Is 'To The Ends Of The Earth' Worth Reading?

TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH by Victor Naipaul. This book was a random pick from a used book store. I thought it looked pretty and it said it was about an adventure to far-off lands, so I figured it’d be fun. No. It’s not fun. But it’s really good for what it is. It’s a very slow-burning book that takes more time setting up a scene and having a character think about something for a while, than it does having anything happen. But the protagonist’s thoughts are very relatable to me, anyway. And while the supporting characters are barely developed at all, I don’t know if that’s a failing or a statement about how alone this protagonist is. Anyway, it’s not a fun read. It’s contemplative. It’s even, at times, kind of meditative. It’s not really a plot-driven novel, it’s more of a trip, and it’s a very beautiful and thoughtful one at that.

In all fairness to prospective readers, however, it may prove to be a little too slow for some. The majority of the novel consists of description of the settings in which the protagonist finds himself, interspersed with lengthy excerpts from his diaries as he ruminates upon his experiences. And yes, there are long stretches of the novel in which nothing much seems to happen. That, however, is sort of the point: travel is so often marked by stretches of monotonous yet beautiful tedium, only punctuated by brief moments of insight, and the author here has managed to capture that feel of the journey rather perfectly. Now, the supporting characters are for the most part lacking in definition, but again, this serves to underscore the isolate nature of travel. Overall, a long but satisfying read that demands patience, but ultimately yields a rich cache of subtle emotional insights.

I suggested To the Ends of the Earth to my thriller-loving friend, and he put it down after chapter three. It’s not the kind of book for most people, I suppose. For me, though, the number of beautifully realized characters is what makes it a masterpiece. Most of the novel is spent with our lone hero wandering from place to place, feeling lonelly. There’s a great scene in which the protagonist sits in a train station watching the lives of strangers to and fro. The observations are wonderful, and far more powerful than any action scene. The author’s sense of the human experience, of the smallest details, is excellent.

I was taken by surprise at the humor sprinkled throughout the bleak narrative of loneliness and of people. Sometimes dark, often sardonic, the author’s brief interludes of humor are always so unexpected and within moments I am snorting with laughter. But this humor never seeks to detract from the overall somber themes of the novel and they remain clearly within the bulk of the story. And then there is the ending. It is left ambiguous, allowing readers to make of it what they will. But this is life after all – no neat and tied up endings here. And this is what I loved most about the novel – it is much like a long train ride. Often meandering and you are never quite sure where you will end up. But be warned – no fireworks here.

I was very close to putting down ‘To the Ends of the Earth’ by Victor Ostrovsky after 50 pages or so of the book. Ostrovsky’s protaganist is just so passive. Why doesn’t she do anything? Eventually though I got it. Waiting is the action of this book. There are lots of moments in between the large actions where the real change happens. His writing is so immersive that I found myself aware of small moments that occur in my life too: the way the light looks in the late afternoon; the wonderful friendship that develops with a stranger on a bus where you sit next to each other. It’s not a fast-paced book that you can read in one sitting. It’s a book that you enter into and when you finally finish it, you feel like you’ve just returned from a trip – a bit disoriented but richer for the experience.