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Title: Rituals by Cees Nooteboom ISBN: 0156003945 Publisher: Harvest Books Pub. Date: 1996 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 5
Rating: 5
Summary: Remarkable on all levels
Comment: This book gives you something to chew on on every level. The prose is good, (the English translation can not capture some of the idiosyncrasies of Dutch, but is very good overall) right from its opening sentence "The day Inni Wintrop committed suicide, Philips shares stood ..." All of the characters in the book are memorable and wonderfully sketched. (As an introverted person, I'm always amused by the walk through the woods scene. Taats asks Inni a question which spurs a two-page train of thought, but he answers only in a mono-syllable.) And it goes up to the structure of the book: the first of the 3 parts is called "Intermezzo". Plenty of ideas here.
Rating: 5
Summary: "Confused times were at hand."
Comment: "Read Cees Nooteboom," a German acquaintance recommended. "You'll remember his RITUALS." Nooteboom is a Dutch poet and novelist. Set in Amsterdam during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, his sparse, 145-page novel opens with "the appalling news" of President Kennedy's assasination (p. 17), and his protagonist, Inni Wintrop's attempted suicide after his wife, Zita, leaves him for an Italian. The novel then follows Inni as he wanders the streets of Amsterdam alone, looking for meaning in a "wonderful, empty universe" (p. 113). Along the way, he encounters Arnold Taads and his estranged son, Philip, by chance. All three characters have lost their faith in God, and attempt to create their own meaning in life through rituals. Arnold Taads is rigidly tied to time. "Time," Inni learns, "was the father of all things in Arnold Taad's life" (p. 46). Philip Taads, on the other hand, attempts to escape time through Zen-like rituals. And as for Inni, "women had become his religion, the center, the essence of everything, the great cartwheel on which the world turned" (p. 60). Intelligent and poetic, RITUALS is ultimately a parable about the importance of learning to ride the inconsistent waves of life in a universe devoid of God.
G. Merritt
Rating: 5
Summary: Thoughtful meditation on chaos and passion
Comment: This book is also in my top five books of all time. I did a search under the keyword "rituals" and it did not pop up (I had to find it a backwards way), and I had a moment of profound sadness thinking that this most wonderful book could be out of print. "Rituals" truly does inspire me. I haven't read it in four years, but it still is one of the best books I've ever read. I loved the intoxication of love and the meaning of life search of the main character. What can induce you to get off of the floor and live? I've wondered that many times in my life, and Inni (the main character) explores what REALLY matters - if anything. It's not to say that this book is a dour questing life meaning book - rather it is a rich, bravado, humorous, cleansing book that has many many rewards. The part of this book that I often think about (and I hope this wouldn't be a spoiler) is the correlation of Inni's mad, chaotic city (Amsterdam if I remember correctly) with monks in Japan. Very funny and important book. I almost feel akin to all the other reviewers who have read this as if we're in a special club.
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Title: The Following Story by Cees Nooteboom ISBN: 015600254X Publisher: Harvest Books Pub. Date: 1996 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
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Title: In the Dutch Mountains by Cees Nooteboom ISBN: 015600402X Publisher: Harvest Books Pub. Date: 1997 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
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Title: The Discovery of Heaven by Harry Mulisch, Paul Vincent ISBN: 0140239375 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 2003 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
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Title: The Assault by Harry Mulisch, Claire White ISBN: 0394744209 Publisher: Pantheon Books Pub. Date: 1986 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Roads to Santiago by Cees Nooteboom ISBN: 0156011581 Publisher: Harvest Books Pub. Date: 21 February, 2000 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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