Customer Reviews

Konfidenz: A Novel

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Not only is this book intriguing in its storyline, but it is also intriguing in its composition: Dorfman uses several different narrative voices with great success. He puts the reader in the position of being the voyeur--watching the characters, as well as himself, the author. He also turns a voyeuristic eye on the reader, making you wonder if you, like the characters, are being watched. The novel raises issues of trust in a society where basic human rights are consistently compromised. "Private life is an illusion in our world, Barbara. When you can torture one person, private life ends for everybody else."

A distinguished work of Latin-American literature written by Ariel Dorfman (who was exiled from his native Chile after the 1973 coup), Konfidenz is an absorbing story, told almost entirely through dialogue, of a woman best with telephone calls from a mysterious stranger who appears to know everything about her -- including her reasons for fleeing her homeland and the peril she and those close to her are in. Konfidenz is recommended as a tense, gripping, literate, attention engaging, and multifaceted novel.

Konfidenz is a passionate treatise on love, repression, aesthetics.

The central relationships of the text rip apart the sexuality of government; to start this book requires that you read until you finish it, and read it again many times.

It's not a "hard" read at all--Dorfman's style sometimes borders on austerity, and yet emotionally and intellectually, the work is incredibly challenging. A very poetic sort of prose...

This is a magnificent masterpiece. Every human should give themselves the honor of reading this extraordinary work of art.