Reviewed by Sarah Yasin, Continuations Bibliographer
Another gem from the mind of Palahniuk, this is the story of a young man with no name except for the moniker "Pygmy." From a non-descript totalitarian state, Pygmy is sent for vocational testing at the age of four by his government where he is quizzed on topics such as De Moivre's Theorem and the atomic weight of manganese. Because Pygmy excels, he is removed permanently from his family and trained as a terrorist operative. Later, he is sent to America with a group of peers (posing as foreign exchange students) to carry out a terrorist mission. The insanity of Palahniuk's writing shines in Pygmy as he takes the reader along with a terrorist who is programmed to be judgmental of the American way of life, yet who has an undeniable sense of American scruples and humanity which all his training cannot displace.
This book has no political agenda behind it - it is truly non-partisan, which is the triumph of good literature. Written in the first-person, broken-English of a foreign exchange student, this novel is the epitome of experimental fiction. I can remember reading The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and how difficult it was to catch onto the rhythm of the phonetic dialogue. Imagine if Huck Finn instead were narrated with that dialectical dialogue and you have something close to the reading experience of Pygmy. Many people who pick up this book will be nauseated by the poor syntax and may not get beyond the first dispatch. I do encourage such readers to have patience, because the story that unfolds is one of great beauty and craft. Here is an example of the abstruse writing in Pygmy: "Force compelled to sing how yearning for location on top arched spectrum of light wavelengths created by precipitate."
I admire Palahniuk precisely because of his non-linear style of storytelling. And like punk music enthusiasts, his readers never can tell if the stuff they claim to be a fan of is actually making fun of them. Anyone who says he can't get into the book because of the insane syntax is a xenophobe. This book unabashedly exposes our subconscious fears - that we truly are racist even though we abhor the idea of racism.
Do not read this book if you want a taste of Palahniuk and you've never read anything of his before. Please read Choke or Fight Club first instead. There are traces of the classic mind of Palahniuk in Pygmy - the graphic violence (which is reduced to almost poetry in Pygmy), and the cynical realism of his observations. This book is humorous and intelligent. I especially enjoy the spelling bee bit where only the foreign exchange students remain contestants after the American students are eliminated, and the American audience is restless. This is a perfect illustration of America's ignorance of other cultures' triumphs, and how if it doesn't involve us, we aren't interested.
For all of the violence and distasteful ideas in the book, there is something profoundly humane underneath it all. This book is recommended for literary and political science collections. This is a love story - a story of love for the American people that Pygmy calls parasites. Palahniuk can find beauty anywhere, and he has done it again with Pygmy.
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