BOOKPATHS

Ethiopia

Author Dinaw Mengestu describes returning, after an absence of 25 years, to his native Ethiopia.

I would realise later, after two months of never being without a relative near me, just how much had been lost during all those years away from one another, how much could never be regained, and at the same time just how easy it was for a family to claim you as one of its own -- and how much I wanted to be claimed.

Ethiopia

Abraham Verghese gives a personal account of the days leading up to the 1973 coup in Ethiopia.

In 1973, which was my third year of medical school, an ITV documentary revealed to the world a massive famine devastating the Wollo region of Ethiopia. The world knew, but we in the capital city did not. When word finally filtered back, and later when we got to secretly see the documentary (now crudely doctored so that scenes of the lavish state dinners the emperor hosted were spliced in with scenes of the famine), it spelt the end for life as we knew it. – from “Once Upon a Life: Abraham Verghese,” The Guardian

Ethiopia; New York, United States

Cutting for Stone, by Abraham Verghese (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2009)

Conjoined twins are born to a nun who dies in childbirth and a skilled doctor who, confused and desperate, leaves them behind.  Successfully separated, readers follow the boys, named Mario and Shiva by their adoptive parents, through the closeness of childhood, the growing tension between them, political turmoil, separation as one seeks escape in New York, finding their destinies in medicine, and finally coming together again in an ultimately heartbreaking reunion.  Cutting for Stone holds readers attention throughout its 500+ pages, offering not only a compelling story of family, but insights into what it means to be a doctor and the impact of place in our lives.

I stood listening once the car pulled away; the dry rustle of the leaves was like a child’s hand sifting through a box of coins.  The sound had lost all its menace for me.  I found that dented and bent curb, which had stopped a motorcycle but not its rider.  I looked down into the trees and the shadows where he fell.  The spot no longer generated any fear for me.  All my ghosts had vanished; the retribution that they sought had been exacted.  I had nothing more to give, and nothing to fear.  I looked out over trees to the city.  The sky was a mad painter’s canvas, as if halfway through the artist had decided against azure and had instead splashed ocre and crimson and black on the palette.  The city was alight, glowing, but here and there it was obscured by great puffs of mist which smudged my view, like the smoke of many small battles. – from Cutting for Stone, by Abraham Verghese

Related Websites

Abraham Verghese Website

Publisher’s Website

Ethiopia

Tsegaye Gabre-Medhin, Ethiopian Poet Laureate, is remembered in the New York Times. He died on February 25, at age 69, in Manhattan.

There is more on Tsegaye Gabre-Medhin, including a 1998 interview, on the Ethiopian Media Forum website.

“Born in the small mountain town of Boda, near Ambo, Mr. Tsegaye became one of his country's most prominent literary figures as well as an international emissary for its culture. Considered by some to be Ethiopia's greatest playwright, Mr. Tsegaye (pronounced say-GAY) wrote more than 30 plays, most in Amharic, Ethiopia's official language, and translated many Western works into Amharic, including those of Shakespeare, Brecht and Molière. (His native tongue was Oromifa, but he was also fluent in Amharic, several other African languages and English.)” – Jesse McKinley, “Tsegaye Gabre-Medhin, Ethiopian Poet Laureate, Dies at 69,” The New York Times