“The World and All That It Holds” by Aleksandar Hemon
This book follows the life of Rafael Pinto, a Serbian Jew and a pharmacist, he is also an opium addict. In some respects it reminded me of some of William Boyd’s novels as it is also a fictionalised biography of one man’s itinerant life, his loves and travails. Aleksandar Hemon though has written an unusual novel which starts off in Sarajevo and the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
The hostilities of WW1 see Pinto conscripted into the army where his medical background means he cares for the sick and wounded on the frontline in Galicia. He meets fellow soldier Osman, a Muslim; they become lovers. Osman a storyteller and man of action helps and protects Pinto to survive the atrocities and horrors that surround them. After a brutal Russian assault they find themselves behind enemy lines, together but separated from their own forces. This is the start of their journeys which see them in Tashkent as the war concludes, but events within Russia do not make this a safe location. Here he meets an Englishman, Moser who materialises elsewhere in Pinto’s wanderings during which Pinto also meets a side-cast of characters that add dimension to the story. Over the years Pinto’s wanderings lead him and their daughter, Rahela, to eventually reach Shanghai after trekking across deserts following windy camels to suffer the depravities of another confrontation, the second Sino-Japanese War of 1937-1945.
The book is composed of four parts and time periods with each section clearly identified by time and place and maps are also provided. This all helped this reader recall Pinto’s whereabouts. Though the brutalities experienced within Shanghai, which concludes the final third of the book, sees Pinto’s wanderings paused whilst the world around him is devoured by war which includes his homeland. This the one destination he has been cherishing in his mind even if he has been going in the wrong direction for most of his life. What is left at home, is Sarajevo still intact, and what of his mother and family? The book is sprinkled with fond memories of his earlier home life; his student days in Vienna, and nostalgia of his roots and faith.
Osman is the driving force/impetus of Pinto’s life even when events separate them he is there in mind encouraging him, protecting him; their communications touching and it is their relationship that provides strength to this story of itinerant travel. William Boyd may well do it better, but this is an interesting addition into this special ouvre of fiction as the author, a Bosnian born American, takes his reader on a literary peripatetic journey.
