
Muck
A Novel
Dror Burstein(Author)
Farrar, Straus & Giroux Inc (Publisher)
Published on 13. November 2018
Book
Hardback
416 pages
978-0-374-21583-5 (ISBN)
Description
In a Jerusalem both ancient and modern, where the First Temple squats over the populace like a Trump casino, where the streets are literally crawling with prophets and heathen helicopters buzz over Old Testament sovereigns, two young poets are about to have their lives turned upside down.
Struggling Jeremiah is worried that he might be wasting his time trying to be a writer; the great critic Broch just beat him over the head with his own computer keyboard. Mattaniah, on the other hand, is a real up-and-comer-but he has a secret he wouldn't want anyone in the literary world to know: his late father was king of Judah.
Jeremiah begins to despair, and in that despair has a vision: that Jerusalem is doomed, and that Mattaniah will not only be forced to ascend to the throne but will thereafter witness his people slaughtered and exiled. But what does it mean to tell a friend and rival that his future is bleak? What sort of grudges and biases turn true vision into false prophecy? Can the very act of speaking a prediction aloud make it come true? And, if so, does that make you a seer, or just a schmuck?
Dramatizing the eternal dispute between poetry and power, between faith and practicality, between haves and have-nots, Dror Burstein's Muck is a brilliant and subversive modern-dress retelling of the book of Jeremiah: a comedy with apocalyptic stakes by a star of Israeli fiction.
Struggling Jeremiah is worried that he might be wasting his time trying to be a writer; the great critic Broch just beat him over the head with his own computer keyboard. Mattaniah, on the other hand, is a real up-and-comer-but he has a secret he wouldn't want anyone in the literary world to know: his late father was king of Judah.
Jeremiah begins to despair, and in that despair has a vision: that Jerusalem is doomed, and that Mattaniah will not only be forced to ascend to the throne but will thereafter witness his people slaughtered and exiled. But what does it mean to tell a friend and rival that his future is bleak? What sort of grudges and biases turn true vision into false prophecy? Can the very act of speaking a prediction aloud make it come true? And, if so, does that make you a seer, or just a schmuck?
Dramatizing the eternal dispute between poetry and power, between faith and practicality, between haves and have-nots, Dror Burstein's Muck is a brilliant and subversive modern-dress retelling of the book of Jeremiah: a comedy with apocalyptic stakes by a star of Israeli fiction.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
New York
United States
Dimensions
Height: 213 mm
Width: 145 mm
Thickness: 33 mm
Weight
524 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-374-21583-5 (9780374215835)
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Schweitzer Classification
Person
Dror Burstein was born in 1970 in Netanya, Israel, and lives in Tel Aviv. A novelist, poet, and translator, he is the author of fourteen books, including the novels Kin and Netanya, and has been awarded numerous national prizes.
Gabriel Levin is the author of six collections of poetry, translations, and a collection of essays, The Dune's Twisted Edge: Journeys in the Levant. He lives in Jerusalem.
Gabriel Levin is the author of six collections of poetry, translations, and a collection of essays, The Dune's Twisted Edge: Journeys in the Levant. He lives in Jerusalem.