Dog Island by Philippe Claudel

Dog Island by Philippe Claudel

French fiction

Original Title – L’Archipel du Chien

Translator – Euan Cameron

Source – Review Copy

This is the time of year as the Booker international longlist approaches on the horizon that I start working through some books from the last year I hadn’t got to or I have brought thinking they may make the list. first is a writer that has been featured three times before on the blog over the years all his books are different so you never know what you are going to get from him. Claudel had been a teacher in Prisons for a number of years he has credited this with giving him an insight into Guilt and how we judge people that is evident in this book.

The story takes place on an island. An ordinary island neither large nor small. Not very far from the country upon which it is dependent, but which has forgotten all aboutit, and close to a different continent to the one it belongs to, but of which it takes no notice.

One of the Dog Islands

When you search for this archieplago on the maps, you do not notice the dog at first glance it is hidden. The children have trouble finding it. The teacher whom they have already nicknames the old woman was amused by their efforts, then by their surprise when with the tip of her ruler, she sketched the putline of its jaw, The dog suddenly emerged, They werfe frightened by it, it was like being with certain people whose character you do not really know when you first spend time ith them, who one day bite off your head.

This pasaage has such a dark meaning behind it and the way the dog appears is maybe a metaphor for those that appear to the teacher later!!

The setting for this is vague we are only told that it is a group of Islands in the Med we are not told where in the Med that is a great touch as it could be anywhere in the region. So Dog Island is a book where the characters in the story don’t have names they are just known by the title of their jobs so the story starts when the Teacher of Dog island is out for a jog then he comes across three young black men African emigrants how did they end up there dead washed up on the beach. These are bodies are also seen by a couple of other locals. Then the people that run the island appear the doctor, Mayor and Priest appear. There is already a feeling that these bodies are just the tip of something far more sinister and the Mayor at the heart of all that happens on the Island is now having to try and clean up what is going on before the top comes of plans on the island.

“Did you carry out an autopsy on them, Doctor?” The Teachersaid, and on asking this question he swallowed painfully, as though the word, heard thousands of times on detective series, was too burdensome for him.

“No need,” replied the Doctor, maintaining his good humour. “Drowning alas, is obvious, what did ytou expect they died from ? Sunstroke?”

Swrdy laughed, and so did america. Even the Old Woman smiled, silently, her pale lips curled into a haughty pout over her grey teeth. And the mayor laughted too, but in his case it sounded like the hiss of a snake. The teacher, who was wriggling about on his chair, spoke out in his timid little boy’s voice, which did not correspond to his large, strong frame.

The teacher starts asking questions about the bodies on the beach and what happened to them.

Islands are like small villages closed more so than normal so this is a small glimpse into the world of Dog Island but it isn’t just Dog Island I felt that was the region that we don’t have names it is to make the story universal in its themes that off the dark side of the world of those taking people and make huge profits from those chasing the dream of a new world in Europe. We have all heard stories of bodies washing up especially on the Italian island Lampedusa which we saw in the book I reviewed a while ago.  This shows what when one woman the Teacher tries to lift the lid on the dark trade in People those in authority those corrupted by money and power have to try and shut him up. We read of people buying fake life jackets, overcrowded boats, vast amounts of money and broken dreams are in the bodies of the three men washed up on Dog Island beach. This is one of those books that make you as a reader think of the wider picture of the world around them. Have you read Claudel?

Winstons Score B

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