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Sto caricando le informazioni... Dear Mr Mdi Herman Koch
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Iscriviti per consentire a LibraryThing di scoprire se ti piacerà questo libro. Attualmente non vi sono conversazioni su questo libro. Now in his eighties, M, the Dutch novelist, is famous and respected despite the fact that his most significant literary triumphs are behind him. Best known for his novel, Payback, M continues to add to his literary legacy while leading a quiet existence with his daughter and much younger wife, Ana, in their urban apartment. But M is about to face an unpleasant reckoning. Payback, published several decades ago, was a best-selling fictional treatment of a notorious real-life incident: two high school students, Herman and Laura, were accused of murder after their teacher, Mr. Landzaat, vanished. Laura and Landzaat had been involved sexually, albeit briefly: after only a couple of weeks Laura decided to end the affair. But Landzaat was unable to accept rejection, and his subsequent behaviour became obsessive and irrational. Ultimately, he tracked Laura down at her family’s rural property and one snowy evening drove there to confront the two teenagers, who were staying at the house on their own. He was never seen again. However, since no body was ever found the police were unable to assemble a case and charge the two with a crime. In Payback, M fills in the blanks, imagining a sequence of events resulting in the teacher’s disappearance. As Koch’s novel opens, a neighbour in the apartment building is fixated on M and, using lies and subterfuge, insinuates his way into the novelist’s life. At this point, since we know nothing about his motives, we can only wonder, to what end? Koch’s narrative builds suspense as the neighbour finds ways to observe the novelist’s comings and goings and get ever closer to M and his family. But when the story switches gears to focus on Laura and Herman and their high school antics of forty years ago, much of this tension is frittered away. Indeed, Koch relies on a multitude of perspectives to tell a lurid tale that weaves an intricate web of deceit. The problem is not necessarily that none of the characters is likeable or admirable. In other of his works that have been made available to English readers—such as The Dinner and Summer House with Swimming Pool—Koch populates his story with deceivers and conniving manipulators to great effect. These are gripping novels in which little is as it seems, and everyone has something to hide. But in Dear Mr. M, Koch’s characters are not just despicable, they are tiresome and tediously loquacious. Koch spends far too much time with the teenagers, establishing that young Herman is a smart but calculating and narcissistic schemer and that Laura’s attraction to him is ill-advised. M himself is petty and arrogant and burns with envy at the successes of his literary colleagues and rivals. Throughout, Koch is having so much fun describing the bad behaviour of his characters that he forgets to give the reader any reason to care what happens to them, with the result that when the mystery of Landzaat’s disappearance—the novel’s central issue—is finally resolved, the reader, worn down by excessive detail and scene after pointless scene that fails to advance the plot, greets it with a shrug. No doubt this is a novel that would have benefitted from a ruthless and uncompromising edit because we sense that lurking somewhere within the glut of words is a powerful and lively drama. Though it’s also possible this might not have been enough to save it because, apart from the flaccid narrative, some elements of the story come across as ill-conceived and are not entirely persuasive. Readers approaching the works of Herman Koch for the first time will find their interest amply rewarded by the two titles mentioned above. But anyone who decides to take up Dear Mr. M is advised to lower their expectations. Een boek dat ik met een dubbel gevoel heb uitgelezen. Harry Mulisch wordt tamelijk flauw afgeschilderd en er zit een interviewgedeelte in dat ronduit saai is (zo is het vast ook bedoeld). Maar het is ook een grappig boek en slim gemaakt, door Harry Mulisch te imiteren en er een eigen draai aan te geven. Dus tja, het was te dik maar het is ook knap.
Want meer dan een thriller en een verhaal over de grenzen van de moraal, is Geachte heer M. een boek over de mythe van het schrijverschap, het spel met de waarheid in een plot, de verantwoordelijkheid van de schrijver voor leven en dood van personages, de willekeurige beslissingen, romaneske amoraliteit. En over de zwaar drukkende last van ouders voor hun kinderen. De roman raakt zodanig uit balans dat als eerste de suspense wegebt. Dat roept de vraag op wat meesterplotter Herman Koch na dat strakke begin bezielde. Hij breekt met de thrillerachtige inzet. Koch wisselt meningmaal van vertelperspectief. Schrijver M, die in eerste instantie is beschreven als een middelmatige auteur met WO2 als perpetuum mobile in zijn oeuvre, komt later zelf aan bod. Hij kaart boeiende kwesties aan over het manipuleren van de waarheid in romans. Na verloop van tijd lijkt het wel een andere roman te zijn geworden, als een verkeerd geleverd onderdeel van een modulaire bank; een die best lekker zit, maar toch. Omdat ze spannend zijn, worden de romans van Herman Koch vaak weggezet in categorieën als lectuur, misdaad, thrillers. Op zichzelf zou het weinig uit moeten maken hoe een boek wordt bestempeld, als er niet zo'n nadrukkelijk waardeoordeel uit sprak. Neerbuigende complimenten: vermakelijk vakwerk. Het is een goed boek, maar het is geen literatuur. Hij maakt de types die hij beschrijft belachelijk, en tegelijkertijd geeft hij hen de ruimte om zichzelf belachelijk te maken. 'Geachte heer M.' is niet alleen spannend, maar ook regelmatig goed voor een schaterlach. Het zal dus wel geen literatuur zijn. Premi e riconoscimentiElenchi di rilievo
The tour-de-force, hair-raising new novel from Herman Koch, New York Times bestselling author of The Dinner and Summer House with Swimming Pool.Once a celebrated writer, M's greatest success came with a suspense novel based on a real-life, unsolved disappearance. It told the story of a history teacher who went missing one winter after his brief affair with a stunning pupil. Upon publication, M.'s novel was a bestseller, one that marked his international breakthrough. That was years ago, and now M.'s career is almost over as he fades increasingly into obscurity. But not when it comes to his bizarre, seemingly timid neighbor who keeps a close eye on him. Why?From various perspectives, Herman Koch tells the dark tale of a writer in decline, a teenage couple in love, a missing teacher, and a single book that entwines all of their fates. Thanks to M's novel, supposedly a work of fiction, everyone seems to be linked forever, until something unexpected spins the "story" off its rails.With racing tension, sardonic wit, and a world-renowned sharp eye for human failings, Herman Koch once again spares nothing and no one in his gripping new novel, a barbed tour de force suspending readers in the mysterious literary gray space between fact and fiction. Non sono state trovate descrizioni di biblioteche |
Già recensito in anteprima su LibraryThingIl libro di Herman Koch Dear Mr. M è stato disponibile in LibraryThing Early Reviewers. Discussioni correntiNessunoCopertine popolari
Google Books — Sto caricando le informazioni... GeneriSistema Decimale Melvil (DDC)839.313Literature German literature and literatures of related languages Other Germanic literatures Netherlandish literatures Dutch Dutch fictionClassificazione LCVotoMedia:
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This book centers on Mr. M. He wrote a book called Payback which was based on a real (in the story) case of an obsessive teacher gone missing and the suspects of his disappearance. This story centers on the life of this writer as his neighbor becomes obsessed with watching him and 'giving him more information'. The premise seemed interesting enough, but I wasn't a fan of the execution.
Things I loved: surprising ending, twists, dual timeline, Amsterdam (the setting was done well), the main character is a writer
Things I didn't love: the ending was not the best, most of the characters (theme lately in the books I have read), too long
I am happy that I read this one but also could have lived without it. ( )