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Paperback Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution Book

ISBN: 0063021439

ISBN13: 9780063021433

Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution

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Book Overview

Instant #1 New York Times Bestseller from the author of The Poppy War

"Absolutely phenomenal. One of the most brilliant, razor-sharp books I've had the pleasure of reading that isn't just an alternative fantastical history, but an interrogative one; one that grabs colonial history and the Industrial Revolution, turns it over, and shakes it out." -- Shannon Chakraborty, bestselling author of The City of Brass

From award-winning author R. F. Kuang comes Babel, a thematic response to The Secret History and a tonal retort to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell that grapples with student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British empire.

Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal.

1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to London by the mysterious Professor Lovell. There, he trains for years in Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese, all in preparation for the day he'll enroll in Oxford University's prestigious Royal Institute of Translation--also known as Babel.

Babel is the world's center for translation and, more importantly, magic. Silver working--the art of manifesting the meaning lost in translation using enchanted silver bars--has made the British unparalleled in power, as its knowledge serves the Empire's quest for colonization.

For Robin, Oxford is a utopia dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. But knowledge obeys power, and as a Chinese boy raised in Britain, Robin realizes serving Babel means betraying his motherland. As his studies progress, Robin finds himself caught between Babel and the shadowy Hermes Society, an organization dedicated to stopping imperial expansion. When Britain pursues an unjust war with China over silver and opium, Robin must decide...

Can powerful institutions be changed from within, or does revolution always require violence?

Customer Reviews

1 rating

Fantasy but with a purposeful message/history

Kind of reminds me of Animal Farm, but so much more. It is a fantasy plot, but with obvious parallels to real history. For someone like me who doesn't know the history much, I will be rereading it as I learn more about the history of the time period it takes place. It builds upon this history and the perspective of minorities, especially those of colonized people, to argue that an oppressor can only be faced through some violence. While the message seems a bit pessimistic, I found the characters to be rather balanced and potentially accurate, but fitting for the argument. It's a book that can just be enjoyed as a fantasy novel or that can be looked at deeper to see if you agree with author or not and can discuss this with other readers. It also has more than one message/argument to think about, so even if you don't like the overarching argument, you can still think about the smaller ones more relevant to colonialism rather than protesting.

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