AustLit
Latest Issues
AbstractHistoryArchive Description
In A Picture Out Of Frame our sympathy is wholly engaged. A boy grows up in poverty in Iran; he goes to the capital; he receives a letter from a friend; he is in exile. Nothing else happens. It will break your heart.
The prose is simple like that of Juan Ramón Jiminéz in Platero and I. (Yes there are donkeys here too.) But the village life so lovingly portrayed is on the brink of tragedy. That fate is precariously held in balance; its extent is only fully revealed in the letter received at the end. Aidani's deft ability to hold back in the face of overwhelming odds justifies his deliberate simplicity of style. The structure is invisibly subtle.
A meditation on the connections between reality, imagination, past and its present, this is a challenging book with revealing emotional richness. It tells the story of a young man who speaks in the third person in order to examine what he saw and suggests that this story could be anyone’s when invasion, war and terror dictates. The book invites the readers to be the real witness of its character’s narrative and observe how he shares his shattered world with us. The narrator invites us to think about the power of memory and its expression in our lives.
A Picture Out Of Frame is ultimately both hopeful and challenging, revealing how urgently the West and the East need to embark upon an understanding of each other.
[From the publisher's website]
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
Exiles in Heart and Mind
1998
single work
review
— Appears in: Ulitarra , December no. 14 1998; (p. 140-143)
— Review of Album of Domestic Exiles 1997 selected work poetry ; A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel -
A Picture Out of Frame
1998
single work
review
— Appears in: Social Alternatives , October vol. 17 no. 4 1998; (p. 68)
— Review of A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel -
The Australianity of This Literature
1998
single work
review
— Appears in: Overland , Spring no. 152 1998; (p. 110-112)
— Review of A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel -
[Review] Eye of the White Hawk [and] A Picture Out of Frame
1998
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , April no. 199 1998; (p. 59)
— Review of Eye of the White Hawk : Stories 1997 selected work short story ; A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel -
Fiction
1997
single work
review
— Appears in: The Sunday Age , 23 November 1997; (p. 12)
— Review of A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel
-
Exiles in Heart and Mind
1998
single work
review
— Appears in: Ulitarra , December no. 14 1998; (p. 140-143)
— Review of Album of Domestic Exiles 1997 selected work poetry ; A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel -
Aftertaste
1997
single work
review
— Appears in: Famous Reporter , December no. 16 1997; (p. 104-107)
— Review of Friendly Street : New Poets : Three 1997 selected work poetry ; A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel ; Mending the Dingo Fence and Other Poems 1997 selected work poetry ; Her Mother's Arms : A Verse Narrative 1997 selected work poetry ; The Red Shoes 1997 selected work poetry ; Seeing Things 1997 selected work poetry ; The Shadow's Keep 1997 selected work poetry prose -
Compassion Outweighs Desire to Impress
1997
single work
review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times Sunday Times , 21 December 1997; (p. 22)
— Review of The Silver Castle : A Novel 1996 single work novel ; A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel -
[Review] Eye of the White Hawk [and] A Picture Out of Frame
1998
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , April no. 199 1998; (p. 59)
— Review of Eye of the White Hawk : Stories 1997 selected work short story ; A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel -
Fiction
1997
single work
review
— Appears in: The Sunday Age , 23 November 1997; (p. 12)
— Review of A Picture Out of Frame 1997 single work novel
-
cIran,cMiddle East, Asia,