The Annotated Nose [Paperback]

Marc Estrin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 2, 2011

A most unlikely life.

“Marc Estrin” discovers that another writer’s novel — The Nose — not only has spawned a bizarre cult among the nation’s youth, but is based on the extraordinary life of a real person—an outcast named Alexei Pigov.

“Estrin” searches Alexei out and asks him to provide annotations to The Nose.

Alexei says that—although the events of the novel might, for the most part, be real—the purported reasons for them are all damnable lies.

On the left-hand page of The Annotated Nose we read The Nose itself, and take in its beautifully unsettling illustrations.

On the right-hand page we follow Alexei’s complaints – always surprising and often far-reaching.

The layers in Estrin’s remarkable comic book are as multiple, eclectic, and outrageous as the sequence of masks Alexei wears to hide his face from the world over the caroming trajectory of his most unlikely life.

The Annotated Nose is at once Marc Estrin’s most playful and his most ambitious work to date. A signed and numbered limited edition of 75 copies is also available.

Editorial Reviews

Review

According to his website, Marc Estrin is a writer, cellist, and activist living in Burlington, Vermont. However, in a secondary biographical note, he calls himself a Biologist, theatre director, EMT, Unitarian Minister, physician assistant, puppeteer, political activist, college professor, cellist and conductor... baffling, even unto himself. Or, in a third, alternative note, ...was hired to teach theatre at Goddard College, but in his departmentless utopia, wound up also teaching music, writing, Finnegans Wake, math, physics, medical self-help and crazy courses like Philosophy for Dishwashers, an audio based lecture/discussion series to sweeten the life of cafeteria volunteers. There is an even longer, fourth biographical statement that mentions growing up in a small apartment so full of books you had to walk sideways in the hall, giving up literary virginity to Franz Kafka at the age of 16, and reaching back into a past life to study and practice medicine. Much like his newest book, The Annotated Nose (Unbridled Books, 2008), Estrin is a composite of raconteur-like embellishments and factual fictions, who challenges the idea of being hemmed in by terse description. Estrin is the author of four previous novels: Insect Dreams: The Half Life of Gregor Samsa (2002), The Education of Arnold Hitler (2005), Golem Song (2006), and The Lamentations of Julius Marantz (2007). The Annotated Nose continues in a similar vein as his previous work, blending elements of fiction, non-fiction, and biography into a humorous novel that doesn't shy away from incisive political or social critique. According to its cover, The Annotated Nose is based on a cult classic called The Nose, a biography written by William Hundwasser about the strange life of a man named Alexei Pigov. Estrin's annotated edition includes Hundwasser's original biographical text, Alexei Pigov's corresponding critical notes, illustrations by Delia Robinson, and an editorial introduction and appendix by Estrin. I contacted Mr. Estrin via email to ask him a few questions about The Annotated Nose: Rail: On the back of The Annotated Nose, there's a list of authors: Jonathan Swift, Laurence Sterne, Franz Kafka, Bruno Schulz, William S. Burroughs. Included in this list is William Hundwasser, the original author of The Nose. Many of those authors fall within a tradition of alternative/experimental writing. Is The Annotated Nose a part of a particular alternative and/or experimental tradition? Estrin: I was not the author of that list, nor did I suggest it as text for the back cover. Nevertheless, I do tend to enjoy very much authors who are in your face AS AUTHORS. Not everyone on the list writes that way, but Swift and Sterne certainly (add Fielding), and I would add even unlisted authorial discourses such as those found in Thomas Mann. But all those folks are found on my shelves, and I enjoy them for reasons as various as they are. I don't tend to think of them as alternative or experimental since I consider the novel itself as an ongoing experiment since Cervantes, alternative only to itself as it varies and evolves. Fred Ramey, my editor, knows that this is a collection of my guys (since we at one time or another have discussed them between us), and he is good-naturedly tweaking me (us) by putting the fictive Hundwasser among them. Rail: Your book makes use of footnotes, illustrations, differing typefaces and blank space to create a somewhat labyrinthine atmosphere. Did you set out to write a book that would have this quality, or did it come about as a result of your work? Estrin: I actually don't see it as labyrinthine at all. It is simply two novels, one third person, and the other first person (in the form of notes) facing one another on left and right pages. Stay in your place. No mixing, even of presentational styles. --The Brooklyn Rail --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 480 pages
• Publisher: Unbridled Books; First Trade Paper Edition edition (September 2, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1932961607
• ISBN-13: 978-1932961607
• Product Dimensions: 9.9 x 7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,012,702 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Marc Estrin is a writer, cellist, and activist living in Burlington, Vermont.

OR
Marc Estrin's world line approximates a cross between a fungal mycelium and a Rube Goldberg device. Biologist, theater director, EMT, Unitarian minister, physician assistant, puppeteer, political activist, college professor, cellist and conductor, he is baffling, even unto himself.

OR, Alternative:
Marc Estrin was hired to teach theater at Goddard College, but in this departmentless utopia, wound up also teaching music, writing, Finnegans Wake, math, physics, medical self-help and "crazy courses" like Philosophy for Dishwashers, an audio-based lecture/discussion series to sweeten the life of cafeteria volunteers. Such are the fruits of liberal education.

OR, Even more alternative:

Marc Estrin grew up in a small apartment so full of books you had to walk sideways in the hall. Of these, he read not one -- till age sixteen, when he gave up his literary virginity to Franz Kafka: The Trial was his introduction to the larger life. This explains much. A mediocre student in high school, he was teased by his father into reading The Magic Mountain during the summer before college. Epiphany! The book was for him a topo-map of western thought and culture. With Mann as his guide, he sailed through college and grad schools, making a Hegelian leap out of graduate science into the richer, if iffier area of the arts. The Vietnam war and Bertolt Brecht were his siren callers into political activity, and his professional theater work dissipated into organizing, college teaching and communal living. When these ceased to put food on the table, he reached back into a past life to study and practice medicine. With the computer came the possibility of writing without retyping -- a stimulus sufficient to have resulted in his current crop of manuscripts, published and unpublished.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I give it the Proboscis Award, August 26, 2009

By 

John Reed - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Annotated Nose (Hardcover)

I wish I could nominate for all kinds of more prestigious awards, but there you have it. The Proboscis Award, despite the fact that it is in its first year, is a time-honored badge of distinction, and highly coveted. Over 10,000 reviewers read through over 50,000 submissions, and have arrived at their decision entirely unanimously, without the aid of drugs or coercion.

Really, the most brilliant catastrophe (and design) that I've seen published in my lifetime. Do read it.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Phonetics, January 24, 2009

By 

JeanneHenley (Richmond, VA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Annotated Nose (Hardcover)

Estrin's fifth novel is a puzzle. The conceit is intriguing: a fake classic about a weird guy, on the left side of the page, with commentary by the weird guy on the right side of the page. The book production is gorgeous: beautiful typefaces and artwork and it's literally heavy in your hands.

For someone as obsessed with getting a girl as Mr. Nose is, he could not have made himself more repulsive. After he attracts a girl he then rejects, her fate is ridiculous. The interesting lessons -- and there are many -- about our culture often get buried in the absurdities. If you are intrigued but irritated by Mr. Nose, as I was for virtually the entire book, try Estrin's first novel Insect Dreams, or his second, The Education of Arnold Hitler. Estrin is a brilliant writer, on nearly every page. Estrin's writing about music is not to be missed (requiring a classical music education) and he is genuinely hilarious.