![]() ![]() The truths the book tells are deeper than history, more enduring than mere facts Moonglow, his latest, landed on my doorstep with an ominous thud. All the things I’d loved about Chabon’s early work – the surreal Bruno Schulz flourishes, the picturesquely neurotic characters, that radiant voice – were suddenly loathsome. It was sententious and low concept, as if someone had leached the joy from his world and the spark from his imagination. I’d finished it on the train up and it stank. ![]() In 2012, I did an event with Chabon at the Cheltenham literature festival to celebrate the launch of Telegraph Avenue, his eighth novel. Always, though, there was the lightness of touch, the graceful precision of the prose, the sense that here was a writer whose heart was several sizes bigger than any of his peers. He’s a writer who leaps nervelessly across genres and themes: from magic realism to detective fiction, from comic-book heroes to campus Künstlerroman. ![]() Michael Chabon’s best novels – The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Wonder Boys and The Yiddish Policemen’s Union, as well as his underrated debut, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, are among the most luminous and finely crafted books of recent decades. ![]() W hen an author you love writes a book you really don’t, it can feel like an act of personal betrayal. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |