Intimacies: a 12 a.m. review

This was a nice read. I’m writing this past midnight and I don’t really think I can do it justice. In this book, there is ample space, and yet there is spacious intimacy in between the lines. It’s heavily character-driven, with unresolved components and pieces. It reminds me so sharply of Outline by Rachel Cusk.

Language is the silk threading this book, as we follow this interpreter into the Hague, home of the United Nations’ International Court of Justice. There are so many gaps and space between languages, and as someone who interprets, she needs to reflect the humour, irony, and tone across the room, to people who might be tepid with the intonations and connotations in languages and culture. She explores her own intimacies with the city, her own cross-cultural adrift identity, and the strange intimacies she shares with war criminals and perpetrators, as she is the singular person who understands them, and speaks for them in a room full of observant ears and eyes.

As someone fluently bilingual, this book just flowed as smoothly as silk. It was almost like being hooked up to the unnamed protagonist’s thoughts, and immediately I understood her grace of translation, losing sight of meaning, and her struggling to remain neutral in search of words. What it feels like to float through a city and be unsure of where to call home. The bitterness and warmth that radiate from people.

If you like linguistics or the exploration of truths, read it. Hey, Barack Obama even recommended it to back me up here. Give it a shot, and if you don’t feel like it’s any good when you’re a quarter of the way in, then let it go, because the vibe of the books doesn’t change much, no plot twists or anything that will get you blindsided. I liked listening to the syllables of the word “intimate”, every single time as Traci Kato-Kiriyama said it quickly like a flutter in the audiobook. It’s a precious and sparingly used word, like glitter.