All Souls' Day (novel)

Last updated
All Souls' Day
Allerzielen.jpg
First edition (Dutch)
Author Cees Nooteboom
Original titleAllerzielen
TranslatorSusan Massotty
LanguageDutch
PublisherUitgeverij Atlas
Publication date
1998
Publication placeNetherlands
Published in English
2001
Pages398
ISBN 9045223414

All Souls' Day (Dutch : Allerzielen) is a 1998 novel by the Dutch writer Cees Nooteboom. It tells the story of a Dutch documentary filmmaker who lives in Berlin, and reflects, with his friends, on matters such as art, history, and national characters.

Contents

Reception

The Daily Telegraph reported on reviews from several publications with a rating scale for the novel out of "Love It", "Pretty Good", "Ok", and "Rubbish": Daily Telegraph , Times , and TLS reviews under "Love It" and Sunday Times and Independent On Sunday reviews under "Pretty Good" and Literary Review review under "Ok" and Guardian review under "Rubbish". [1] [2]

Julie Myerson of The Guardian wrote:

"It's clear that Nooteboom knows more than enough about art, philosophy, semantics and the whole onanistic malarkey, but the effect of his prose is so blindingly didactic that you quickly feel you would pay good money to have someone smile or burp or drop something or talk about anything other than the reunification of Germany or the iconography of late German romanticism. I also wondered whether Susan Massoty's translation - unbearably arch, enervatingly fussy - might be letting him down." Myerson continued: "we are never allowed to empathise with, let alone believe in, the tragedy that has befallen Arthur. The dead wife and child are no more than juicy, gratuitous sidebars. No, 'juicy' is too kind; they're just bland tidbits, laid whingingly there on the page, and you quickly begin to resent them." [3]

Publishers Weekly said: "Nooteboom's attempt at an intellectual novel is worthy of respect, but Arthur and his friends are frustratingly static in their habits and thoughts, their perorations inflated with hot air. More enervating than invigorating, the book fails to communicate the vitality of a life of thought." [4]

See also

Related Research Articles

<i>The Blind Assassin</i> 2000 novel by Margaret Atwood

The Blind Assassin is a novel by the Canadian writer Margaret Atwood. It was first published by McClelland and Stewart in 2000. The book is set in the fictional Ontario town of Port Ticonderoga and in Toronto. It is narrated from the present day, referring to previous events that span the twentieth century but mostly the 1930s and 1940s. It is a work of historical fiction with the major events of Canadian history forming an important backdrop, for example, the On-to-Ottawa Trek and a 1934 Communist rally at Maple Leaf Gardens. Greater verisimilitude is given by a series of newspaper articles commenting on events and on the novel's characters from a distance.

<i>We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families</i> 1998 non-fiction book by Philip Gourevitch

We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families: Stories from Rwanda is a 1998 non-fiction book by The New Yorker writer Philip Gourevitch about the 1994 Rwandan genocide, in which an estimated 1,000,000 Tutsis and Hutus were killed.

<i>How to Be Alone</i> (book) Book by Jonathan Franzen

How to Be Alone is a 2002 book collecting fourteen essays by American writer Jonathan Franzen.

<i>Everything Is Illuminated</i> 2002 novel by Jonathan Safran Foer

Everything Is Illuminated is the first novel by the American writer Jonathan Safran Foer, published in 2002. It was adapted into a film of the same name starring Elijah Wood and Eugene Hütz in 2005.

<i>The Last Samurai</i> (novel) Novel by Helen DeWitt

The Last Samurai (2000) is the first novel by American writer Helen DeWitt. It follows a single mother and her young son, a child prodigy, who embarks on a quest to find his father. Despite selling well and garnering critical acclaim on publication, it was out of print for almost a decade; when reissued in 2016, it received renewed praise and accolades.

<i>The Fortress of Solitude</i> (novel) 2003 novel by Jonathan Lethem

The Fortress of Solitude is a 2003 semi-autobiographical novel by Jonathan Lethem set in Brooklyn and spanning the 1970s, '80s, and '90s. It follows two teenage friends, Dylan Ebdus and Mingus Rude, one white and one black, who discover a magic ring. The novel explores the issues of race and culture, gentrification, self-discovery, and music. The novel's title is a reference to the Fortress of Solitude, a fortress constructed for Superman.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cees Nooteboom</span> Dutch novelist, poet and journalist (born 1933)

Cees Nooteboom is a Dutch novelist, poet and journalist. After the attention received by his novel Rituelen, which won the Pegasus Prize, it was the first of his novels to be translated into an English-language edition, published in 1983 by Louisiana State University Press of the United States. LSU Press published his two earlier novels in English in the following years, as well as other works up until 1990. Harcourt and Grove Press have since published some of his works in English.

<i>In the Heart of the Sea</i> 2000 book by Nathaniel Philbrick

In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex is a book by American writer Nathaniel Philbrick about the loss of the whaler Essex in the Pacific Ocean in 1820. The book was published by Viking Press on May 8, 2000, and won the 2000 National Book Award for Nonfiction. It was adapted into a film of the same name, which was released in December 2015.

<i>My Name Is Red</i> 1998 Turkish novel by Orhan Pamuk

My Name Is Red is a 1998 Turkish novel by writer Orhan Pamuk translated into English by Erdağ Göknar in 2001. The novel, concerning miniaturists in the Ottoman Empire of 1591, established Pamuk's international reputation and contributed to his reception of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2006.

