Burmese Lessons: A True Love Story

Every aspect of the book is interesting and Connelly tells the story perfectly for those who are politically or sociologically inclined to read this book.

Reading this book was a sometimes difficult, but profound experience. Karen Connelly brings to life her experiences in Burma and Thailand, and illuminates the Burmese struggle for independence from a military regime, in this memoir/ love story. In bits and pieces, we get the history of Burma and the revolutionary dissidents, as well as an overview of the various rebel groups, representatives, and artists/ writers who have been imprisoned and tortured by the regime for their efforts at shedding light on the brutalities occurring in their homeland. Connelly interviews several of these people throughout the course of the novel. She has an insider's view into the underground in which the dissidents move; she soon realizes, however, that she is naive as to the delicate workings and history of this world in ways she did not realize. She meets Maung, a leader of one of the dissident groups, who has pledged his life to the cause. The two fall in love, and for the majority of the novel, the story moves back and forth from the larger scope of the Burmese struggle to the more intimate world of Karen and Maung's budding love. The writing is diamond-like, hard and brilliant, and spares nothing. Scenes of torture and brutality are described unflinchingly; there is nothing watered down here. This is what makes it effective at what the author intended-- to bring Burma to life, to expose the effects of a military regime on ordinary people, to juxtapose a passionate, sweet love affair with the bitter realities of living in refugee jungle camps, malaria, war, and death. The one shortcoming, for me, was that this relentless honesty carried into the very intimate relationship between Karen and Maung. I always appreciated the candor of Karen's thought process about her relationship with him, her relationship with Asia, and her life as an author-- it made her human, flaws and all. But the vivid, detailed descriptions of the sexual relationship between Karen and Maung felt to me a bit self-indulgent, as though these bits became more of a personal journal than a memoir. I'm a big fan of brutal honesty, but these scenes felt a bit voyeuristic to me, and in the end, not necessary to the overall message of the book. That aside, it was a very worthwhile read which sheds light on a struggle that's not mentioned on the news. The author's quest is an admirable one and her writing has a lovely flow to it that makes it difficult to look away even during the most horrifying of scenes.

Karen Connelly interweaves the emotional, political, and literary strands of her story in a pleasing and satisfying way. The love story is powerful but so is the background situation on the border between Burma and Thailand and her honesty about her reactions is compelling.

Connelly's experience, and her telling of it, is courageous, eloquent, wise, honest, and powerful. To be so externally focused and at the same time so personally engaged is a challenging balance to strike, but Connelly does so with easy authority, in language that is original, poetic, true. A generous, rigorous, rich outing. Brava.

I would suggest to you that Karen Connelly is not a writer. Instead, I would put forward the argument that she is an artist who paints pictures with words. The sentences she writes exude literary color and vibrancy like thousands of Bollywood dancers all dressed in the brightest and most eye catching Saris performing their greatest routine. On more than one occasion I found tears streaming down my face when I took myself out of the narrative. I had become overwhelmed by the sheer beauty of the pictures she had painted through the strokes of her words. At times I felt submerged in the environments described to the point I was almost feeling the Buddhist serenity and smelling the Burmese foods. The page truly is her canvas upon which she paints vivid imagery using the brush of her heart and the paints of her soul. 'Burmese Lessons' dissolves Ms Connelly's personal experiences and the day to day lives of the Burmese people, who live under a military dictatorship, into a memoir. Like the proverbial tea and sugar they start out as separate entities but one is added to the other and the stirring of a relationship takes place that has Ms Connelly drinking from the cup of love. Outside of this cup the Burmese table, on which the cup sits, is covered with dishes filled with oppression and injustice. Intimately linked to the Burmese culture Ms Connelly puts her safety on the line so we too can sample the foods that cover this table, digest the sociopolitical situation and taste for ourselves the life changing events of which she partook in the mid 1990s. Reading this book was the literary equivalent of making love one last time to your soul mate in a four poster bed, on a balmy night, on top of the finest satin sheets and never wanting that night to end. It was bittersweet...full to the brim of joy and love yet overflowing with hurt and pain. So wonderful is the writing that the book itself is like a living, breathing entity that is full of life, love and sorrow. If you want to read a factual work that will move you and leave a lasting impression on your heart then look no further than 'Burmese Lessons'.