It is an awful, uncomfortable yet indisputable truth that we, as societies and individuals, often treat differently those who look or love or sound or worship differently than we do. We don't always become suspicious, but too often we do. We don't always feel threatened, but too often we do. We don't always respond with violence, but too often we do.
Sometimes these contrasts come purely from hatred. We need only tune into the news to be bombarded with plenty of examples. But humans are complicated, and often the reasons for their actions are complicated, too. Not necessarily more justifiable, just less tidy, less easily dismissed.
Karen Jennings' "An Island" probes the roots of why we treat others with such reductive inhumanity, even at times against our rational intentions or interests. The novel, which was long-listed for the 2021 Booker Prize, is set in a fictional African country — Jennings is South African — whose past includes periods of colonization, independence, dictatorship and popular uprising, periods that stoke division, fear and aggression.
