Customer Reviews

Last Call

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

 

 

Mulisch accomplished here again a dazzling novel. It is theatre withing theatre. In intricate winding of lives, the old actor, Uli Bouwmeester performs his last role of the last role of the older actor de Vries in Shakespeares Tempest, Prospero.As magically as Prospero, the author weaves places, situations, characters, times, events in moving, twirling, engaging tapestry. In reference to Poe's "Narratives ..of Pym" the ending takes the reader through the life transforming and time transcending narratives of the protagonist. The novel unfolds with the clarity of greek tragedy. But even more than these (after all 3000 years of development) it provides rare glimpses of insight into the deeper issues of life.

This is a somewhat over-complicated novel revealing the flawed and somewhat unappealing central character through the story-line. The theatrical setting is well defined and several of the characters - Willem (Uli) himself and Berta his sister for instance - are well-drawn.
But Harry Mulisch is indeed someone who sometimes needs to hide his high intelligence and he fails to do so in this book. By turns bewildering and banal, the reader is left wondering what exactly is the point which Mulisch is getting at. The skill with which Mulisch executes the five "acts" has little corrolary in content: it's as if it is all form and little substance. Above all, Mulisch fails to make us really care about Uli; the focus shifts to Berta who is revealed as a more sympathetic and interesting figure.
Dixon's appalling translation does Mulisch no favours: some of her howlers must be incomprehensible to non-Dutch speakers ("everyone was hanging on her lips" springs to mind) and her intrusively nit-picking punctuation gives the prose a stop-start feel that makes reading clunky and awkward.
This is a book for Mulisch afficionados only.