![]() Lerner makes a powerful link between the violence of young white men and the state of politics While 10:04 dispensed with fictionalised titles and called its narrator Ben, the three books can be considered a trilogy, in that the basic facts of the life being presented are clearly those of Lerner himself – growing up in Topeka, Kansas, moving to Brooklyn via an interlude in Spain, writing poetry and then novels, and becoming the father of two girls. ![]() The protagonist of Lerner’s third novel, The Topeka School, is called Adam Gordon – the same name as the narrator of Leaving the Atocha Station. The books were absurdly smart, occasionally infuriating and often hilarious. ![]() ![]() Ben Lerner’s first two novels, Leaving the Atocha Station and 10:04, were funny, cynical, metafictive delights, taking the raw material of Lerner’s life – a Kansas boy making it big in the world of avant-garde poetry – and playing modish games with the knowing, waspish first-person narrative, constantly destabilising the reading experience. R eading a new book from a writer you admire is never a straightforward thing, particularly when the advance buzz, while positive, suggests a change of direction, a new maturity and seriousness. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |