A History of the Island
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- $17.99
Publisher Description
”A masterpiece by one of Europe’s finest contemporary novelists.” – Rowan Williams
Monks devious and devout – and an age-defying royal pair – chronicle the history of their fictional island in this witty critique of Western civilization and history itself.
Eugene Vodolazkin, internationally acclaimed novelist and scholar of medieval literature, returns with a satirical parable about European and Russian history, the myth of progress, and the futility of war.
This ingenious novel, described by critics as a coda to his bestselling Laurus,is presented as a chronicle of an island from medieval to modern times. The island is not on the map, but it is real beyond doubt. It cannot be found in history books, yet the events are painfully recognizable. The monastic chroniclers dutifully narrate events they witness: quests for power, betrayals, civil wars, pandemics, droughts, invasions, innovations, and revolutions. The entries mostly seem objective, but at least one monk simultaneously drafts and hides a “true” history, to be discovered centuries later. And why has someone snipped out a key prophesy about the island’s fate?
These chronicles receive commentary today from an elderly couple who are the island’s former rulers. Prince Parfeny and Princess Ksenia are truly extraordinary: they are now 347 years old. Eyewitnesses to much of their island’s turbulent history, they offer sharp-eyed observations on the changing flow of time and their people’s persistent delusions. Why is the royal couple still alive? Is there a chance that an old prophecy comes to pass and two righteous persons save the island from catastrophe?
In the tradition of Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose, Julian Barnes’s A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters, and Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant, Vodolazkin is at his best recasting history, in all its hubris and horror, by finding the humor in its absurdity. For readers with an appetite for more than a dry, rational, scientific view of what motivates, divides, and unites people, A History of the Island conjures a world still suffused with mystical powers.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Tragedy and farce commingle in Vodolazkin's protracted fable about the uses and abuses of history (after Brisbane). The narrative is framed as a chronicle of a fictitious island nation with annotations from deposed monarchs Parfeny and Ksenia, who, at 347 years old in the present day, have witnessed many of the events described. The chronicle provides an arch recap of regicides, hostilities between nation's northern and southern regions, various political upheavals, and the island's lurching entry into modernity, and is populated by a rogue's gallery of assassins, tyrants, and quacks such as the "Minister of Development and Magic Tricks." In their commentary, Parfeny and Ksenia reflect on calamities, the efforts to rewrite history for political gain, and the shifting conceptions of history over time. They also detail their experience consulting with the producers of a French film about their lives and homeland, which yields further engaging ruminations about representation and accuracy. However, it can be difficult to get invested in the narrative of the allegorical island or the long, steady march from biblical times to the present. Despite its wit and verve, and in contrast to the numerous power struggles detailed throughout, this ambitious story too often feels bloodless.
