Paul Auster - The book Of Illusions
The
story is told by a man who lost his wife and two sons in an aircrash. He is
suffering hard, drifts almost into alcoholism, but then he finds something to
do. He hears of twelve silent movies by an artist, who disappeared in 1930.
These movies had been forgotten, and were sent now to different museums – and
nobody knew, who had sent them. The man (he is called David Zimmer and is
professor of literature) watches the movies in the six museums, and writes a
book about this silent movie artist: Hector Mann, actor and director. Afterwards
Zimmer still has psychological problems and lives very lonely. An old friend
remebers of him and gives hin a book to translate. But while he is working at it,
he gets a letter from a woman, who says she ist the wife of the still living
Hector Mann (in 1990!). Zimmer does not believe that Mann is alive and wants to
see hin, just because he liked the book by him. Zimmer al least writes back.
Then one day when he comes home fram town late and is drunken, there is someone
waiting for him in his garden, a woman about his age. She is a friend of Hector
Mann and his wife, and she wants him to come to New Mexico, and after some
dispute they in fact fly to New Mexico the next day (and besides, fall in love).
On the journey Zimmer listens to the whole story of Mann. He disappeared because
of a crime, and lived from there an under false names, and at different places
until he met his present wife. They bought and built a ranch in New Mexico, and
started later to make movies again, movies that nobody except themselves should
ever see. After his death they should be destroyed. Mann dies one day after
Zimmer’s arrival, and so Zimmer gets to know only one movie. The wife of Mann
wants him to leave at an instant and the situation is strained. The woman, who
fetched Zimmer from his home, kills the wife by mistake and then commits suicied,
because her whole life seems to be destroyed. It does not help her, that she and
Zimmer had fallen in love. Soon there covered up all traces of Hector Mann and
his movies, and only David Zimmer stays is left to tell the story about a genial
artist and his strange life.
I
have read books before with something strange destroyed during the story, so
that there is no evidence of it left. The descriptions of the movies did not
interest me very much, so I can say the book is OK, but I have read better ones.
24.06.04