http://negroplease.vox.com/library/posts/tags/what+is+the+what/page/1/ rumor has it, a blogger once lived here. en Vox Sat, 09 Dec 2006 09:45:21 -0800 Copyright 2006 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss what is the what http://negroplease.vox.com/library/post/speakeasy-the-new-dave-eggers.html?_c=feed-rss-full nobody@vox.com(Jason) http://negroplease.vox.com/library/post/speakeasy-the-new-dave-eggers.html?_c=feed-rss-full http://negroplease.vox.com/library/post/speakeasy-the-new-dave-eggers.html?_c=feed-rss-full Sat, 09 Dec 2006 09:45:21 -0800 <blockquote><p>Written as a series of alternating sections or flashbacks,<strong> </strong><em>What Is the What</em>—bad title, terrible cover—calls itself a novel but was created closely out of the story told to Eggers by Valentino Achak Deng, who reached Atlanta, after 14 years in refugee camps, in 2001. Achak survived the government helicopter gunship obliteration of his village in southern Sudan and a frightening and painful trudge to safety in Ethiopia. His personal experiences, as he says in a preface, are in essence no different from those depicted: Every event in the book could, and indeed did, take place, but not all to him, nor in the order presented. As such, the narrative reads very much like reporting, which accounts perhaps for its power—but also poses a number of interesting questions.<br /></p></blockquote><p><br />- <a href="http://www.slate.com/id/2154863/fr/rss/">True Grit</a> by Caroline Moorehead, Slate Magazine, 12.05.06<br /> </p> <p style="clear:both;"> <a href="http://negroplease.vox.com/library/post/speakeasy-the-new-dave-eggers.html?_c=feed-rss-full#comments">Read and post comments</a> | <a href="http://www.vox.com/share/6a00c10e0f6f1fd3b400cdf7ebb53d094f?_c=feed-rss-full">Send to a friend</a> </p> books dave eggers slate speakeasy caroline moorehead what is the what