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25 of 31 humans found the following review helpful.
Rich in Symbolism
By Jeffrey Behnke
The Sacred Book of the Werewolf is so rich in symbolism that I scarcely recognise where to begin. On the surface, it seems to be the story of a teenage oriental prostitute named A Hu-Li who falls in love with a werewolf in her travels through modern day Russia. But underneath that comparatively thin layer is a tale more with regards to a Russian crisis of identity, and mankind’s crisis of identity as well, as both try to transform itself from tailless monkeys into something else–the super-werewolf. Which direction ought to Russia go? Shall it bow to the temptations of globalization and take on the calibers of the western world, or will have to it go in the opposite direction and listen to the lessons of the east which find expression in this book through the eclectic narrative of A Hu-Li herself?
Despite A Hu-Li’s chosen path through life, you discover that not one thing regarding her is rather what it seems–you’re led to believe she is a prostitute, but discover she is virgin. You are led to believe she is young, but discover she is thousands of years old. You think she is human, but then discover she is a werefox, and her profession originates from her capacity to use her tail–or “tale”–which causes men to believe she is the precise incarnation of their most disturbing fantasy. When they are indulging in her services, however, they are plainly indulging in something originating from their own mind as A Hu-Li busies herself by lying next to them, disconnected, reading–and scoffing–at scientific creative writing of recognized artisti value written by the likes of Stephen Hawking.
Early in the novel for the duration of her adventures, she ends up running into a prince-like Russian named Alexander who doesn’t fall for her tricks that she plays with her tail and who, coincidentally, ends up excessive damage and destruction her and robbing her of the thing she precious the most–her virginity. You then discover this Alexander is a werewolf and, rather possibly, the super-werewolf that A Hu-Li and her family of werefoxes have been seeking for thousands of years. That is precisely where the cut and arid plot of the story ends and the unfeigned nature of Pelevin’s aim begins.
While reading the narrative, I couldn’t aid but get the impression that what I was reading took the form of a mosaic, or cards in a deck that had been shuffled, but rather of spades, hearts, diamonds, and clubs, I was seeing mysticism, erotica, Russian literary history, and a critique of globalization all at the same time. You don’t mechanically see aim in the plot at basi glance, and you wonder as the critics on the back of the book have done, whether or not Pelevin is playing a good deal of joke on his readers. The critics seem to pretend to get the joke and call it comedic, but I pulled from it is words something completely different.
Which direction must Russia go? This question seemed to be at the heart of the book. I found it largely in Alexander’s thoughts as he spends more and more time with A Hu-Li. Alexander, the heart and soul of Russia, is protected by the atypical Russian male thug who drinks like a Russian is believed to drink and is unruly in a number of ways. He protects Alexander, run errands for him, but is in the end not one thing more than a façade as the unfeigned Russia, the unfeigned Alexander, operates behind the scenes. Russia has heart and soul and is tortured in his own way as he tries to determine what it is he must do as the world has moved on, which direction he will have to take in life. He presently operates in stealth mode–it is a part of his occupation, to uncover mysteries and keep mysteries of his own.
There is a part of Alexander which cannot stand the way the world is–the rubber, the tires, the cement, tall buildings, the vomit and pollution–and this finds form as smells from which he protects himself by wearing a face mask around his ultra-sensitive werewolf nose. He only removes it to take in the smells of A Hu-Li which he claims he could proceed to smell forever. So much sweeter than the rest of the world.
Russia–personified as Alexander–wants to get over the perceptive limitations it has of itself and become the super-werewolf which has much of the same ring to it as Nietzsche’s Uberman, and it is genuinely tragic to see Russia in this state, going through it is current struggle. You wonder if he will succeed. You wonder if every one else will succeed along with him. In one stage of the novel, however, you get the sentiment he will not, as we find Alexander transforming into a werewolf and howling near an oil well in a snow-like wasteland, pleading for oil to come forth in a re-enactment of a bizarre Russian Cinderella fairy tale. Truly not “super” at all. It is a tragic scene because of the suggestion that Russia has lost itself as it attempts to join in and bestow to the needs of globalization. “Please,” Alexander seems to plead with his howling, “come forth dear blood of the world and fill our wells!” This is one of his jobs, you discover. Alexander thence transforms into the wolf while doing so–the animal–in the same way that he transforms into the werewolf for the duration of his sexual sessions with A Hu-Li.
