Ether
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- ¥1,600
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- ¥1,600
発行者による作品情報
A bearded man in a badly soiled suit known only as The Stranger wanders an apocalyptic landscape on the fringes of a dying metropolis, looking for a way to "get back on top." Thwarted and rejected at every turn by old friends and strangers alike—even by the author of this novel, whom he visits repeatedly in unsuccessful attempts to determine his own narrative—his impotence and rage are expressed in acts of seemingly senseless violence. The various characters he encounters on his journey—a pack of sadistic boys, skinheads who beat him senseless, a deaf-mute woman who tries to heal him, a sidewalk preacher, and a deranged man who identifies him as The One—avoid or abuse him, or attempt to follow him.
Entertaining, disturbing, and wildly intelligent, written with sinister humor and great compassion, Ether reflects on the possibilities and consequences of forgiveness, the problems of faith, and the trials of creation.
"Like a David Lynch movie transcribed by Pierre Reverdy, it's a brilliant and unforgettable book, written somewhere between sleeping and waking."—Chris Kraus, author of Torpor
"This is an intense, intelligent novel that paints a vivid picture of an America that most of us refuse to see, are afraid to see. This is real art."—Percival Everett, author of I Am Not Sidney Poitier
"A book that's both pure as snow and filthy as dirty, with the lovely detachment of ice. Like Beckett, Ehrenreich has the talent of being particular and general at once, and thus steps outisde of time"—Lydia Millet, Pulizer Prize finalist for Love in Infant Monkeys
"Ether is a dark and powerful work, with disturbing metaphysical overtones. Ben Ehrenreich is a gathering power in the literary land."—John Banville, author of The Infinities
"Ben Ehenreich transforms the brutal human and urban blight into a landscape of cosmic battle. Ether is a dark, complex, richly written, beautiful novel. It is a rarity in American fiction today."—Frederic Tuten, author of Self Portraits: Fictions
"Ether, perhaps even more than his previous novel, The Suitors, shows Ben Ehrenreich unafraid of storytelling that is terrifically bold and sly."—Sesshu Foster, author of World Ball Notebook
Ben Ehrenreich is an award-winning journalist and fiction writer. Ether is his second novel.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Ehrenreich's second novel, God takes the form of a homeless man adrift in a frightening postapocalyptic world who vainly seeks to return to his former glory. At first glance, this notion appears an interesting conceit; God rendered a has-been, a loser, whether by the faithlessness of modern man, the advances of science, or the godlessness of this terrible present. Had the author taken a page from Milton or Dante and pursued a consistent metaphor, he might have produced a fine commentary on the status of God in modernity. Unfortunately, Ehrenreich appears primarily interested in debasing divinity (he is fascinated by squalor) and word-smithing small gems in an otherwise unconnected series of vignettes. There is peculiar beauty to be found (the burning of a hummingbird on a gasoline pyre), but much is too obviously an exploration of Ehrenreich's whims, such as a cloying section devoted to facts about sea creatures that is a far cry from the meditations of Melville. God is a difficult subject, perhaps best left to serious thinkers and not authors interested in shock value.