<i>Death in Holy Orders</i> 2001 Dalgliesh novel by P. D. James

Death in Holy Orders is a 2001 detective novel in the Adam Dalgliesh series by English writer P. D. James.

<i>The Murder Room</i> 2003 Dalgliesh novel by P. D. James

The Murder Room is a 2003 detective novel by English writer P. D. James, the 12th in the Adam Dalgliesh series. It takes place in London, particularly the Dupayne Museum on the edge of Hampstead Heath in the London Borough of Camden.

<i>Unless</i> 2002 novel by Carol Shields

Unless is the final novel by Canadian writer Carol Shields, first published by Fourth Estate, an imprint of HarperCollins in 2002. Semi-autobiographical, it was the capstone to Shields's writing career: she died shortly after its publication in 2003. The work was widely acclaimed and nominated for the Booker Prize, the Giller Prize, the Governor General's Award, the Orange Prize for Fiction, and received the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize. In 2011, it was a finalist in the Canada Reads competition, where it was defended by actor Lorne Cardinal. Like many of her works, Unless explores the extraordinary that lies within the ordinary lives of ordinary women.

<i>Serendipities</i>

Serendipities: Language and Lunacy is a 1998 collection of essays by Umberto Eco. Dealing with the history of linguistics and Early Modern concepts of a perfect language, the material in the book overlaps with La ricerca della lingua perfetta. As Eco explains it in his preface, serendipity is the positive outcome of some ill-conceived idea.

<i>The Autograph Man</i> 2002 novel by Zadie Smith

The Autograph Man, published in 2002, is the second novel by Zadie Smith. It follows the progress of a Jewish-Chinese Londoner named Alex-Li Tandem, who buys and sells autographs for a living and is obsessed with celebrities. Eventually, his obsession culminates in a meeting with the elusive American-Russian actress Kitty Alexander, a star from Hollywood's Golden Age. In 2003, the novel won the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Literary Prize. The novel was a commercial success, but was not as well received by readers and critics as her previous and first novel, White Teeth (2000). Smith has stated that before she started work on The Autograph Man she had writer's block.

<i>The Great Fire</i> (Hazzard novel) 2003 novel by Shirley Hazzard

The Great Fire (2003) is a novel by the Australian author Shirley Hazzard. It won the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction and a Miles Franklin literary award (2004). The novel was Hazzard's first since The Transit of Venus, published in 1980.

<i>Pastoralia</i> Collection by George Saunders published in 2000

Pastoralia is short story writer George Saunders’s second full-length short story collection, published in 2000. The collection received highly positive reviews from book critics and was ranked the fifth-greatest book of the 2000s by literary magazine The Millions. The book consists of stories that appeared in The New Yorker; most of the stories were O. Henry Prize Stories. The collection was a New York Times Notable Book for 2001.

<i>What I Loved</i> 2003 Siri Hustvedt novel

What I Loved is a novel written by American writer Siri Hustvedt first published in 2003 by Hodder and Stoughton in London. It is written from the point of view of Leo Hertzberg, an art historian living in New York. The author herself grew up in Northfield, Minnesota, and then moved to New York in 1978. In a discussion of the September 11 attacks, she describes New York as "as much an idea as an actual place".

<i>Lost Paradise</i> (novel) 2004 novel by Cees Nooteboom

Lost Paradise is a 2004 novel by the Dutch writer Cees Nooteboom. It tells the story of two Brazilian women who move to Australia, and of a Dutch middle-aged critic who goes to an Alpine spa.

<i>The Impressionist</i> Book by Hari Kunzru

The Impressionist is Hari Kunzru's debut novel, first published in 2003. Kunzru received the Betty Trask Award and the Somerset Maugham Award for the book's publication.

<i>Mountains of the Mind</i> 2003 book by Robert Macfarlane

Mountains of the Mind: A History of a Fascination is a book by British writer Robert Macfarlane published in 2003 about the history of human fascination with mountains. The book takes its title from a line by the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins and combines history with first-person narrative. He considers why people are drawn to mountains despite their obvious dangers, and examines the powerful, and sometimes fatal, hold that mountains can come to have over the imagination. The book's heroes include the mountaineer George Mallory, and its influences include the writing of Simon Schama and Francis Spufford. In the end, Macfarlane criticizes Mallory for devoting more time to the mountain than his wife and notes that he has personally sworn off high-risk mountaineering. The New York Times's John Rothchild praised the book, writing "There's fascinating stuff here, and a clever premise, but Mountains of the Mind may cause recovering climbaholics to trace their addiction to their early homework assignments and file class-action lawsuits against their poetry teachers."

References

  1. "Books of the moment: What the papers say". The Daily Telegraph. 16 Feb 2002. p. 56. Retrieved 19 July 2024.
  2. "All Souls Day". Complete Review. 2023-10-04. Retrieved 2023-10-04.
  3. Myerson, Julie (2002-01-05). "More matter, less art". The Guardian . Retrieved 2012-03-12.
  4. Staff writer (2001-10-08). "Fiction Review: All Souls Day by Cees Nooteboom". Publishers Weekly . Retrieved 2012-03-12.