STILL WISHING I had heeded Daniel Mendelson's suggestion to go with the English translation--what was I thinking? I feel no obligation too read Beckett in French. But having come this far....
How far, you ask? Seven years in, I am on p. 842, with 500-something pages to go. With a major push I may complete the book in a decade.
But is it worth it? Still feels like yes.
The Orestes parallel has escalated. Maximilien Aue spends a restless, feverish night in the house of his mother and her new husband, and when he wakes up, they have both been murdered. Hmm. Did our boy do something rash? His sister is showing no interest at all, though, in resuming their adolescent explorations.
Brilliant passages on Aue's visit to Paris. Before the war, Aue became acquainted with the key fascist-leaning French writers, so we get glimpses of Maurras, Brasillach, Céline, and a long conversation with Lucien Rebatet. Littell's depiction of the atmosphere of this milieu is persuasive.
Littell also arranges things so that Aue has an interview with Himmler, who, homophobe that he was, wants to know why Maximilien is not yet married. Max, single-mindedly gay save where his sister is concerned, says he is married to the Third Reich for the duration of the present crisis. Good answer!
Max's interview with Eichmann is even better. Littell has injected some hybridized essence of Curzio Malaparte and Hannah Arendt into these scenes--an afternoon and evening with Lucifer's office manager, complete with a couple of Brahms quartets. Eichmann finds Bach a little too chilly.
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