This book was a weird mixture of fiction and non-fiction related to the theme of travel. The author is quite famous in Poland apparently, and this collection is the first of her work that I’ve read.
Starting the book without knowing the format allowed me a sense of wonder while reading. Which of these stories are true? Are these memories of the author or simply short stories that she wrote during her travels? Eventually the reader can sense the rhythm of it – but it takes a while and is a unique reading experience.
The author seems to be fascinated with the preservation of organs and body parts separated from their owners – and I learned a lot more about plastination that I ever really wanted to know. This focus on organs floating in preservative is a dark theme throughout the book. So if you’re into that then this is the book for you!
The writing is shot through with an intangible element of cold war gray – a sort of darker view of things and there is little to no joy to be found in these stories. There is a sense of the author putting together a plate for the reader, and whether they enjoy that plate or not is on them rather than the author.
As a fellow traveler there was a lot I recognized – especially the descriptions of the airports and flying through the darkness over some unknown country below. I enjoyed the writing here when it focused on something I am more familiar with.
This apparently is a translation from the original Polish, and if that is true then it is either a phenomenal translation or a horrible one. The English is beautiful and extremely well thought out. Rarely do I read a translation that feels so natural – so I wonder if it is really what the author intended or not. Either way it was wonderful to read.
Finally there was a great passage written about an old professor, dying from a stroke and massive damage to his brain, and the description of the blood flooding his brain and drowning his memories one by one was something that I’ll never forget:
But the crimson inner ocean of the professor’s head rose from the swells of blood-bearing rivers and gradually flooded realm after realm- first the plains of Europe, where he had been born and raised. Cities disappeared underwater, and the bridges and dams built so methodically by generations of his ancestors. The ocean reached the threshold of their reed-roofed home and boldly stepped inside. It unfurled a red carpet over those stone floors, the floorboards of the kitchen, scrubbed each Saturday, finally putting out the fire in the fireplace, attaining the cupboards and tables. Then in poured into the railway stations and the airports that had sent the professor off into the world. The towns he’d traveled to drowned in it, and in them the streets where he had stayed awhile in rented rooms, the cheap hotels he’d lived in, the restaurants where he’d dined. The shimmering red surface of the water now reached the lowest shelves of his favorite libraries, the books’ pages bulging, including those in which his name was on the title page. It’s red tongue licked the letters, and the black print melted clean away. The floors were soaked in red, the stairs he’d walked up and down to collect his children’s school certificates, the walkway he’d gone down during the ceremony to receive his professorship. Red stains were already collecting on the sheets where he and Karen had first fallen and undone the drawstrings of their older, clumsy bodies. The viscous liquid permanently glued together the compartments of his wallet where he kept his credit cards and plane tickets and the photos of his grandkids. The stream flooded train stations, tracks, airports, and runways – never would another airplane take off from them, never would another train depart for any destination.
This book was an odd read, a different tone from what I’m accustomed to, but overall I thought it was not a bad book.
Next I am reading This Isn’t Going To End Well by Daniel Wallace.
