Adam Gordon is a brilliant, if highly unreliable, young American poet on a prestigious fellowship in Madrid, struggling to establish his sense of self and his attitude towards art. Fuelled by strong coffee and self-prescribed tranquillizers, Adam's 'research' soon becomes a meditation on the possibility of authenticity, as he finds himself increasingly troubled by the uncrossable distance between himself and the world around him. It's not just his imperfect grasp of Spanish, but the underlying suspicion that his relationships, his reactions, and his entire personality are just as fraudulent as his poetry. In prose that veers between the comic and tragic, the self-contemptuous and the inspired, Leaving the Atocha Station is a dazzling introduction to one of the smartest, funniest and most audacious writers of his generation.
Leaving the Atocha Station
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A remarkable first novel ... Gales of laughter howl through Leaving the Atocha Station. It's packed full of gags (Adam is convinced that Ortega y Gasset is two people, like Deleuze and Guattari) and page-long one-liners itemising the narrator's ghostly immunity to normal human relations ... After the attacks, with the election of Zapatero imminent, an activist tells Adam that he has been "up all night protesting and partying. I asked if those were the same things, protesting and partying." The question is not asked maliciously and the book never feels like satire. What is does feel like is intensely and unusually brilliant. Beyond that, I don't know quite what it is and I like it all the more for that. --Geoff Dyer, Observer
The narrator of Ben Lerner's short but potent novel is, by his own admission, a fraud... A morbid fascination at his social awkwardness and self-destructive duplicity, and the tension created by a mind teetering on the edge of panic, are some of the more straightforward pleasures of the narrative. But there is much more to this beguiling text. We perceive an intellectual rigour and ideological coherence behind Gordon's masks; through these Lerner sets up profound questions about the possibilities of art and human experience... That the novel refuses to yield clear answers is no accident. Like the literature Gordon eulogises, its charge derives from the ambiguities that emerge from its contradictory propositions. --The Times
Hilarious and crackingly intelligent, fully alive and original in every sentence. --Jonathan Franzen
The narrator of Ben Lerner's short but potent novel is, by his own admission, a fraud... A morbid fascination at his social awkwardness and self-destructive duplicity, and the tension created by a mind teetering on the edge of panic, are some of the more straightforward pleasures of the narrative. But there is much more to this beguiling text. We perceive an intellectual rigour and ideological coherence behind Gordon's masks; through these Lerner sets up profound questions about the possibilities of art and human experience... That the novel refuses to yield clear answers is no accident. Like the literature Gordon eulogises, its charge derives from the ambiguities that emerge from its contradictory propositions. --The Times
Hilarious and crackingly intelligent, fully alive and original in every sentence. --Jonathan Franzen
About the Author
Born in Kansas in 1979, BEN LERNER is the author of three books of poetry, The Lichtenberg Figures, Angle of Yaw, and Mean Free Path. He has been a finalist for the National Book Award and the North California Book Award, a Fulbright Scholar in Spain, and the recipient of a Howard Foundation Fellowship. In 2011 he became the first American to win the Munster State Prize for International Poetry. He teaches in the writing program at Brooklyn College. Leaving the Atocha Station is his first novel.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
By Paul Bowes
TOP 500 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback
Ben Lerner is a highly regarded young American poet. 'Leaving the Atocha Station' - the title is taken from a poem by John Ashbery, whom Lerner admires - is his first novel. Set around the time of the Madrid bombings in 2004, it recounts a few months in the life of Adam Gordon, a young American poet who has been awarded a writing scholarship in Spain. Adam is struggling: with doubts about his ability as a poet; with his relationships with women; with the Spanish language; with the question of whether to return to the States or pursue a new life in Spain; with drugs prescribed and unprescribed. The common factor is his sense of mediacy: of being in transit and yet without a defined goal, of being separated from his own experiences in a way that renders them null.
'Leaving the Atocha Station' has been highly praised by reviewers, but left me with a distinct sense of dissatisfaction. The novel of a young man's education in life is a firmly established genre, and certain types of cliché have become hard to avoid, but Lerner seems actively to court some of the worst. In particular, the reader's investment in the story is likely to turn on his or her response to the central character. Lerner is alive to Adam's selfishness and self-absorption, his casual cruelty and mythomanic propensities, and it may be that these qualities were intended to come across as essentially comic - especially as they rarely achieve the results Adam intends - but the abiding impression was of a highly privileged young man who might serve as a living exemplar of the American term 'ingrate'.
