|
|
5.0 out of 5 stars
Extraordinary Hall-of-Mirrors as Narrative!, 29 Mar 2005
There have been enough summaries of this text in other reviews so I won't venture my summary here. Perhaps it's enough just for me to say I experienced the book as a journey, an interloping & interlooping series of stories that may (or may not) involve the author with the narrator(s) & the narrators appearing to come to life & enter into the (presumed) real life of the author, Lee Siegel. Just who is who in this moebius strip of self revelation? The chief narrator, Roth, is a creation of the author, Siegel, but Roth is translating the KamaSutra & in doing so has so fallen for the narrative that he is possessed by the desire to act it out, regardless of reality, his (fictional) position & truly wonderful wife. He loses touch with his (fictional) reality to create his text within a text reality of India & romantico-erotic love with his alluring but bland student. Not only is nothing real in their relationship, it soon becomes clear that Roth (who is fictional) is imposing his vision of ancient, classical & wondrous India upon the current run-down state of the Indian cities & temples. All this writing seems to wear out our author (Siegel) who seems himself to feel the text of the KamaSutra & Roth's infidelities wearing on him so he must enter the (fictional) text in person to intervene. The whole thing is a wonderful phantasmagoria, with stories within stories within stories. Is it comedy? Sure, if you like. Is it tragedy? Undoubtedly, if you read it as such. Is it love story? Well, I found it to be one, partially, sometimes. Is it erotic literature about erotic literature within erotic literature? Absolutely, whatever that means. I agree with others who say the book is not for everyone, as some very disgruntled reviews show. But that makes it all the more special. It is for readers with acumen, some willingness to suspend expectations, to follow narratives back into themselves instead of steadily progressing to a satisfyingly expected conclusion, & to ask questions about writing, about loving, about textuality & reality that perhaps can never really be answered. *...Dead Language* could be labelled as postmodern, but the truly postmodern resists such labels. It just is what it is and what it is to me is a book that breaks open barriers in writing, self, characters, authors, narrators, & events in a way that feels ultimately unspeakably enlightening. In short, I feel this wondrous, sometimes befuddling, book is a masterpiece.
|
by Nick Hornby
by Paulo Coelho
by David Brown
by Elif Shafak
by Doris May Lessing
