I am a lover of
historical fiction. I devour them like an elephant in a cane field; though I
haven't seen one (an elephant in a cane field) I assume it is an orgy of
feeding. My arguments on my love for this genre is exhibited by the collection
of Igguldens, Cornwells, Ghosh's in my library and the fact that I always
roll back to one book if this type whenever I hit the readers block. Yes there
is such a thing called readers block when you want to read but you cannot. My
love for this genre must have stemmed from my childhood love of all those Balarama
Amarchitrakathas. Whenever I scour the secondhand stalls or the online
stores my target is to get at least one book of historical fiction and many
times I have came across the name Jean Auel and her Clan of the Cave
Bear.
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| The Book |
It is definitely not a
work of historical fiction but one of pre-historic fiction. The
first book of the Earth's Children series was published back in 1980, adapted into
a movie in 1986. The book was followed by five more books which I am yet to
procure and devour. Clan of the Cave Bear (CCB) is set in prehistorical times
when our precursors Cro-magnon man and the Neanderthals meet. Just like we
dislike to an edge of homophobia of anything that makes us uncomfortable like
race, religion and cast, the Neanderthals (called the Clan) was wary of the
Cro-magnon (called the others). I find the name 'Others' used to describe the
fair, blonde race of people from the snowy North too close for a coincidence to
be used by GRR Martin to describe his Northern Ice Zombies. May be he too liked
the CCB pretty much and decided to pay homage.
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| Movie poster based on the book |
We follow the life of a
5 year old Cro-magnon girl named Ayala who was orphaned by an earthquake,
attacked by a cave lion and finally rescued by a band of Neanderthals. Iza, the
medicine woman in the Clan adopts Ayala as her daughter and the rest of the
story follows Ayala's attempt to fit into the Clan despite her different
origin, looks, method of thinking, abilities etc. The book is not unique in the
sense of the plot or even the characters but because of the settings and how
well we can relate the speculative history 25,000 years ago to the modern day.
There is a male centered society with one leader, a second in command and a
group trying to usurp them; there are prejudices about the unknown, the sense
of oneness in the Clan, the high position enjoyed by the religious men, the
orchestration of people who think different or do not follow the traditional
ways, the brash youngsters, wise elders, disciplining of women by violence
including rape. Apparently we haven't progressed much since the day we were
hunting mammoth and grinding sticks to make fire wearing the fur of the
lynx.
The books description of
the life in a cave and the survival in the forest is so splendid that you could
see the bison stampeding, the ground trembling while the hunters prowl the
grassland. In the end the book leaves you with a sense of awe and you wonder
how brilliantly had the author created in her mind a world so strange to you
but eerily familiar too. Well the answer to that question lies in those 470
pages.
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| The Lady who wrote it |
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| To read list |
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| Neanderthals according to Google |
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| Google's Cro-magnon |
Pssss... This is my first
attempt in reviving a book, pardon the mistakes and do criticize you critical
scum !
Pssss 2.... According to the knowledgeable goddess wiki, The Earths Children is being made into a TV series, rejoice !
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