The Folly
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
A vacant patch of South African veld next to the comfortable, complacent Malgas household has been taken over by a mysterious, eccentric figure with "a plan." Fashioning his tools out of recycled garbage, the stranger enlists Malgas's help in clearing the land and planning his mansion. Slowly but inevitably, the stranger's charm and the novel's richly inventive language draws Malgas into "the plan" and he sees, feels and moves into the new building. Then, just as remorselessly, all that seemed solid begins to melt back into air.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
An enigmatic newcomer to a South African veld endeavors to construct a mansion on an inherited plot of land and, in the process, pushes the sanity of his neighbors to its limit in this heady, lively, and darkly surreal novel by South African writer Vladislavic. Upon arriving in the small community, Nieuwenhuizen, as he's known, promptly invites the curiosity of his neighbors Mr. Malgas, a hardware store owner, and his wife, Mrs. Malgas by setting up camp on an untended acre behind their house. A neighborly overture by Mr. Malgas leads to a budding friendship between the two men, and in time, Mr. Malgas volunteers to help Nieuwenhuizen realize his home-building ambitions. Mrs. Malgas, who remains suspicious of Nieuwenhuizen, sees all too clearly that her husband is becoming a kind of servant to their new neighbor. In brief sections, we witness Mr. Malgas's growing obsession with, and increasingly humiliating submission to, Nieuwenhuizen. Mr. Malgas's inability to see that his new friend's house is a fiction or, conversely, our inability to see that it's real gives the story a dizzying effect. Vladislavic's cryptic, haunting tale echoes Jorge Luis Borges and David Lynch, drawing readers into its strange depths.