Characters that are hard to admire in life may nonetheless prove compelling in narrative. But Lerner never managed to make me care about Adam's intransitive state or his possible futures.... Read more ›
'Leaving the Atocha Station' has been highly praised by reviewers, but left me with a distinct sense of dissatisfaction. The novel of a young man's education in life is a firmly established genre, and certain types of cliché have become hard to avoid, but Lerner seems actively to court some of the worst. In particular, the reader's investment in the story is likely to turn on his or her response to the central character. Lerner is alive to Adam's selfishness and self-absorption, his casual cruelty and mythomanic propensities, and it may be that these qualities were intended to come across as essentially comic - especially as they rarely achieve the results Adam intends - but the abiding impression was of a highly privileged young man who might serve as a living exemplar of the American term 'ingrate'.
Characters that are hard to admire in life may nonetheless prove compelling in narrative. But Lerner never managed to make me care about Adam's intransitive state or his possible futures.... Read more ›
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By Carol-Ann
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
I took the review of this book from the Times and thought it sounded like something i would generally enjoy reading. I found the book tedious and boring, and actually found myself wishing the % away on the kindle! Somehow i could not give up on it, but i felt as though i was endlessly waiting for either something to happen or some blinding insight about one (or any) of the (cold and unlikeable) characters. Full of accounts which go nowhere, self indulgent ramblings and endless text about smoking, drinking, taking tablets and telling lies. I am not sure what the point was to this novel. Inaccessible, utterly depressing and did little for me i am afraid. Maybe the author is a better poet than writer.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Adam is a young American poet on a fellowship in Madrid in 2004. He has been funded to work on a poem about the Spanish Civil War but he confesses that he knows nothing about the history of the country and his Spanish is not proficient enough for the task he has set himself. He spends most of his time avoiding contact with the foundation that has funded him, partying with young Madrileños and taking drugs. He seems unable to exist without copious prescription pills, hash, weed, nicotine, caffeine and alcohol.
Adam is the unreliable narrator par excellence. He continually lies to his companions, adopts anecdotes from others as his own, claims that his Spanish is poor but seems to manage in some complex situations. He is fooling the other characters in the book as well as the reader. He is exceedingly egotistic and self-referential. Even when discussing the Madrid terrorist bombings his first thoughts are for his own relationship with Teresa rather than the victims.
The cover of Leaving the Atocha Station is splashed with rave reviews: "luminously brilliant", "intensely and unusually brilliant", "seductively intelligent". I am sorry to say that much of the book left me cold. There were many funny incidents and reflections - like when he leaves his hotel in Barcelona to buy a coffee and (not knowing the name of the hotel) gets lost in the narrow streets for a whole day.
There are undoubtedly splashes of brilliance in this book but they verge on the "look how clever I am" type of writing. There is a very narrow line between brilliance and pretentiousness.....
Adam is the unreliable narrator par excellence. He continually lies to his companions, adopts anecdotes from others as his own, claims that his Spanish is poor but seems to manage in some complex situations. He is fooling the other characters in the book as well as the reader. He is exceedingly egotistic and self-referential. Even when discussing the Madrid terrorist bombings his first thoughts are for his own relationship with Teresa rather than the victims.
The cover of Leaving the Atocha Station is splashed with rave reviews: "luminously brilliant", "intensely and unusually brilliant", "seductively intelligent". I am sorry to say that much of the book left me cold. There were many funny incidents and reflections - like when he leaves his hotel in Barcelona to buy a coffee and (not knowing the name of the hotel) gets lost in the narrow streets for a whole day.
There are undoubtedly splashes of brilliance in this book but they verge on the "look how clever I am" type of writing. There is a very narrow line between brilliance and pretentiousness.....
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
This book is written by a clever author, who, it seems to me, wants you to know how clever he is. I love Madrid, have lived a student life and ought to have been pleased with the detail and authentic Madrid feel of the novel, but I had a big problem. I really disliked the protagonist (you cannot call Adam a hero). It is not that he is a drug taking, self-indulgent American spending his country's money and that of his rich parents, unwisely (he is on a fellowship grant for poetry writing). It is that he is a compulsive liar who treats others with disdain. Part of the author's skill is that he makes you see Adam's friends through your own eyes, not Adam's and you realise what cultured and valuable people they are, but this only served to make me dislike Adam even more and I was glad when the book ended.
