Name: The Books of Jacob: A Novel
Price: 18.62 EUR
Availability: InStock
Author: Olga Tokarczuk
ISBN: 9780593087503

Type

Physical Book

Author

Olga Tokarczuk

Translated by

Jennifer Croft

Publisher

Riverhead Books

Language

English

Pages

992

Format

Paperback

Dimensions

22.8 x 15.6 x 5.3 cm

Weight

1.01 kg.

ISBN13

9780593087503

Synopsis "The Books of Jacob: A Novel "

A NEW YORKER "ESSENTIAL READ" "Just as awe-inspiring as the Nobel judges claimed." - The Washington Post "Olga Tokarczuk is one of our greatest living fiction writers. . . This could well be a decade-defining book akin to Bolaño's 2666." -AV Club "Sophisticated and ribald and brimming with folk wit. . . The comedy in this novel blends, as it does in life, with genuine tragedy." -Dwight Garner, The New York Times LONGLISTED FOR THE 2022 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, TIME, THE NEW YORKER, AND NPR The Nobel Prize-winner's richest, most sweeping and ambitious novel yet follows the comet-like rise and fall of a mysterious, messianic religious leader as he blazes his way across eighteenth-century Europe. In the mid-eighteenth century, as new ideas--and a new unrest--begin to sweep the Continent, a young Jew of mysterious origins arrives in a village in Poland. Before long, he has changed not only his name but his persona; visited by what seem to be ecstatic experiences, Jacob Frank casts a charismatic spell that attracts an increasingly fervent following. In the decade to come, Frank will traverse the Hapsburg and Ottoman empires with throngs of disciples in his thrall as he reinvents himself again and again, converts to Islam and then Catholicism, is pilloried as a heretic and revered as the Messiah, and wreaks havoc on the conventional order, Jewish and Christian alike, with scandalous rumors of his sect's secret rituals and the spread of his increasingly iconoclastic beliefs. The story of Frank--a real historical figure around whom mystery and controversy swirl to this day--is the perfect canvas for the genius and unparalleled reach of Olga Tokarczuk. Narrated through the perspectives of his contemporaries--those who revere him, those who revile him, the friend who betrays him, the lone woman who sees him for what he is--The Books of Jacob captures a world on the cusp of precipitous change, searching for certainty and longing for transcendence. In a nod to books written in Hebrew, The Books of Jacob is paginated in reverse, beginning on p. 955 and ending on p. 1 - but read traditionally, front cover to back.

Olga Tokarczuk

(Author)

View Author's Page

Olga Tokarczuk, one of the best and most celebrated current Polish writers, has received the 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature, awarded in 2019, and has been honored with awards such as the Brueckepreis or the Nike, the most prestigious in her country. Author of nine novels and three storybooks, her works have been translated into forty-five languages and have earned her recognition from colleagues like Annie Proulx ("A writer of the caliber of W. G. Sebald") or Svetlana Alexievich ("A magnificent writer").

At Anagrama she has published A Place Called Antaño: "Tokarczuk is as skilled in character creation as she is in plot articulation, creating a universe where facts are sprinkled with philosophical reflections and bursts of lyricism" (Rafael Narbona, El Mundo); The Wanderers, International Man Booker Prize 2018 and finalist of the National Book Award in the category of translated books: "A beautiful book about the need to cross borders to know something more about ourselves" (Rafael Narbona, El Mundo); "A constellation-novel" (Marta Rebón, El País); "Fascinating, genre-less book" (Mercedes Monmany, ABC); "An inexhaustible book" (Domingo Ródenas de Moya, El Periódico); "Perhaps we are facing the best travel book ever written" (Antonio Lozano, La Vanguardia); "A vibrant mosaic of stories" (Pablo Martínez Zarracina, El Correo); "A great and joyful read" (Santiago Aizarna, El Diario Vasco); and The Books of Jacob: "A work that demands to be read on the same terms as War and Peace" (Tim Smith-Laing, The Telegraph). Her most recent novel is Land of Empusas.

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