Both the west and the east play their influence out on Alexander allround the pages of this book, and you are left marveling as you approach the end what direction he will take, and how it will affect A Hu-Li as well. In another strange scene–this book is loaded with them–A Hu-Li kisses Alexander for the primary time in an expression of love, which causes their kinship to spun into a totally dissimilar direction. Ultimately, Alexander ends up discovering the true age of A Hu-Li and flees her presence, claiming he can not have sex with an individual so old. To me, this reveals the choice that the author believes Russia is making in the world. Instead of seeking transcendence through ancient wisdom, it has gone the way of globalization–the whore–which paints itself young and chases men in turtleneck sweaters wearing jewelry and Nike shoes.
The uttermost benefactor in the entire story is A Hu-Li herself as she discovers she is an empty vessel that fills itself with lies, that the world is illusion, that she is an illusion, that she is the world, that everything is a dream, that she is the dream the world is dreaming, and that words are useless to describe the nothingness which is the truth inside of us all. Words attempting to describe this are not one thing more than stepping stones on the pathway to transcendence–the pathway to the super-werewolf which is an inexplicable path that has taken A Hu-Li thousands of years herself to find. She seeks her true nature, and she does so by learning that her “tail” is the truth, her tail is the world that is lying to itself while it masturbates, transfixed by itself, transfixed by it is own lies. Thus, in a paradoxical manner, all the lies we tell to ourselves–if we confess they are so–is this truth, and the key to this ancient cognition finds form in the Sacred Book of the Werewolf that A Hu-Li is writing for her love–Alexander and, symbolically, Russia itself. She hopes it will in the long run find it is way into his hands as he pursues the younger delectations awarded after burying his head in the world of globalization. Pelevin gives you the impression that this pursuit is all for naught, and Russia, like the rest of us, will never learn, but still we will have to try. Pelevin, in the role of A Hu-Li, gives his gift of ancient wisdom to Russia–his own Alexander.
Although it was a rough begin at first, I veritably enjoyed this book of material and spiritual transformation. Like the tailless monkeys in the story, we have forgotten we are lying to ourselves as we have lost our tail. The truth is the nothingness at our core, but it is a nothingness which may be anything at all. Stephen Hawking may have inside of his head the theory of everything, but Victor Pelevin reveals inside of us all the theory of nothing, and after reading this book, Pelevin’s surely seems the more lovable and childlike version of the two. Pick it up, read it, see what the werewolves may have to instruct you. Enjoy!
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful.
Ingenious combining of philosophy, metaphysical speculation, mysticism and fantastic fiction
By Nathan Andersen
A Hu-Li is a Chinese werefox, in aspect like a young girl, but in reality almost two thousand years old, with a concealed magical tail she may use to project fantasies into the minds of those around her. For centuries, she has lived in Russia as a prostitute, using her tail to provide her clients with a Lolita-like fantasy while she feeds upon their sexual energy. She has, herself, never genuinely loved or been loved – until she meets a werewolf who allows her to discover something with regards to herself she’d never came across on her own.
The story itself is rather fun and intriguing but that’s only the half of it. A Hu-Li is seeking enlightenment, is steeped in Buddhist traditions and in creative writing of recognized artisti value and philosophy, and her story is as much with regards to ideas as it is exciting. Pelevin’s wittiness does not all translate (the name of the heroine, “A Hu-Li” may seem Chinese, but, apparently, in Russian sounds strikingly similar to a bit of crass Russian slang), but his playful tone throughout, his a heap of casually perceptive reflections on contemporary life and creative writing of recognized artisti value and politics and art are unmistakeable and enjoyable. The story works as an allegory of contemporary Russian consumerism, an engaging meditation on the nature of sex and gender, on the relation amidst the humane and the animal in all of us, and a complex reflectiveness on the nature of experience and reality. If that sounds heady and boring, it’s not. It’s a lot of fun, and the comparings with Murakami (and others like Saramago and Phillip K. Dick) are rather apt. Definitely worth checking out for those who like inventive speculative fiction and fantasy.
7 of 8 humans found the following review helpful.
The Meaning of Life* (if you are a werefox)
By Michael P Mccullough
I don’t think that this book reminded me of anything Nabokov wrote (as suggested in the blurbs); notwithstanding this is an imaginative (maybe kooky) book that starts out as a sort of science fiction and ends up as a zen manifesto and with the invention of the meaning (or lack there of) of life (for werefoxes, at least – the narrator plainly didn’t have the time to spell it out for humans).
I think I may have missed a lot of the subtlety of this book because I recognise very little with regards to Russia.
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