National Book Award for Translated Literature
The Family Clause
A grandfather living abroad returns to Sweden every six months and steps back into the lives of his adult children. His son wants to end an old arrangement with him, while his daughter faces a turning point of her own. The novel portrays the unspoken contract that binds a family and the wounds parents and children pass on to one another, with both wit and pain.
Work Information
Does staying a family mean being bound to the past, or can it become a way to remake those bonds?
The Family Clause is Alice Menzies's English translation of Jonas Hassen Khemiri's Swedish novel Pappaklausulen. An arrangement by which a father living abroad periodically returns and stays in his son's small apartment begins to unsettle the whole family. The son's parenting and work, the daughter's pregnancy and choices, and the father's self-image and past intersect, revealing pain that has been hidden inside the closeness of family.
Review Summaries
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The accumulation of everyday detail and the gradual exposure of family disappointment and irritation are strongly regarded. Some readers may find the narration dense, but the portrait of a family marked by both melancholy and comedy leaves a lasting aftertaste.
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The shifting perspectives and sharp depiction of a family trying to remain together across generations are highly valued. The translation is also received as carrying across the wit and sense of loss embedded in the original.
Book Information
- Publisher
- Farrar Straus & Giroux
- Published
- 2020-08-25
- Pages
- 308 pages
- Language
- 英語
- Size
- 14.35 x 3.02 x 21.74 cm
- ISBN-13
- 9780374134327
- ISBN-10
- 0374134324
- Price
- 4920 JPY
- Category
- 洋書/Literature & Fiction/Women's Fiction/Domestic Life
“The son did as he was told. All his bloody life, he has done as he has been told. Time to change that, he thinks, grabbing a pen. He doesn’t write that this will be the last time his father stays here. He doesn’t write that he wants to break the father clause. Instead, he writes: Welcome, Dad. Hope you had a good flight .” A grandfather who lives abroad returns home to visit his adult children. The son is a failure. The daughter is having a baby with the wrong man. Only the grandfather is perfect—at least, according to himself. But over the course of ten intense days, relationships unfold and painful memories resurface. The grandfather is confronted by his past. The daughter is faced with an impossible choice. The son tries to write himself free. Something has to give. Per a longstanding family agreement, the grandfather has maintained his Swedish residency by coming to stay with his son every six months. Can this clause be renegotiated, or will it chain the family to its past forever? Through a series of quickly changing perspectives, in The Family Clause Jonas Hassen Khemiri evokes an intimate portrait of a chaotic and perfectly normal family, deeply wounded by the death of a child and the disappearance of a father.
Jonas Hassen Khemiri is the author of novels ( Everything I Don't Remember , Montecore ), plays ( I Call My Brothers ), and a collection of plays, essays, and short stories ( Invasion! ). Among his many honors are the August Prize, the highest literary award for Swedish literature; the Enquist Literary Prize; the Borås Tidning Award for Best Literary Debut Novel; and an Obie Award. His novels have been translated into more than thirty languages, and his plays have been performed by more than one hundred companies around the world. He lives in Stockholm, Sweden. Alice Menzies is a freelance translator based in London. She has translated books by Fredrik Backman and Katarina Bivald, among others.
Reviews
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Good service
Book arrived promptly and in good condition. Haven't read it yet but don't expect to be disappointed.