Bartleby & Co. - Softcover

Vila–matas, Enrique; Dunne, Jonathan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0811216985 ISBN 13: 9780811216982

Publisher: New Directions, 2007

Synopsis

In Bartleby & Co., an enormously enjoyable novel, Enrique Vila-Matas tackles the theme of silence in literature: the writers and non-writers who, like the scrivener Bartleby of the Herman Melville story, in answer to any question or demand, replies: "I would prefer not to." Addressing such "artists of refusal" as Robert Walser, Robert Musil, Arthur Rimbaud, Marcel Duchamp, Herman Melville, and J. D. Salinger, Bartleby & Co. could be described as a meditation: a walking tour through the annals of literature. Written as a series of footnotes (a non-work itself), Bartleby embarks on such questions as why do we write, why do we exist? The answer lies in the novel itself: told from the point of view of a hermetic hunchback who has no luck with women, and is himself unable to write, Bartleby is utterly engaging, a work of profound and philosophical beauty.

About this title

Product Description:

Bartleby and Co. A marvelous novel by one of Spain's most important contemporary authors, in which a clerk in a Barcelona office takes us on a romping tour of world literature. Full description

Review:

"Modern Spain's best writer among a growing sect of fanatics scattered around the world: from Estocolmo to Veracruz, from Paris to Cabo Verde, from Lisbon to Prague, from Varsovia to Buenos Aires."

About this edition

• Publisher: New Directions
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0811216985
• ISBN 13: 9780811216982
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 178