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Title: The Manuscript Found in Saragossa (Penguin Classics) by Jan Potocki, Ian MacLean ISBN: 0-14-044580-3 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: September, 1996 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.42 (19 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: I wish I could give SIX STARS to this one
Comment: A quick note: Although Jan Potocki was Polish, he wrote The Saragossa Manuscript in French under the title "Manuscrit trouve' a' Saragosse." I still treasure a beloved and battered copy that bears a 1958 copyright. The translator of that edition, Elisabeth Abbott, did an outstanding job in rendering Potocki's tale into English. The story certainly captivated me at the time -- an 8th grader and a stranger to well-written literary fiction. I believe The Saraossa Manuscript is a landmark in this genre, but especially so considering that it was penned in 1804. The ink on the United States constitution was scarcely dry when Potocki put forth his novel and its ideas.
The Saragossa Manuscript stands out in its treatment of the supernatural. Today, if it were a movie, it might earn an "R" rating in its open treatment of sex. Potocki's novel predates works by beloved American authors such as Washington Irving, Nathaniel Hawthorn, and Edgar Allen Poe. Recalling the public burning of Thomas Hardy's "Jude the Obscure" in the 1890's, one wonders what would have been the outcry had this novel have resurfaced in Victorian times.
To the modern reader, the tone of The Saraossa Manuscript might be reminiscent of the Japanese film "Ugetsu" (The Tales of Moonlight and Rain) by director Kenji Mizoguchi. Its motif is reminiscent of Francis Ford Coppola's movie, "Dracula," where demons do not necessarily present themselves as horrid apparitions, but rather they corrupt their victims though sweet intoxicating seduction. Tanith Lee's novels depicting Azhrarn, Prince of Demons (from Tales of the Flat Earth series) come to mind. This brand of evil puts all mortals to the test, for evil masks itself and becomes beguiling. One needs only to look at 20th century history to see this pitfall all the way from Jim Jones to Adolph Hitler.
Potocki's novel is remarkable and certainly worth a visit by the student of literature and the genre fan.
Rating: 5
Summary: A Very Palpable Hit
Comment: Imagine a book written by Edgar Allen Poe, translated by Edward Fitzgerald, filtered through the consciousness of Jorge Luis Borges, and you would have some inkling of what makes this extraordinary book so special. It is to literature what surrealism is to painting. Potocki, who on the strength of this book alone qualifies as Poland's greatest literary figure, prefigures the postmodern movement with his sleight-of-hand and multi-multi-layered text. A Freudian could spend years investigating the recesses and depths of Potocki's subconscious.
The framing device is a young nobleman's romantic wanderings through a section of Spain that could exist only in the mind of someone who was none too selective about his/her diet, or the kind of herbs they decided to ingest. A grotesque and lurid air suffuses this imaginative tale. The plot, if it could be called such a thing, unfolds like a chinese puzzle, one unreliable narrative nested within another. ...It wends its way into your thoughts like an ear-boring worm. It is the sort of work that Danielewski attempted, rather feebly by comparison, in his novel, House of Leaves. Potocki combines the supernatural with the erotic in a way that is unique in literature. Open the pages of this book and prepare to be disturbed and unsettled at times, but be prepared also to engage in a long, strange, diverting trip.
By the way there is a CD of a movie version of Manuscript which was made in Europe in the 60s. Apparently it has been shown periodically in San Francisco art houses, and was appreciated by Jerry Garcia, among others. If the movie even approximates the book, I could understand why.
Rating: 4
Summary: Traveler's Tales
Comment: This is a huge, creaking, Spanish galleon of a book. Centered on tales told by travelers during a sixty-six day mule trip through the mountains of 18th century Spain, it begins to wear on the reader rather like such an arduous journey might. Still, you stick with it, for the scenery if not the destination. It is broken up into reasonably sized chapters, and the chapters are often broken down further into "tales", so you can readily find places to lay it down. The problem is, that the tales are divided and interwoven so intricately, that if you lay it down too many times, then you have to backtrack to refamiliarize yourself with the story and the characters.
You have a little of everything in this book, it is really a rather amazing assemblage. You have stories dealing with adventure, romance, the supernatural, history, humor, philosophy, moral instruction, etc. Not only that, but the stories are related by a wide variety of characters in their own words- men and women; Christian, Moslem, and Jew. Yet it is all at least loosely tied into the overall frame work of the story of a young officer of the Walloon Guards, Alphonse van Worden, traveling to Madrid to take up his command- and his relation to the mysterious Gomelez family, and to two hanged brothers- and the remarkable way that characters tend to awaken beneath their common gallows.
Even one of the characters in the story, a mathematician, repeatedly states that he has to use mathematical notation to keep all the different storylines straight.
I personally believe that the author, Jan Potocki, used this book as a framework to tell the tales that he heard during a lifetime as an adventurer. He was famed for his travels from Siberia to Egypt. Moreover, the late 18th century and early 19th century were a time of story telling. Travelers entertained each other nightly with tales told around an inn or campfire. Story telling was an extremely valuable and respected skill in those days. Potocki here seems to use this book to as a place to hang every remarkable tale that he has ever heard in a remarkable life.
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Title:The Saragossa Manuscript ASIN: B00005Y6YR Publisher: Image Entertainment Pub. Date: 26 March, 2002 List Price(USD): $24.99 Comparison N/A, buy it from Amazon for $22.49 |
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Title: Wolf Solent by John Cowper Powys ISBN: 0375703071 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 24 November, 1998 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
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Title: Hymns to the Night by Novalis, Dick Higgins ISBN: 0914232908 Publisher: McPherson & Co Pub. Date: September, 1988 List Price(USD): $5.95 |
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Title: Selected Writings (PENGUIN CLASSICS) by Gerard De Nerval, Richard Sieburth, Gerard De Nerval ISBN: 014044601X Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: August, 1999 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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Title: Melmoth the Wanderer by Charles Maturin, Douglas Grant, Chris Baldick ISBN: 0192835920 Publisher: Oxford Press Pub. Date: November, 1998 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
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