A review by iammandyellen
Nadirs, by Herta Müller

5.0

I suppose childhood's heart is either savage or enchanted depending on the circumstances enclosing it, but depending even more, I think, on the disposition of the child. Müller's extraordinary manipulations of syntaxes and the performative functions of words create the sense of slippery, unfixed meaning that comes as such a trauma to the child narrator. I love also her exploration of the friction between the world-understanding the adults are trying to develop in the child and the many ways it is betrayed by the actions of those same adults.