Bark / The Silence (Storycuts)

Oct 30, 2024 9:26 PM

Author:Julian Barnes

In 'Bark', Jeanne-Etiene Delacour takes pleasure in the avoidance of any threat to his longevity. Formerly a gourmand and a gambler but now an ascetic, his fastidious new lifestyle is the result of an investment in a public works project - one which holds the promise of considerable reward for the last investor to survive. As he draws black lines through the thirty-nine names in his pocket book, the human capacity to rationalise any indulgence is explored.

In 'The Silence', a composer attests that silence is the logical conclusion to music. He considers the silence that has been in effect throughout the interminable wait for his Eight Symphony, and how it will segue into the silence that will follow the end of his life - a life he claims to have sacrificed on the altar of his art.

Part of the Storycuts series, these two stories were previously published in the collection The Lemon Table.

Reviews

Etgar Keret has written several great books, but this is his greatest. These stories are the most funny, dark and poignant I've read in a long time. It's tempting to say they are his most Kafkaesque, but in fact they are his most Keretesque

—— Jonathan Safran Foer

Distinctive, understated and very funny... If you read only one book of short stories this year, it should be this one

—— Daily Mail

Etgar Keret is a great short story writer whose work is all the greater because it’s funny...The stories are all thought-experiments. What if, they ask. Why not? And, what the heck? Like all art, they are highly patterned, highly charged, refracted reflections on the chaos and randomness of everyday existence

—— Guardian

A maddening, abruptly moving and effortlessly funny collection ... Clever, relevant and oddly resonant, Suddenly a Knock on the Door is Keret’s best, most mature work and the perfect introduction to his sad, strange and moving fiction

—— Independent

At once sophisticated and anti-literary, extremely funny and slyly serious. While invariably set in contemporary Israel, and full of sex and violence, they also hark back to older storytelling traditions such as the parable, the folk tale and the absurdist fiction of Gogol and Kafka

—— Observer

Extremely funny... Keret’s stories understand the plasticity of narrative and the importance of imaginative acts

—— The Times

The ingenious and original master of the short story overflows with absurdity, humour, longing and compassion... Keret's most mature and most playful work yet, and establises him as one of the great international writers of our time

—— GQ

Distinctive, surreal and intelligent

—— Antonia Charlesworth , Big Issue in the North

Sublimely irresistible

—— Tim Samuels , theholbornmag.com

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