Schopenhauer's Telescope: A Novel [Paperback]

Gerald Donovan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 15, 2004

"The haunting novel ...[is] one of the most unusual novels of the year...The effect is pulse-quickening and horrific, as though we've been force marched through a theme park of grotesque monsters."- . In an unnamed European village, in the middle of a civil war, one man digs while another watches over him. Slowly, they begin to talk. Over the course of the afternoon, as the snow falls and truckloads of villagers are corralled in the next field, we discover why they are there--not just who they are but also how sinister events in the country have led them to be separated by a deepening grave, and why the history of civilization is inseparable from the history of mass violence. Beautifully written, with a poet's eye for detail coupled with a chilling and compelling narrative drive, is current in the best sense--no thin allegory of today's conflicts, but a remarkable attempt to make art out of the brutality of life.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A self-reflexive commentary on war and violence, Donovan's first novel is sophisticated and innovative, though too caught up in toying with literary conventions. Two unnamed men in an unnamed, war-torn European town some time in the 20th century engage in philosophical dialogues on morality and human cruelty. One, an awkward loner-referred to as "the baker"-is digging a hole, while the other, an educated, overbearing man-referred to as "the teacher"-watches him. The men's philosophical ruminations circle around historical instances of evil-from the Mongol hordes to World War II-as well as the baker's secret past, which is somehow linked to recent events in the ravaged town. The war is conveyed through stylized imagery (in the background are brooding soldiers and a mass of people delivered in trucks) that could belong to any conflict of the last century. The baker's past, when revealed, stands the reader's assumptions on their head, but the energy of this climax-and of the novel as a whole-is diffused by Donovan's experimental hijinks, which involve excerpts of a screenplay about Genghis Khan, a fairy tale, and such digressions as an overly long anecdote about one of the baker's obnoxious former customers. Donovan lets this novel get away from him, but he is an inventive and thoughtful writer, and those who have the patience will appreciate his meditations on the specters haunting Europe and look forward to his next, hopefully more focused effort.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

In the midst of a European civil war, two men stand in a field. One is a monster; the other tries desperately to understand him before time runs out. On opposite sides of the conflict, a baker digs a hole while a history teacher watches. As the mound of frozen dirt beside the hole grows higher, truckloads of villagers arrive to wait under the machine guns of soldiers, and we realize the terrible implications of the excavation. Throughout the day, the two men engage in intellectual combat, debating the true nature of evil. Bloodthirsty chapters of history form their battleground, from the ravages of Genghis Khan to the murder of 10 million Africans by Belgian rubber barons in the 1890s. As the men spar with surprising wit and verbal dexterity, Donovan employs the conventions of narrative to craft a stunning lesson about not choosing sides before all the evidence is in. Sociopaths, it seems, are the only people who can make sense of war and flower in its heat. Frank Sennett
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Counterpoint (June 15, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1582433100
• ISBN-13: 978-1582433103
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.7 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,167,151 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Ambitious, original novel, November 5, 2003

By 

J. N. Mohlman (Barrington, RI USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Schopenhauer's Telescope (Hardcover)

Gerard Donvan's novel "Schopenhauer's Telescope" take as it's focal point an act that was carried out all too often during Europe's tortured twentieth century: the digging of a mass grave. One would expect that such a setting would provide for a rather limited narrative, but as it turns out, the opposite is true. "Schopenhauer's Telescope" sprawls in every direction, touching upon a host of topics and exploring so many themes that it is sometimes to its detriment. Nonetheless, this is a powerful novel, that succeeds far more often than it fails.

The central characters are Baker and Teacher; they share a conversation in an unknown field in an unknown European country as the Baker digs what is clearly intended to be a grave. As I mentioned above, their conversation meanders across a host of topics, but one recurrent theme repeats itself, or perhaps two that intertwine. The theme is history, but the two men have drastically different feelings about what it means and how it should be studied.

The Baker views history as an inexorable tide, something to be survived rather than engaged, because survival is the core purpose of his existence. The Teacher, on the other hand, views history as a living, breathing thing; something that cannot be understood in its entirety, but which can be embraced and learned from.

While this conversation is fascinating, the most intriguing element of this book is the dichotomy it sets up between the two men. What are their roles? How have they each found their way to this snowy field? The reader is left uncertain as to who holds the power in the relationship until well into the narrative, and even then, one is left to question which man really understands the world, and more importantly, his place in it.