By NickR
Format:Paperback
First of all, congratulations to Granta Books for picking up this book by a first-time novelist who should go on to do more, and even better.
It's a fine book, but I don't believe it lives up to the hype that's been loaded on it. The professional reviewers who described it as "the funniest book I read this year", and full of "gales of laughter" have a very odd sense of humour. It's wry, it invites schadenfreude, it has an initially loathsome and drugged-up protagonist who sort-of comes good - but "hilarious", really..?
Ben Lerner is clearly bright and well read, and enjoys playing with language. In just 180 pages he delivers more of an intense literary experience than Roberto Bolaño managed in his comparably-themed 600-page bloat-fest, 'The Savage Detectives'. I hope Ben Lerner will write more fiction.
PS: the use of the capitalised Spanish definite article in place names was odd. Phrases such as "I would cross El Paseo del Prado", and "the noise from La Plaza Santa Ana" sound jarring. I think most people would find "the Paseo del Prado", and "the Plaza Santa Ana" more normal (and Lerner's Adam does leave for "the Prado", not for "El Prado").
It's a fine book, but I don't believe it lives up to the hype that's been loaded on it. The professional reviewers who described it as "the funniest book I read this year", and full of "gales of laughter" have a very odd sense of humour. It's wry, it invites schadenfreude, it has an initially loathsome and drugged-up protagonist who sort-of comes good - but "hilarious", really..?
Ben Lerner is clearly bright and well read, and enjoys playing with language. In just 180 pages he delivers more of an intense literary experience than Roberto Bolaño managed in his comparably-themed 600-page bloat-fest, 'The Savage Detectives'. I hope Ben Lerner will write more fiction.
PS: the use of the capitalised Spanish definite article in place names was odd. Phrases such as "I would cross El Paseo del Prado", and "the noise from La Plaza Santa Ana" sound jarring. I think most people would find "the Paseo del Prado", and "the Plaza Santa Ana" more normal (and Lerner's Adam does leave for "the Prado", not for "El Prado").
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Stoned in translation
So much felt splendidly spot on in this tale of a young guy hanging out in a foreign city - a rite of passage that so many of us have been through - myself in Barcelona. Read more
Published 1 month ago by paperbackwriter
1.0 out of 5 stars
intellectual arrogance behind a mask
This is possibly the most depressing book I've read in many a year. The narrator, Adam Gordon, is self-important, intellectually arrogant and cold - if this is a roman à... Read more
Published 3 months ago by charlie
4.0 out of 5 stars
Well written and comical
This is a very well executed debut novel from this American poet turned novelist and has a number of autobiographical features that seem to mirror the writers own experiences. Read more
Published 3 months ago by Pete Williams
5.0 out of 5 stars
compelling & funny
hot new poet's novel. He looks like franzen but writes better. This is a coming of age writer in foreign country story, clearly a lot of autoB thrown in, with some unreliable... Read more
Published 7 months ago by weeks
1.0 out of 5 stars
would be more stars if it was a parody
this novel is about an american postgrad on some kind of endowment that funds him to produce 'poetry' in madrid for a while. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Roman Totale
5.0 out of 5 stars
Jesting Pilate
What is truth? said jesting Pilate.
Autofiction is a particularly diffricult genre to pull off, and I think Lerner does a good job. Read more
Autofiction is a particularly diffricult genre to pull off, and I think Lerner does a good job. Read more
Published 10 months ago by terence dooley
5.0 out of 5 stars
Made me want to stay on the tube
Started it one morning on my commute and just wanted to keep on and keep on reading. This is a wonderful book. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Emran
3.0 out of 5 stars
A tad boring.
It isn't as badly written as some reviewers have been making out, but I did find this book quite tedious and one word another reviewer used which I would agree with is... Read more
Published 11 months ago by kindler
2.0 out of 5 stars
Famous people like it... but I found it a little tedious
This book comes with extensive praise (within the front covers) from, among many others, Paul Auster and Jonathan Franzen. Read more
Published 15 months ago by William Jordan
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