Belladonna
By: Daša Drndić ; translated from the Croatian by Celia Hawkesworth
Contributors: Hawkesworth, Celia, 1942- translator
Publisher: New Directions Publishing Corporation
Published: 2017
Language: eng
Number of pages: 378
ISBN-13: 9780811227216
Subjects: Fiction; Memory; World War, 1939-1945; History
Work titles: Belladonna
Description: "From the author of the highly acclaimed Trieste, a fierce novel about history, memory, and illness. Andreas Ban, a psychologist who does not psychologize anymore and a writer who no longer writes, lives alone in a coastal town in Croatia. He sifts through the remnants of his life--his research, books, photographs--remembering old lovers and friends, the events of WWII, and the breakup of Yugoslavia. Ban's memories of Belgrade, Amsterdam, and Toronto alternate with meditations on the mental faculties of rats, a depressed arctic fox, and the agelessness of lobsters. He tries to push the past away, to "land on a little island of time in which tomorrow does not exist, in which yesterday is buried." Drndic leafs through the horrors of history with a cold unflinching wit. "The past is riddled with holes," she writes. "Souvenirs can't help here."--
Notes: Translation from the Croatian of: Belladonna.

Includes bibliographical references.