I Curse the River of Time
A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEARIt’s 1989 and “three monumental events twine around one another in Arvid Jansen’s penumbral soul. His fifteen-year marriage is dissolving, his mother is dying of cancer, and the Berlin Wall is tumbling down. The parallels are obvious—worlds are...
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A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEARIt’s 1989 and “three monumental events twine around one another in Arvid Jansen’s penumbral soul. His fifteen-year marriage is dissolving, his mother is dying of cancer, and the Berlin Wall is tumbling down. The parallels are obvious—worlds are ending, internally and externally—but the analogies Petterson draws among these dramatic endings are not....I Curse the River of Time is a little like the starker reaches of the West, a little like the stonier shores of Maine, a little like Edward Hopper, a little like Raymond Carver....There is a quality that I can only call charm, or something like charm, to Petterson’s essentially dark and lonely sensibility....It exerts a gravitational pull on the reader” (Stacey D’Erasmo, The New York Times Book Review).
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Format: paperback
ISBN:
9780312429539 (0312429533)
Publish date: August 2nd 2011
Publisher: Picador
Pages no: 240
Edition language: English
Category:
Novels,
Literature,
European Literature,
Book Club,
Historical Fiction,
Literary Fiction,
Drama,
Family,
Contemporary,
Modern,
Scandinavian Literature
There is plenty of compassion in a Per Petterson novel. Even with at least three difficult themes wrapped up into one package. Death, relationships, and the examination of a life too late in the game now to change. This novel was not "fun" to read, but I am glad I read it. Seems I end up liking ...
Translated by Charlotte Barslund.Discarded from London Borough of Lewisham Library.Opening: All this happened quite a few years ago.#57 TBR Busting 2013Didn't like this navel-gazing much at all.Next!!5* Out Stealing Horses4* To Siberia4* In the Wake2* It's Fine By Me2* I Curse the River of Time
It was difficult at first to give myself into Petterson's simple rhythms. The story is mostly backstory, and he meanders about his memories and his past life in ways that sometimes seem irrelevant. But his wonderful poetic prose -- the "dementing lures" described by James Wood in his recent New Yo...
Not at all happy, and no resolution, but quite a poignant portrait of a young Norwegian man who is too wrapped up in shame and anxiety to connect with others.
The main person in this was very wimpy, which I was not expecting and did not like. He kept saying very boring, obvious things about his boring, obvious emotions and I don't know if that was supposed to be another reminder of how wimpy he is or if P.P. has just gotten to be a worse writer than he w...
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