Customer Reviews

Running Away (Netherlandic and Belgian Literature Series)

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In the first section of this short, somewhat strange novel, an unnamed narrator has landed in Shanghai and is picked up at the airport by one of his girlfriend's business contacts, to whom he delivers an envelope stuffed with cash. The narrator's lack of knowledge regarding the purpose and legitimacy of this transaction sets the tone for what is to come, a series of moves from place to place during which he is rarely grounded or aware of what actually is happening. From Shanghai he travels to Beijing at the invitation of a girl he meets at a party, but their mutual attraction is frustrated by the business contact's intervention, and the fact that they never seem to be able to stay together in one place. In the final section of the novel the narrator has gone to Elba to see his girlfriend, Marie, at her father's funeral. Elba, being of course the island to which Napoleon was exiled, as well as where Marie's father essentially had exiled himself, also reinforces symbolically the alienation felt by the characters. Ultimately this two-part structure challenges the reader to compare the narrator's relationships in China and on Elba, adding to the interest that this slim novel holds.

Occasionally Toussaint's reaching for an emotional effect comes across as heavy-handed, for example when the narrator offers the following: "in an aqueous fog, trembling and dimly illuminated, my mist-filled eyes formed blinding tears in the black night." More often however Toussaint's style seems perfectly suited to the surreal experience of the narrator. His description is what you might call "impressionistic"; rather than describe every sight, sound, or smell in a room, he admirably limits the presentation to those things that impress themselves upon the narrator's senses. Toussaint also is very effective at quickening the pace of his style in order to convey the rushing sensation the narrator experiences in moments of high tension (a motorcycle ride from the police, a mad scramble on a cliffside path). In all, this was well worth it, and I look forward to reading more by this writer.

Running Away is a torridly paced novel, in which a nameless protagonist travels across landscapes of urban decay at blinding speed. It skates around desire and crime -- there's an attempted seduction in the bathroom of an express train as it rockets through a dismally polluted Chinese countryside, where new construction mixes with old ruins. It all comes to naught, as the main character is forced to return to his girlfriend in Europe, where the book concludes. Every sentence is a gem, and Toussaint packs enough existentialism into the proceedings to satisfy even the most jaded palette.