From Publishers Weekly
Slovenian Gregor Gradnik, the hero of Jancar's spirited and spiritual first novel in English translation, is a visiting creative writing instructor at a New Orleans university, where he assists his sponsor, Professor Fred Blaumann, in an endless accumulation of data for Blaumann's never-to-be-realized book on the physical and spiritual aspects of melancholy. It's a subject familiar to Gregor, whose frequent dreams of falling he interprets as recollection of the spirit's descent into the material world. Gregor may wish to remain a detached and ironic observer of his own and others' spiritual malaise, but he is as quickly pulled into the lives of the people around him as he is into the violent, sexual frenzy of Mardi Gras. He moves between two social levels: the supposedly decent, outwardly successful people of his academic acquaintance and the group with which he feels more comfortable, the tarnished, sleazy but unpretentious characters who frequent his neighborhood bars in the French Quarter. Infidelities and tortured relationships abound in both strata (Gregor is himself prone to guilt-ridden erotic episodes) as sheer physical desire does battle or merges with the longing for transcendence. A swiftly moving series of scenes, some pathetically comic, some downright tragic, an atmospheric rendering of New Orleans?part Kafka, part Tennessee Williams?and a varied cast of dramatic, if broadly drawn, characters such as Gregor's Cajun neighbor Gumbo, who involves Gregor in his disastrous love life and outlandish business schemes, make this intellectually stimulating novel enjoyable, if not escapist, reading.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Library Journal
Filthy slush and homeless people warming themselves at steaming manholes: this is Slovenian author Gregor Gradnik's depressing introduction to America via New York City, the place where he had wanted to live. So maybe he'd actually been lucky that only New Orleans could offer him a writer's fellowship. No filthy slush there, but plenty of heat, jazz, rice, beans, cockroaches, and eccentric characters, all of which he sets himself to observe with a melancholy will. But observation gradually changes to participation as the misfit finds himself entangled in a chain of unconventional relationships that slowly blur the traditional distinctions between fact and fiction, dream and reality, East and West. Told with dark wit and vivid description, this novel brilliantly reflects the colorful, confusing collage that we call America and offers a fine introduction to one of Slovenia's leading contemporary writers. Highly recommended wherever literate fiction is appreciated.?Sister M. Anna Falbo, Villa Maria Coll. Lib., Buffalo, NY
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