Unfortunately, the novel is at times horribly over-written. Donovan enjoys playing with various approaches to his narrative, and generally speaking he is successful. However, there are times when form trumps substance and this can make for tedious reading. Moreover, over the course of two ill-advised segments, he reveals one of the characters (saying which one would be a major spoiler) to be somewhat insane, which significantly curbed any sympathy or compassion I might have felt for him. Moreover, it is difficult to judge the mentally ill for their actions, and the book's endgame suffers somewhat as a result.

That said, the positives in "Schopenhauer's Telescope" more than outweigh the negatives. At its best, Donovan's writing borders on poetry, and his style represents a genuinely original voice. This is a novel rich in ideas and philosophy, but it is also a novel that raises more questions than it answers. What is a life well lived? What makes life worth living? Is evil absolute, or does it need to be taken in context? These questions just scratch the surface, and I suspect that additional readings would reveal additional questions, and that furthermore, other readers will take away completely different questions. "Schopenhauer's Telescope" is just one of those books that can be interpreted a dozen different ways by a dozen different people without any of them being wrong. While far from perfect, Donovan's work is among the best I have read this year, and will, I am certain, stay with me for some time to come.

Jake Mohlman

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Pessimism transcended, July 9, 2003

By 

Harry L. Stille (Houston, Texas USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Schopenhauer's Telescope (Hardcover)

I leave it to critics and novelists to comment on the merits or shortcomings of a first novel? I can only say that I was attracted to "Schopenhauer's Telescope" by its title. Written by a poet, this first novel is presented in beautifully cadenced poetry like prose, though burdened at times by wearied transitions. Drafted in short chapters, the work resembles the form of Schopenhauer's, "Essays and Aphorisms."
At the precise center, marked by a curious screenplay on the Great Kahn, Mr. Donovan reveals the theme of his novel - strength through indifference. Focusing his inverted telescope on the past, Donovan comments on historical atrocities, interpreted like modern events, thus suggesting that nothing has changed. The result is a pessimistic (or for some) perhaps realistic view of history. There are possibly many metaphors and symbols to be mined by astute reviewers, but references to philosophers such as Hume, Locke, to me seemed more contrived and artificial than substantive. In terms of the title, the prevailing mood of pessimism, often associated with Schopenhauer is appropriate.
Surprisingly, the novel ends with the protagonist, an "indifferent" survivor placing a "love" letter on a table next to his bed, before he simply disappears. Like the announcement of a coming attraction, this ending suggests that a more differentiated view of life resides in the soul of this thought provoking and creative poet/novelist. I look forward to his next work.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Read this now., December 29, 2004

By 

A. Sutton "violet" (California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Schopenhauer's Telescope (Hardcover)

When I first read this book in autumn of 2003, I was struck by how relevant it seemed to the issues of the time. As months and finally a year passed, its passages came back to me again and again, with greater force each time. It was as though the real world outside this novel was warping to meet the dark setting of the fiction.

Read this book, and go back and read again the accounts of torture at Abu Ghraib. Read this book, and seek out the stories of those who lived through the torments of Saddam's Iraq. Or just turn on CNN (better yet, Fox News), mute the sound, and read this book. This novel could be the critical comment to any real-time story of power and cruelty. There is no shortage of such stories now.

I gave this book only four out of five stars because I've shared it with friends who are less interested in poetry than I am, and they have found it a fairly slow read. That was not my experience, but it might be yours.

Above its obvious parallels to a world at war, this book's more lasting value is its presentation of two characters who are at odds with each other, and at each other's mercy. I didn't see a protagonist and an antagonist in this story: I saw two central characters (and a surrounding world) with nothing left to win. When our differences are the only things that define us, all that was once of value is lost to us. The battle against one another is all we have left, and even that is worthless.

Read this book, red staters and blue staters, and try to figure out which side of the ditch you're on. Try to figure out who's right and who's wrong, and about what, and why any of it matters. I won't guarantee that you'll see yourself or anyone you know in these pages; chances are that you won't. But there may be a time when a scene from this book will come back to you, throwing its odd light on a world that few of us have looked at clearly in a long time.

Happy New Year to Amazonians everywhere. Let's be kinder to each other in 2005.