 of the work. ( )

No story line, but some really good thoughts about travel, migration, motion, utterly surreal ( )

I adored [b:Drive Your Plough Over the Bones of the Dead|56433385|Drive Your Plough Over the Bones of the Dead|Olga Tokarczuk|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/book/50x75-a91bf249278a81aabab721ef782c4a74.png|8099373], so had pretty high expectations for 'Flights'. While the writing is just as polished and insightful, the structure is wholly different. 'Flights' is a novel in fragments, loosely connected by travel and bodies. When I started reading it last week, I found the absence of underpinning narrative or protagonist made it difficult to focus on and ended up switching to [b:Souls in the Great Machine|250361|Souls in the Great Machine (Greatwinter Trilogy, #1)|Sean McMullen|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1386924662l/250361._SY75_.jpg|242596]. There is much to appreciate in 'Flights', yet I find it hard to articulate what it all added up to. Some powerful meditations on racism and the concept of home proved memorable. The sections about 17th century anatomists did not have much impact on me, despite being beautifully written.

There is also something unsettling about reading a book fixated on international travel in mid-2021. I haven't travelled more than 5 miles from my flat in the past 18 months; the idea of a proper journey during the pandemic is alarming. Travel as Tokarczuk depicts it seems like an artifact of the past. Nonetheless, I liked the concept of airports as countries unto themselves, which reminded me of Rem Koolhaas' The Generic City. 'Flights' definitely does capture a sense of movement and rootlessness. I slightly resented the idea that long distance train trips are merely for cowards who fear flying, though. They also have a much lower environmental impact. I didn't stop flying because it frightened me, but because of carbon emissions. Overall I don't think the different stories and settings within 'Flights' cohere effectively, or at least not sufficiently for me to find the book truly compelling overall. It is very finely written, but the experimental, fragmentary style isn't to my taste. ( )

And, finally, 400+ pages later, I have finished reading Flights. It took longer than I expected or, honestly, would have liked. It is a collection of more than 100 items—some only a few lines long, others taking 30 or more pages—that have two general themes: travel and human anatomy. Tokarczuk is fascinated by every possible aspect of travel, from the mundane details of packing to “travel psychology” and philosophy to one’s fellow passengers, to the actual experience of flying and hotel rooms. She is likewise interested in human anatomy, particularly in what she (or more precisely, her translator) calls plastination, the process whereby a human body (or its parts) is transformed into plastic. Perhaps you have seen these famous exhibits: human bodies where the blood (and/or the organs) have been “replaced” by colored plastic. Tokarczuk is enthralled by the subject and returns to it frequently. Some entries seem to be no more than idle thoughts on a topic; others could well have been abandoned novels. Indeed, several longer entries—especially the one on a famous (real) 17th century Flemish anatomist—are fascinating. Then there is the lengthy story about a Polish family vacationing in Croatia; part one ends on page 51 and part two begins on page 330. Or the story about the afterlife of Chopin’s heart. Or the letters from the daughter of a black servant of Emperor Francis of the Holy Roman Empire begging for the return of her father for burial. The empreror, you see, has taken the body of this servant after his death in 1796, stripped it of its skin, stuffed it, and placed it on display. (This is a true story—although the letters are presumably, Tokarczuk’s invention.) Or the sections entitled “Sanitary Pads.” Or “Belly Dance.” “Airports.” “Cleopatra.” You get the idea. Whatever caught her fancy. Toward the very end is a story of a retired professor where Tokarczuk makes (somewhat clumsy) use of a metaphor to tie the theme of travel to the theme of her interest in anatomy and the body. All in all, I found the book extraordinarily uneven; sometimes fascinating, sometimes unbearably tedious. Though I have to imagine that I am wrong, at times (many more than one), the book seemed more like the convenient gathering of unrelated scraps that could otherwise be of minimal value, stitched together into one somewhat cohesive volume. Make no mistake: Tokarczuk can be a compelling writer. The problem for me in the book was the distinction between her ability to do so and the frequency with which she did so. Some entries are very nearly silly and some downright riveting. The book bounces from greatness to self-indulgence and back, over and over. ( )