Last year, one book won the Nebula Award for Best Novel, Best Book of the Year for Fiction, was nominated for the Goodreads Choice Award for Fantasy, and was shortlisted for Waterstones Book of the Year. It debuted at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list and boasts over 75,000 5-star reviews on Goodreads. Out of the top five reviews, though, three of them give it two stars– seemingly low reviews for such a critically acclaimed work, but not uncommon for this one. Many reviewers claim they disliked it so much that they weren’t even able to force themselves to finish it. From day one, it was deeply polarizing.
It’s my favorite book.
If you kept up at all with the online reading communities on social media last year, you probably already know that I’m talking about Babel by R.F. Kuang. If not, I am pleased to introduce you to this whirlwind of a novel. In my opinion, it’s a must-read.
Babel follows a young boy called Robin, who is taken from his home country of China and sent to England, promised an elite education and privileges he could only dream of. Eventually, he finds himself studying at the Royal Institute of Translation, or the College of Babel, at Oxford University– a fictive college at a real university in our real world.
At Babel, students create powerful silver bars that enhance the world in nearly every way, using the power of translation and a magic system steeped in meaning. Robin and his peers at Oxford are told they’re working towards peace and unification, but Robin soon realizes he is only assisting the British Empire in their crimes against Eastern countries, like his own. In the end, he has to decide between his new life that he has come to love, or what he unequivocally knows is the right thing to do— which would also destroy the friendships he considers the only family he’s ever known, the school that gave him everything he has, and every privilege he has worked so hard to attain.
Babel tackles identity, colonialism, self-discovery, prejudice, friendship, and elitism like no book has before. It’s simultaneously a love letter and a hate letter to academia, and it’s absolutely brilliant.
Prior to this book’s release, R.F. Kuang was already widely known to be incredibly bright and undoubtedly a mind-blowing talent, but Babel really sealed that deal. Babel is well-researched, impressively erudite, and features a cast of characters so complex and developed, that they feel real. It doesn’t shy away at all from going into uncomfortable places, especially for white audiences, and is unapologetic through and through. An impressive dialogue on ethics, identity, and violence— or rather the necessity of it — blended seamlessly with an extensive lesson in etymology.
The antagonist was one of the best, most well-developed, and horrifyingly real characters I have ever read, characterized with villainy so subtle that I loved her long before I hated her. The scariest part, I felt, about the story’s ‘villain’ was that she was not truly evil at all— she through and through believed she was doing the right thing.
This book spoke to me in a way that not many can– it reflected a piece of myself that I rarely see in literature. I found myself in Robin– the ambitious, loyal, bookworm-ish, biracial protagonist. I saw my own wild, ongoing identity crisis in his. There is something very specific about the ‘not enough of either’ crisis that so many biracial people discuss, but isn’t widely reflected in media. Robin’s story also voices the immigrant experience, an experience that I personally can’t relate to firsthand, but one that draws a lot of empathy from me. Robin is told more times that one can count to “use your English,” that he’s not “really” Chinese, that he’s different, better, more civilized than other Eastern people — because he’s assimilated into English cultural norms. Robin’s story makes me ache.
Essentially, this book filled me with joy, wrung me out of any positive emotions I’ve ever felt, and then gave me hope once more. I think about it every day. To me, it truly is a tale like no other, a genuine tragedy, a literary feat, and a brave testament to existing in a white man’s world when you are not one.
To me, it is truly a tale like no other, a genuine tragedy, a literary feat, and a brave testament to existing in a white man’s world when you are not one.
As with any novel, it wasn’t perfect, despite how many times I tried to claim on Twitter that it was. I had a few minor critiques relating to pacing, which I felt was quite slow in the first half, and almost too fast in the second. I also found the story itself to be a bit lost at some points, just in the sheer immensity of the theme, Kuang’s clear passion and raw emotion, and the wide scope of the novel.
Additionally, at many points, I found it to be heavier on the social and political commentary than on the actual fantasy aspect, which is indeed the genre it finds itself in. I worried occasionally that Kuang didn’t trust her reader– she included many footnotes and drawn-out explanations. I believe there is a certain point at which authors need to trust their readers and understand that some things will be missed and that that is just an unfortunate fact of releasing the stories and words that live inside your mind to the world. I did enjoy most of the footnotes, though. It made my nerd brain very happy.
The main critique from audiences who left the 1 and 2-star reviews was that it lacked nuance and it villainized white people. I would argue that it didn’t villainize white people, it villainized colonizers, who are, by the way, generally quite villainous. It seems there is little room for nuance with regard to people’s lives, people’s livelihoods, and the extinguishing of language and culture.
On page 497, Robin states “This is how colonialism works. It convinced us that the fallout from resistance is entirely our fault, that the immoral choice is resistance itself rather than the circumstances that demand it.” This quote, to me, embodies the core of this novel: resistance, resilience, growth, and power– how culture and language give power, what is lost when attempts are made at translating them, and what is lost when they are lost.
Lucky for you, Babel is recently out in paperback! Go buy it wherever you buy books!