Alan Rafferty
Accident-Prone Author
Oracle Night
By Paul Auster
Faber & Faber 243pp £15.99
Collected Prose: Autobiographical Writings, True Stories, Critical Essays, Prefaces and Collaborations with Artists
By Paul Auster
Faber & Faber 512pp £25
IN 1999 PAUL Auster instigated the National Story Project in America. The idea was that people would submit anecdotes and other factual accounts which 'defied our expectations about the world ... in other words, true stories that sounded like fiction'. There were over four thousand entries, and the resulting radio shows and book constitute a remarkable archive of what Auster called 'reports from the front lines of personal experience'. However, the project also served as an investigation into one of the quandaries at the centre of Auster's work: what makes a story true?
It's a puzzle he re-examines in his latest novel, Oracle Night. Sidney Orr, the narrator, is a writer living in Brooklyn and slowly recovering from an accident so severe that his doctors think he should have died, who buys a curiously enchanting blue notebook in an exotic stationery store that
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
Knowledge of Sufism increased markedly with the publication in 1964 of The Sufis, by Idries Shah. Nowadays his writings, much like his father’s, are dismissed for their Orientalism and inaccuracy.
@fitzmorrissey investigates who the Shahs really were.
Fitzroy Morrissey - Sufism Goes West
Fitzroy Morrissey: Sufism Goes West - Empire’s Son, Empire’s Orphan: The Fantastical Lives of Ikbal and Idries Shah by Nile Green
literaryreview.co.uk
Rats have plagued cities for centuries. But in Baltimore, researchers alighted on one surprising solution to the problem of rat infestation: more rats.
@WillWiles looks at what lessons can be learned from rat ecosystems – for both rats and humans.
Will Wiles - Puss Gets the Boot
Will Wiles: Puss Gets the Boot - Rat City: Overcrowding and Urban Derangement in the Rodent Universes of John B ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Twisters features destructive tempests and blockbuster action sequences.
@JonathanRomney asks what the real danger is in Lee Isaac Chung's disaster movie.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/eyes-of-the-storm