
Berg
Ann Quin(Author)
Dalkey Archive Press
Published on 1. December 2001
Book
Paperback/Softback
168 pages
978-1-56478-302-8 (ISBN)
Description
"A man called Berg, who changed his name to Greb, came to a seaside town intending to kill his father..." So begins Ann Quin's first novel, which has been compared to the fiction of Samuel Beckett and Nathalie Sarraute. Against the backdrop of this gritty seaside town, an absurd and brutal plot develops involving three characters--Alistair Berg, his father, and their mutual mistress. In his attempt to kill his father, Berg mutilates a ventriloquist's dummy, almost falls victim to his father's mistaken sexual advances, and is relentlessly taunted by a group of tramps. Disturbing and at times startlingly comic, Berg chronicles the interrelations among these three characters as they circle one another in an escalating spiral of violence. A member of a group of British avant-garde writers that included B. S. Johnson and Eva Figes, Ann Quin is one of the best kept secrets of British contemporary experimental writing. She published four novels before her death at the age of 37.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Normal, IL
United States
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Dimensions
Height: 214 mm
Width: 141 mm
Thickness: 14 mm
Weight
254 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-56478-302-8 (9781564783028)
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Schweitzer Classification
Person
Ann Quin, one of the best kept secrets of British experimental writing, has garnered comparisons to such diverse writers as Samuel Beckett and Nathalie Sarraute. Before her death in 1973, she published four novels, including "Berg" and "Passages". In 1964 she became the first female recipient of the D. H. Lawrence Fellowship which allowed her to travel to the U.S., a trip that provided the basis for "Tripticks".