A Book of Memories is a novel within a novel. The outer shell of Hungarian author Peter Nadas's ambitious tale concerns a nameless Hungarian writer and his ménage à trois with an aging actress and a younger man in East Germany. While the contemporary writer's own story unfolds, he is busily at work on an historical novel about a German novelist named Thomas Thoenissen. As if a novel about a novelist writing about a novelist wasn't confusing enough, the two fictional writers have a great deal in common, including an unnatural affection for their mothers and a predilection for bisexual triangles. Throw into this already heady brew a great deal of Eastern European cold-war politics, and it becomes obvious that A Book of Memories requires a serious commitment from the reader.
Moving in time between the old Stalinist era and post-communist Eastern Europe, Peter Nadas convincingly conveys the effects of communism, both as it happened and as it collapsed. In his unnamed narrator he creates a perfect conduit between two times; the narrator grew up in a privileged communist family, the son of the state prosecutor in a Stalinist regime. In chronicling the boy's passage from child to man, Nadas paints a vivid portrait of the secrecy, fear, and tension in a society in which the personal and the political are often one and the same.
Moving in time between the old Stalinist era and post-communist Eastern Europe, Peter Nadas convincingly conveys the effects of communism, both as it happened and as it collapsed. In his unnamed narrator he creates a perfect conduit between two times; the narrator grew up in a privileged communist family, the son of the state prosecutor in a Stalinist regime. In chronicling the boy's passage from child to man, Nadas paints a vivid portrait of the secrecy, fear, and tension in a society in which the personal and the political are often one and the same.
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Used availability for Péter Nádas's A Book of Memories
See all available used copies of this book at: Abebooks UK or Abebooks US
Hardback Editions
July 1997 : Hardback
| Title: A Book of Memories Author(s): Peter Nadas ISBN: 0-224-03524-X / 978-0-224-03524-8 (UK edition) Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd Availability: Amazon Amazon UK More details... |
May 1997 : Hardback
| Title: A Book of Memories Author(s): Peter Nadas, Amri Goldshtain ISBN: 0-374-11543-5 / 978-0-374-11543-2 (USA edition) Publisher: Farrar Straus Giroux Availability: Amazon Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
Paperback Editions
July 2008 : Paperback
| Title: A Book of Memories: A Novel Author(s): Péter Nádas ISBN: 0-312-42796-4 / 978-0-312-42796-2 (USA edition) Publisher: Picador Availability: Amazon Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
October 1998 : Mass Market Paperback
| Title: A Book of Memories Author(s): Peter Nadas ISBN: 0-14-027567-3 / 978-0-14-027567-4 (UK edition) Publisher: Penguin Books Australia Availability: Amazon Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
June 1998 : Paperback
| Title: A Book Of Memories Author(s): Peter Nádas ISBN: 0-09-976631-0 / 978-0-09-976631-5 (UK edition) Publisher: Vintage Availability: Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
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