liquidation

After reading liquidation I find myself reaching for that big book all of us have in our libraries, diminished though they be. The book which tells us what we should know or that which we already know but of which we unsure. Fumbling between 'post-coital' and 'Potenza' I find that expletive post-modern. The definition alludes to a 'late 20th century style, a distrust of ideologies, a deliberate mixing of styles and conventions'.

I don't understand the term because for me it always referred to an art that contained within itself a criticism of the form itself. It contained an allusion to its creation and a criticism of it. I never found it to be modern, let alone post-modern. Hamlet, for instance, I find to be post-modern as evidenced by the play within a play. Ulysses by Joyce must surely be post-modern and yet this term persists, and yet too, there must be some relevance for it as a descriptor. Or is there any relevance to it beyond the stylistic concerns of the Sunday supplements?

Liquidation suffers the fate of many books from late 20th and early 21st century writers who try to leave something of significance and yet the paradox is that they are generally nihilistic or cynical in their approach. The act of writing a book is essentially positivistic in nature and yet the doctrine they preach is pessimistic. Can a trumpet be blown that rallies people to their own demise? Perhaps, is what Beckett would say, and yet be assured I would not make this argument at the vanguard of conservative ignorance but rather in the shadow of such bold intellects.

'work makes one free'

I wanted to like this book and yet feel let down by the author, Nobel prize winner though he may be. Liquidation it is a good book that goes beyond the story telling narrative of a beginning, middle and end. It does seem to capture the succession of events that make up a life and the sense that their is very little of a story to relate. There is a sense that the story is lost, is abandoned, is discarded and maybe in some sense we all discard our own story. It is a 'degenerate art' that surely Hitler would have burned but yet it survives. Unfortunately, I believe it ultimately fails to make a connection with the Holocaust in spite of the words, in spite of the author's own life story.

But perhaps, in asking the questions, in presenting what is at times a contrived story it does achieve some awareness of an event. As you can see I am conflicted in my response to this book, a definite re-read is in order. However, I was left, thinking that I should go to Auschwitz.

Perhaps, he succeeded. Perhaps.

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liquidation
Imre Kertész
post modernism
Auschwitz