1st Printing. 274 pages. Published in 1990. The author's third novel. One of the greatest novels of the 20th century. The first appearance of the title in English and in the United States. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only. The First Edition is now scarce. Presents Danilo Kis' "Pescanik" in a felicitous English translation. Considered his greatest novel by some critics and readers, inspired by Bruno Schulz's masterpiece. "Describes the external and internal worlds of a railway clerk called ES whose quotidian concerns include antagonism toward his well-to-do sister Netty, quarrels with her son George about a piece of jointly owned property, and futile, indignant inquiries to the authorities about why his pension has been reduced. But Kis uses this life of a victim as a counterpoint to his second storyline, which matter-of-factly reveals an exploding, horrific world in which Jews are murdered in countless mundane or outlandish ways, commit suicide, or simply disappear while the general population goes mad" (Publisher's blurb). The novel is an homage to Bruno Schulz's "Sanatorium Under The Sign of The Hourglass" (first published in English in 1978). Schulz was a murder victim of the most arbitrary kind, shot in the street by a Nazi officer who wanted to kill someone else - but could not - because he was a fellow Nazi officer. The latter happened to admire and collect Schulz's drawings and so became his protector. In this "life-versus-death" game of one-upmanship, there was no possible way Schulz's Nazi protector could up the ante. Despite his talent, Schulz was just another Jew after all, inferior, sub-human. Kis' fictional re-creation of Schulz's pathetic life is one of the most sublime and moving gestures in literature. An absolute "must-have" title for Danilo Kis collectors. This title is a great book. This is one of very few copies of the First Hardcover Edition/First Printing (American) still available online and is in fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright. Please note: Copies available online have very serious flaws, are subsequent printings, or are the Softcover Edition. This is surely an accessible and lovely alternative. A rare copy thus. "Hourglass" is regarded by Joseph Brodsky and Susan Sontag as one of the greatest novels of the 20th century. A fine copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER DANILO KIS TITLES IN OUR CATALOG) ISBN 0374172870.

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Bibliographic Details

Title: HOURGLASS - Rare Fine Copy of The First Hardcover Edition/First Printing
Publisher: New York City, NY: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1990
Publication Date: 1990
Language: English
ISBN 10: 0374172870
ISBN 13: 9780374172879
Binding: Hardcover
Edition: 1st Edition.
Condition: Fine
Dust Jacket Condition: Fine
Signed: no

About this title

Synopsis

In a devastating story of the Holocaust, a fifty-three-year-old minor functionary of the Royal Hungarian Railways, E.S., investigates the reduction of his pension, while the Nazis plot the extermination of the European Jews

Review

"What distinguishes Ki 's novel is its authorial independence. A conventional narrative structure is ignored; it is the author's musings and diversions that magically build suspense. That he succeeds is a rare achievement." --Herbert Mitgang, "New York Times"
"

"What distinguishes Kis's novel is its authorial independence. A conventional narrative structure is ignored; it is the author's musings and diversions that magically build suspense. That he succeeds is a rare achievement." --Herbert Mitgang, New York Times
"Probably no other novelist has succeeded better than Kis in making a densely stylistic pattern out of such a nightmare, conveying with gruesome but also aesthetically beautiful effect the interrelation in such a life at such a time of the quotidian and the apocalyptic, the combination of the sense of trivia with the sense of doom." --John Bayley, New York Review of Books
"A finely sustained, complex fictional performance. It is full of pain and rage and gusto and joy of living, at once side-splitting and a heartbreaker." --John Simon, Washington Post Book World

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