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Browsing October, 2012
La Vie Rêvée d’Ernesto G
La Vie Rêvée d’Ernesto G, par Jean-Michel Guenassia. Published September 2012 by Albin Michel.
Very interesting second novel by the author of Le Club des Incorrigibles Optimistes. Joseph K, born in Prague in 1910, studies medicine and goes to work in Algiers for the Institut Pasteur but has to hide in the malaria-infested southern countryside when the German occupiers begin rounding up Jews. After the War he returns to Prague and becomes a convinced communist. This tale of his gradual disillusionment takes a curious turn when he has to look after a Latin American patient who turns out to be none other than Che Guevara, who begins to be charmed by Joseph’s own daughter. The prose is sometimes slow, and the the plot constructions doesn’t have the same taut architecture as the earlier novel, but it is still a fascinating encounter with some of the twentieth century’s most poignant themes – tenderness, loss and betrayal among those who are caught in the hurricane of historical events.
Press and Reviews for The War of the Sexes
Picture credit: Boardroom battles….. The Apprentice. Photograph: BBC/PA Photo, from the review in The Guardian.
December 2013 update: Martin Wolf has chosen The War of the Sexes as one of his books of the year in the Financial Times:
“With characteristic brilliance, Seabright uses biology, sociology, anthropology and economics to explain the war of the sexes. Men and women must co-operate to bring their offspring to maturity and conflict is inherent. Yet today opportunities for more successful and equal relations between the sexes are greater than ever before.”
Other reviews:
In chronological order of appearance:
John Whitfield in Nature.
A favorable but somewhat surrealistically inaccurate review by Roger Lewis in the Daily Mail.
Jonathan Rée in The Guardian
Fran Hawthorne in The New York Journal of Books
Camilla Power in Times Higher Education
Alexander Delaigue in Liberation (in French)
Anna Cristina Pertierra in Inside Story
Joshi Herrmann in The London Evening Standard
Michele Pridmore-Brown in the Times Literary Supplement, available here (pdf here)
Elaine Graham-Leigh in Counterfire
Some reactions in the blogosphere:
Sander Van Der Linden in LSE Review of Books
My post at the Huffington Post blog
Interviews, other coverage:
The Financial Security Project at Boston College
BBC Nightwaves, the interview runs from the 23 minutes point and lasts 11 minutes
VoxEU interview
The Moncrieff Show on Newstalk Radio Ireland, section 4, around 9 minutes in