Quilt
4/5
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Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
Nicholas Royle
Nicholas Royle is the author of five short story collections – Mortality, Ornithology, The Dummy and Other Uncanny Stories, London Gothic and Manchester Uncanny – and seven novels, most recently First Novel. He has edited more than two dozen anthologies and is series editor of Best British Short Stories for Salt, who also published his White Spines: Confessions of a Book Collector. Forthcoming is another collection, Paris Fantastique (Confingo Publishing). In 2009 he founded Nightjar Press, which continues to publish original short stories as limited-edition chapbooks.
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Reviews for Quilt
4 ratings1 review
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wow, what does one say of this? I've spent two days trying to come up with the words for a proper review that sufficiently reflects the complexity and charm of this slim volume, but I'm afraid my muse has deserted me; or rather, has been humbled into awed silence by the erudite extravagance of Prof. Royle's mesmerizing monograph. That, and I'm still trying to figure out the ending :-)
I suppose Quilt qualifies loosely as a novel, in the sense that it has characters (really just the two), time more-or-less flows forward in linear fashion, and the author shows a grudging nod to such plot niceties as beginning, middle, and end. However, it's also free-association stream-of-consciousness poesis, in which the writer gives full rein to his obvious infatuation with ontological wordplay.
The book starts out as a reasonably coherent if lyrical tale about a man dealing with his father's demise, but quickly develops a Kafka-esque quality as the protagonist waxes weird on the philosophical and theological import of...wait for it...stingrays. As it happens, I have a thing for sharks and their compressed cousins myself, so was delighted by the professor's unexpected dive into the philological murk of our subconscious substrate; however, crafty readers hoping for allusions to actual quilting will be much surprised, as mantuas are masked by mantas, and purls passed over for pearls.
Four stars, for reminding us that syntax is our servant, not master, and that words were created expressly to share thoughts, feelings and dreams which could not otherwise be communicated simply by pointing to rock, and grunting.