I have been thinking about the use of the weird and kind of random footnotes in Babel by Rebecca F. Kuang…. EVERYONE speaking about them online find them tiresome and think that they take you out of your reading experience, and I kind of agree… But I still LOVE that they’re there.
See the thing is that I’ve never seen the author using them that much in any other of her books!! So my guess is that she simply is criticising the overuse of barely relevent footnotes in academic paper…
I mean the whole book is about criticising in many ways the institution of University??? I just don’t think she would use that many footnotes just to add some light context for the sake of her worldbuilding, because Rebecca F. Kuang KNOWS how to worldbuild without footnotes (cf the Poppy War trilogy!!)
I think she’s just being the sarcastic PhD student that she is; criticising the not always relevent and frankly boring footnotes you can find everywhere in academic writings, that make the papers reading experience even worse.
by danouuu
18 Comments
I spent the first half of the book wondering why they were there and the second half just accepting them, but it makes SO much sense that it was a critique because some of them were so unnecessary (but some of them weren’t) still I don’t think it took too much away from the novel you can always just ignore them
I’m currently reading Babel on Kindle and find the footnotes so fun! (though they are a bit finicky to tap on on Kindle). It’s such a creative way to add extra tangential information (backstory, explanations etc), and it works SO WELL with historical fiction
I never considered it—they didn’t take me out of the reading and sometimes they provided some interesting context or a historical/linguistic anecdote that made me see the passage in a different way. Maybe because I work as a translator I’m more understanding of the desire/need to provide “extraneous” information or additions that will help orient the reader.
Also I just finished Yellowface the other day and I was surprised at how different it was! Still compulsively readable but totally different tone and feel. I was expecting it to be as long as Babel so I was a little disappointed not to be able to spend so much time with it haha
This is in my tbr pile and when I stumbled on the footnotes critique I groaned and it was mentally demoted. Your comment has bumped it up again. Thank you.
I said the same thing [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/10tos3q/):
I think, in-universe, Babel is a historical nonfiction book about itself. Hence the book’s academic title (“On the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History…”) and footnotes.
Just finished it. While I understand and share many of the criticisms of it, it was a fun read. I can see how it might not appeal to people who are not into linguistics, but it was right up my alley. 4/5 stars
The footnotes always made perfect sense to me in the context of the novel, Babel is very much ABOUT academia as much as it just takes place within it. People who find it annoying should go hang around their nearest college’s humanities department and see what it’s like haha
This book has been on my try list and I do like a fiction book with footnotes so…
I recall reading somewhere she described Babel as her response to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell by Susanna Clarke. Or her take on it, or something along those lines. Jonathan Strange was full of footnotes and I think that’s a big reason why they were included in Babel.
The footnotes were great. I think there were a few distinct schools to them. 1) the informational most like a real foot note academic history giving us context to things taken for granted in the characters conversation. 2) the anecdotes just kind of general world building and character quirk related. 3) my favorite, the notes clearly added after the fact by someone who was there. It’s very much the hand written in the margins kind of feel of a character with first hand experience of the main cast after the fact. They’re super personal and great and based on events in the book make so much sense with the bundled narrative being spread by this person
I didn’t get on with the book overall, to the extent it was my pick for the recent post on most disappointing reads this year.
The footnotes felt very odd in this book. Some of them were fine and added interesting linguistic details, but a lot of them could have just been in the main text. There’s also an unwelcome tendency for them to be very preachy or judgmental.
It’s typical of the literature of the era the book is describing. I did some Victorian Literature work and immediately felt it was an imitation of that literature style/epoch.
I bought this as an audiobook and haven’t started yet. Should I read it in another format instead because footnotes and audio aren’t conducive…
The footnotes make perfect sense for how the book itself is presented as a history of events. Probably the smartest thing about the book lol
Sometimes I lose a little faith in other readers when they criticize books because they miss the obvious 🙁
I found some of the footnotes to be truly interesting, though. Although, I especially enjoyed the etymological aspects of the book. I think she read something like seven or eight books on language just to write this one.
I have to agree with what others have said in that this book is a critique of academia and how ridiculous it can be at its heart. Babel and Yellowface have the same vibes to me. They are both industry critiques while also giving a deep look into the recesses of the minds of their characters. Babel is a look inside the mind of a conflicted, overworked scholarly student and Yellowface being a disturbing peek into the mind of an intensly lonely person who wants nothing more than to be loved regardless of who it is by.
I read the book on my Kindle and the footnotes were as easy to get to as tapping the little number, having the passage pop up and then clicking out of the footnote to continue reading. I did think to myself what a pain it would be to read a physical version constantly having to flip back. A suggestion for people who intend to read: get a kindle or Libby version if you can!
What an interesting take! I wondered the same myself.
As someone prone to falling down many wikipedia holes and a lover of etymology, I really enjoyed the footnotes.