The Fifth Impossibility: Essays on Exile and Language

This new collection from MacArthur Fellow Manea (The Black Envelope) brings together translations of essays written between 1989 and 2011. The titular "impossibility" is exile, and Manea considers the deported author under different auspices: risk-taker, moral conscience, even clown. At the same time, he asserts that "the most important theme for the East European writer [is] the distance between the core of the victim and the core of the oppressor;" consequently many of the meditations focus on political problems of totalitarianism and democracy. Manea's main critical target is Europe, particularly his native Romania, but he also briefly censures American entertainment culture, especially in its exploitative treatment of the Holocaust. His political ideal is moderately liberal: "a more secure and open world...a lawful and fair society...and an enhanced democracy in many other places as well as [America]," and his style is engaging, well-crafted, and at times striking%E2%80%94he describes his mailbox as an "urn with the ashes of the days." Two standout essays include "On Clowns: The Dictator and Artist," which examines clowning, artistry, and totalitarianism; and "Happy Guilt," a reconsideration of famed religious scholar Mircea Eliade. Though several themes recur throughout, there is little overlap in content in these timely and insightful essays on writing, politics, and exile. (May)