Doppelgänger

Drndić’s pair of unusual, slightly connected novellas (following EEG), explores the depths of loneliness in post-Soviet Croatia. The first novella, “Artur and Isabella,” depicts an unusual meeting between two elderly strangers on New Year’s Eve, 1999. Artur is incontinent and collects hats. Isabella collects garden gnomes that act as stand-ins for a large family lost to the Holocaust. Each grapples with fading memory; the text fractures repeatedly with interspersed vignettes such as typed out police surveillance inventories of the contents of their respective apartments. The second, longer work, “Pupi” is more ambitious and less comprehensible, the action moving back and forth through time as the lead, Printz, a former spy for the government, attends his mother’s funeral, watches rhinoceroses injure themselves, reminisces about his lost childhood love, feuds with his brother, and returns silverware sacked in WWII to its original Jewish family. Lists (a long sequence of bipolar writers and artists, an alphabetized list of Holocaust-related terminology such as Eugenik and Zyklon B) and long chunks of dialogue pepper the action. The bleakness can be overwhelming, but this volume has much to offer, with surprising links between the two stories and insights into the ravages of time and mental illness. These two novellas are a testament to Drndić’s considerable talents.[em] (Sept.) [/em]