About Michael Cope's
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GOLDIN is a rich novel in which myth and fairy tale are drawn into conversation with urgent ecological and spiritual concerns. It will appeal among others to readers with an interest in oriental religion and spiritual practice, to lovers of Blake and Rumi, to readers of contemporary fairy tales, and to all those who are concerned with forms of ecological intervention. Peopled with diverse beings and metaphors, tales and sub-tales, the text repeatedly explores the granting and choosing of wishes and desires. As one speaker puts it, "mortals have built a wish-granting machine of fabulous power, and can force the poor world to yield up whatever they like. But they have not wished well." A goldsmith called Alan Goldin is selected by the gods to help them decide how they should respond to the world's predicament. Should they intervene, and how? Should they do nothing? In order to act as an impartial adviser, Goldin must sacrifice that which he loves most, his "sense of self." The spiritual crisis which this provokes brings him into contact with Mataji, an ancient woman who has incarnated the goddess many times. Mataji's story, a narrative of yearning, desire, sex and bliss which spans 150 years, reveals that she and Goldin are caught up in the same problem. Her gods are Indian, rather than Greco-Roman, but they are equally disturbed by the impact of modernity. Joot Singh, a man raised in India to be a spiritual leader who chooses instead "failure", the life of the homeless vagrant, is another major character whose path is inextricably intertwined with Mataji's and Goldin's. The gods love telling stories and the novel is full of tales told in a variety of voices. As the main characters tell their stories, Goldin is offered a variety of windows on our present global crisis, and its personal and spiritual resonances. This narrative approach evokes a powerful cumulative awareness of the energy and joy of the sentient, interconnected world, as well as of the deep pain of its devastation through greed and self-serving power. In the final chapters the stories of Mataji, Joot Singh, Goldin and the gods converge in one place, and the goldsmith makes his decision. Julia Martin
Ten years in the making, GOLDIN is 430 pages long, and is lavishly decorated and illuminated throughout with specially-designed fonts and engravings by the author. Goldin: A Tale
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GOLDIN: A Tale was dictated to me, either by my unconscious mind, an explanation I favour, or by some external agency, which is how it felt. I had set out to write an altogether different book, but the first sentences of this one appeared on the screen, and from then it was like a séance. I would simply sit and wait, and the words would come, or not. I never knew in advance what was coming, and had the unusual experience, for an author, of being surprised by the ending. Due to this I am unsure whether there exists any 'key' to 'deeper meanings' in Goldin, or whether it should be read purely on the surface, as fiction. The book came to me between February 1995 and September 2001. After that, I edited and designed. The only way to get my very specific intentions for the text past publishers was self-publication, with a concern like iUniverse.
Goldin goes against the prevailing feeling that South African fiction should remain mired in concerns of colonial history and its legacy. Although I see nothing wrong with a strongly parochial focus, (I was setting out to write such a novel when GOLDIN took over), I also see no reason why such a focus should define and confine a national literature. Although set in South Africa, GOLDIN could play out anywhere in the globalized world: its major concerns are psychological, spiritual and ecological. At the same time it is an investigation into the Tale as a literary form. Michael Cope
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