Don Juan: His Own Version
A Novel
Download image
ISBN10: 0374532648
ISBN13: 9780374532642
Trade Paperback
112 Pages
$19.00
CA$26.00
Don Juan's story—"his own version"—is filtered through the consciousness of an anonymous narrator, a failed innkeeper and chef, into whose solitude Don Juan bursts one day. On each day of the week that follows, Don Juan describes the adventures he experienced on that same day a week earlier. The adventures are erotic, but Handke's Don Juan is more pursued than pursuer. What makes his accounts riveting are the remarkable evocations of places and people, and the nature of his narration. Don Juan: His Own Version is, above all, a book about storytelling and its ability to burst the ordinary boundaries of time and space.
In this brief and wry volume, Peter Handke conjures images and depicts the subtleties of human interaction with an unforgettable vividness. Along the way, he offers a sharp commentary on many features of contemporary life.
Reviews
Praise for Don Juan: His Own Version
"Handke's power of observation and his seemingly casual tone, in which every word bears indispensable weight, are as mesmerizing as ever . . . A Handke tale invites active reading, speculation rather than passive absorption . . . It is [his] loving gaze, honed by time and discipline, that shows readers the way out again into the world's prolific and astonishing strangeness."—Kai Maristed, The New York Times Book Review
"Numerous pleasures await the reader who delves into the fabric of Handke's prose . . . A subtle writer of unostentatious delicacy, Handke excels at fiction that, as it grows, coils around itself like wisteria. This is where the French New Novel might have gone if pushed."—Paul West, The Washington Post Book World
"Handke's perfectly suave novella is a rich tapestry of contradictions about desire and class."—Booklist
BOOK EXCERPTS
Read an Excerpt
Don the Juan had always been looking for someone to listen to him. Then one fine day he found me. He told me his story, but in the third person rather than in the first. At least that is how I recall it now.
At the time in question, I was...
About the author
Peter Handke; Translated from the German by Krishna Winston
