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Beethoven was one-sixteenth Black

Beethoven was one-sixteenth Black

Author(s): Nadine Gordimer

Location(s): South Africa

Genre(s): Short Stories

Location

Content

This rich story collection will be a reminder to Nadine Gordimer’s countless admirers, and a taster for the uninitiated, of her enduring imaginative power. A woman gauges the state of her marriage by the tone of her husband’s cello: a wife reads her husband’s mood by the scent in the nape of his neck: a newly emigrated couple are divided by visual obsession, he with his native Budapest, she with South African suburbia. With consummate artistry, Gordimer illustrates the show downs, standoffs and highlights of human intimacy while penetrating the nuances of immigration, national identity and race.

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“Rich . . . with invention, insight, and artistry.” -San Francisco Chronicle

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