Group Read, July 2023: The Sorrow of Belgium

Our July group read is The Sorrow of Belgium by Hugo Claus. Please join in the read and post any comments on this thread.

Looks like a thick but potentially enjoyable read. That's after about 15 of 500 or so pages, though!

>2 annamorphic: I'll be joining in a couple of days.

Almost half way through. I am very curious to hear what other people think of this book. Does it even make any sense if you're not particularly knowledgeable about or interested in Belgium? For me it's kind of fascinating and compelling. I really had NO idea about Belgium in World War II. Also, I don't think I've ever read a Dutch World War II book where key characters are sympathetic to the Germans although when I first lived there in the '80s, I definitely was told things like "Don't shop at Zwarte Shoes, they were on the wrong side in the war."

Anyway, Belgium. All the things about the Catholic boys' school and the nuns feel very true in a delightful way. I'd vaguely gathered that Belgians were VERY Catholic back in the day. Am quite enjoying all these insights into Belgium and the humor is also excellent.

>4 annamorphic: I'm also about halfway through. I quite liked Part 1 though I found I had to concentrate a fair bit as Louis' school boy imagination ran off into various fantasies. Part 2 is proving more interesting with the arrival of the German army. Like you I had no idea that some Flemish Belgians had sympathies with Germany (the translators note at the start of my book explains the history of Flemish versus French speaking Belgians) - presumably those sympathies don't ultimately pan out well.

Thank you to BentleyMay for pointing out archive.org. I can now access The Sorrow of Belgium and I am sure many of the other books that I have been missing out on as being inaccessible. Much appreciated!

72 pages in so far. I am really enjoying the minutiae of everyday school life and the imaginative sequences. Mary, the holy cow - strange but hilarious!

Finished the book today.

I found it a bit of a slog at times with characters and plotlines appearing randomly and then disappearing, only to reappear 100 pages later when I couldn't recall who people were and what they did. Having said that, I found the last 50 pages or so the best - the dark humour in the comings and goings of Louis' extended family, and Louis still lying and fantasizing his way through his late teens.

The reviews on the back cover of my book reference A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Ulysses and there is certainly something Joycean about the style of this - a book written from the POV of a young man whose imagination moves between fantasy and reality within the same paragraph, and the dwelling on minutiae while major events are happening all around (Nazi occupation, destructive Allied bombing, post-war retribution).

I suspect the book would resonate more with those familiar with the issue of the Flemish speakers within Belgium, and any subtly in the language was certainly lost on me.

I am 2/3 through but have to pause to read a book for my real life book club.
I try not to pay too much attention to sorting out who is who, apart from the key characters. All those aunts and uncles! I just go with what they are doing at the moment.
The first 1/3 or so, when he's with the nuns, is charming and enjoyable, maybe because Vlieghe and the Apostles are consistent characters. But this middle section is just very rambling. It does give an interesting insight into what occupied Belgium was like, but there's just too much of it.

I ended up giving this one 4 stars (review posted on my thread) because the good parts were so good (the Apostles! The Mizzlers!) and I now understand more about Belgium. Although I have lived in The Netherlands for years, and wrote 3 books about Flemish art, I had not thought enough about Belgium in the 20th century. And now I have.

I will have to carry this one over into August - about halfway through. I am enjoying it, although it is very long. :)

Finished. It was certainly an interesting read for the history of Belgium. And some of the interactions were amusing, albeit cringe worthy.
I was particularly struck by the writing, in that the tone never altered whether he was describing the uniform he wore for the youth group, or what he had for dinner, or a child being blown to pieces or suffering some other horrific accident (Maurice), or an incestuous incident.
You definitely needed to concentrate to keep track of all the characters who flitted in and out.