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In a white city on the African shore of the Mediterranean, the Islamic fundamentalists are gaining control of the streets and the European community of artists and decadent aristocrats take refuge in memories and innumerable barely-recognised vices. Luca and Irene, a young couple, are accepted into this decaying and malicious ex-patriot society because of Irene's family money. On learning that his wife has breast cancer, Luca becomes obsessed with the memory of his mother who died of the same illness, and escapes into the only world in which he feels secure, his garden, to which he devotes himself with the desperate passion of one threatened by the entire world. There he remains ignorant of the intrigues of his friends and acquaintances, untouched by Irene's illness and her distance. He immerses himself ever more deeply in his dream, becoming more and more like the city's inhabitants who are rushing towards corruption and destruction.… (más)
A gorgeously written novel; the language, even in translation, is beautiful. A quick read, and one of the most amusing and disturbing novels I've come across - blending as it does the literature of the decadence, the campy flamboyance of Firbank, and the distilled evil of Sade, obsession, horticulture and pathology. In it is the sensibility of Ovid, Kafka and Mengele. It is also a send up of colonialism and a reflection on the inconvenient phenomenon of random, violent death. I certainly hope the author will try fiction again. ( )
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés.Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
There is a first scene.
Citas
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Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés.Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
And as Marta clung to her (her face hollowed by scrimping and furrowed with tears is now in close up, it fills the screen): "Don't worry, you can't see anything...this city is full of opportunities for a pretty girl like you...listen to me, don't cry, we'll fix him up even if it's a little boy...princes, sultans, lords...don't cry or you'll ruin those pretty eyes...I know a duke who'd be just right for you...the duke of Mainville...Bébé de Mainville...do you like the name?...do you like nice names?...then listen, listen to my story, niña."
In a white city on the African shore of the Mediterranean, the Islamic fundamentalists are gaining control of the streets and the European community of artists and decadent aristocrats take refuge in memories and innumerable barely-recognised vices. Luca and Irene, a young couple, are accepted into this decaying and malicious ex-patriot society because of Irene's family money. On learning that his wife has breast cancer, Luca becomes obsessed with the memory of his mother who died of the same illness, and escapes into the only world in which he feels secure, his garden, to which he devotes himself with the desperate passion of one threatened by the entire world. There he remains ignorant of the intrigues of his friends and acquaintances, untouched by Irene's illness and her distance. He immerses himself ever more deeply in his dream, becoming more and more like the city's inhabitants who are rushing towards corruption and destruction.
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