Intimate Ties
Two Novellas
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
A master of high modernist literature explores female sexuality and desire through the eyes of two women—one, married and unfaithful; the other, caught in a love triangle—in these two erotic novellas
First published in 1911, Intimate Ties is Robert Musil’s second book, consisting of two novellas, “The Culmination of Love” and “The Temptation of Silent Veronica”. Each revolves around a troubled woman in the throes of her sexual and romantic woes, as their memories of the past return to influence their present desires. Musil tracks the psyche of his protagonists in a blurring of impressions that is reflected in his experimental prose.
Intimate Ties offers the reader an early glimpse of the high modernist style Musil would perfect in his magnum opus The Man Without Qualities.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Best known for his unfinished epic, The Man Without Qualities, Musil's second published work, from 1911, is two difficult, modernist novellas, both dealing with the psyches of women. In the first, and superior, novella, "The Culmination of Love," Claudine goes on a long trip to visit her daughter at boarding school. Despite her entreaties, her husband, who is not the girl's father, decides to remain home. During her travels, by train and carriage, Claudine reflects on her previous sexual misdeeds, which both disgust and thrill her. She meets an undersecretary, who attempts to seduce her. Naked on her hotel room floor, with the undersecretary waiting outside, she wonders what to do. "The Temptation of St. Veronica" is more difficult to follow. Veronica lives with her aunt and two young men, Johannes and Demeter. Johannes is cerebral and contemplating suicide, Demeter is all action. Both are interested in Veronica, but she is unsure of how to proceed, partially due to a disturbing childhood memory of near-bestiality with a dog. According to the excellent afterward by the translator, Musil himself considered these novellas failed experiments. At its best, the book is a complex, immersive examination of obsessive Eros, but the text too often denies the reader entry.
