Book Review Final

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Book Review

Battle-zone absurdity and adrenaline-fueled folly

By Michiko Kakutani

Published on 3/14/11

Book: The Taliban Shuffle by Kim Barker

Battle-zone absurdity and adrenaline-fueled folly by Michiko Kakutani is about commenting on the book, “The Taliban Shuffle” by Kim Barker, states how it manages to describe Afghanistan situation as hilarious by using literary techniques such as diction, language, and Syntax. Kakutani describes the book as “oxymoron”, which states that the book is eccentric for its humor rather than seriousness about the topic: war in Afghanistan. In addition, she states that in 2003, Taliban used “recalcitrant donkeys as a suicide bombers”, which seems hilarious. By using diction, Kakutani was able to make the serious topic such as Afghanistan one into the funny one.
 Syntax is among the literary techniques “Black humor…is a perfect tool for capturing the sad-awful-frequently-insane incongruities of war”. By using “-“frequently, she was able to make negative words sound like hilarious ones by putting them all together, making it less serious.
 At last, language is used by Kakutani to make Afghanistan war sound funnier than it should be. She also stated that the war “ke[pt] hopping”, making readers think war as a some kind of animal, like a bunny. By doing personification, she was able to make war sound like a bunny, thus making it less serious and more entertaining.
The critical perspective of this work seems to be Formalism for it only focuses on the book that Kakutani wrote, not author’s background or the history of the world. I have discovered the connection between this and other course material or readings that I have had in the past. When I was a Freshman, I was in the U.S. history class. In there, I learned about the Vietnam War. I learned that rarely solders were held accountable for anything and that there were no rules. In addition, I remember learning that the South Vietnam government was corrupt. In current Afghanistan, exact same thing is happening:  corrupt government, no rules, no justice. I want to praise Kakutani for writing a very critical yet funny book review. I enjoyed it very much. Good job!