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Septologien #3-5
Io è un altro. Settologia III-V
Due uomini condividono lo stesso nome, Asle. Uno è un uomo di successo, l’altro alza il gomito troppo spesso. Viene da pensare che siano la stessa persona, eppure a volte si incontrano e si parlano. Il tempo e lo spazio li seguono come due rette che a volte sembrano intersecarsi, su quella che potrebbe essere la costa sudoccidentale della Norvegia, tra i ghiacci, il mare scuro e i fiordi. Tra amori fugaci, alcool, gruppi rock e sigarette, i due Asle si incontrano per la prima volta. Si assomigliano, si vestono allo stesso modo ed entrambi vogliono fare i pittori. E sarà proprio grazie all’arte, frequentando l’Accademia, che Asle conoscerà per la prima volta sua moglie, e se ne innamorerà all’istante.
288 pages, Paperback
First published October 7, 2020
243 people are currently reading
3,177 people want to read
About the author
Jon Fosse
243books1,593followersJon Olav Fosse was born in Haugesund, Norway and currently lives in Bergen. He debuted in 1983 with the novel Raudt, svart (Red, black). His first play, Og aldri skal vi skiljast, was performed and published in 1994. Jon Fosse has written novels, short stories, poetry, children's books, essays and plays. His works have been translated into more than forty languages. He is widely considered as one of the world's greatest contemporary playwrights. Fosse was made a chevalier of the Ordre national du Mérite of France in 2007. Fosse also has been ranked number 83 on the list of the Top 100 living geniuses by The Daily Telegraph.
He was awarded The Nobel Prize in Literature 2023 "for his innovative plays and prose which give voice to the unsayable".
Since 2011, Fosse has been granted the Grotten, an honorary residence owned by the Norwegian state and located on the premises of the Royal Palace in the city centre of Oslo. The Grotten is given as a permanent residence to a person specifically bestowed this honour by the King of Norway for their contributions to Norwegian arts and culture.
He was awarded The Nobel Prize in Literature 2023 "for his innovative plays and prose which give voice to the unsayable".
Since 2011, Fosse has been granted the Grotten, an honorary residence owned by the Norwegian state and located on the premises of the Royal Palace in the city centre of Oslo. The Grotten is given as a permanent residence to a person specifically bestowed this honour by the King of Norway for their contributions to Norwegian arts and culture.
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October 18, 2022
I Is Another is two more days of consciousness flowing in the unremitting stream�
He’s recalling his adolescence�
He recollects his first steps as an artist� He’s remembering his parents, friends and his beloved� He brings his latest paintings to his art dealer for the forthcoming show�
He is so tired� He feels some overpowering weakness� He becomes lethargic and apathetic�
Our thoughts and memories are cyclic so we keep recalling the same events and things again and again.
He’s recalling his adolescence�
…now he doesn’t want to paint house and home anymore, now he wants to paint just his own pictures, because his head is full of pictures, it’s a real torment, yes, pictures get lodged in his head all the time, not as things that have happened but like a kind of photograph, taken right there, right then, and he can kind of flip from one of the pictures in his head to another, it’s like he has a photo album in his head and the strangest things are there as pictures�
He recollects his first steps as an artist� He’s remembering his parents, friends and his beloved� He brings his latest paintings to his art dealer for the forthcoming show�
…and then I think that even though I like Beyer a lot there’s something about him that makes me uncomfortable, so we’ve never truly become friends, we’re too dissimilar for that, maybe it has to do with me being a country kid and he a city kid, maybe it’s because his family are big city people and mine are more humble, just ordinary country people, I think, and I think Beyer’s a good person, I like him, but I do get tired of him pretty quickly, he gets on my nerves, there’s something about his eagerness that gets to me, so whenever we see each other it’s always a pretty short meeting and a bit forced and I tell Beyer I have to leave�
He is so tired� He feels some overpowering weakness� He becomes lethargic and apathetic�
…and right away something like a darkness falls down over and inside me and I think that I don’t have the strength to paint anymore, I’ve done my part, I’ve done all the painting I’m going to do, I’m done with painting, I don’t want to paint anymore, I think, enough is enough, I think and I go into the main room and over there on the easel I see the bad painting with the two lines that cross in the middle, no, I can’t look at it, I can’t even take the picture down from the easel and put it in the pile with the other paintings�
Our thoughts and memories are cyclic so we keep recalling the same events and things again and again.
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June 16, 2024
I Is Another - Jon Fosse's second novel bookended by The Other Name and A New Name forming his Septology that's translated into fluid, clear, hypnotic English by Damion Searls.
I Is Another picks up where The Other Name leaves off. Asle wakes up the next morning and continues to contemplate the large painting he has on his easel in his studio, the canvas, where a thickly painted purple line crosses another thickly painted brown line, the two dripping lines forming a St. Andrew's Cross.
Again, we follow Asle's stream of consciousness (the entire novel is, in effect, one continuous sentence) where he does everyday things like speak with neighbor Åsleik, feed the dog he's taking care of at the moment, deal with Bayer, owner of an art gallery in Bjørgvin where he has always shown his paintings, all the while flashing back to episodes in his past along with musings on art and life.
To provide a taste of what a reader will encounter, here are several glistening excerpts from Asle's stream of artistic consciousness (over the course of three days: Septology, III-V):
Asle's Younger Years - The novel follows the thread of a disturbing scene on the last pages in The Other Name (Asle as an innocent lad is molested by The Bald Man) by delving into a number of episodes of Asle's boyhood, including his mother nagging him about things like his long hair and the time when he is introduced to smoking. “Asle realizes that he likes smoking, so he's going to be a smoker...he feels something like a nice tingling in his whole body, yes, it's like he feels calmer and somehow better, he thinks.�
Also, his fear reading aloud in high school and, before that, as a fourteen-year-old, when he quit playing the bass guitar in a rock band - “and it doesn't make sense to keep trying something you can't do, something you'll never be able to do even sort of well, it's not like with pictures, those he makes easily, like there's nothing hard about it, but as for guitar playing, well, he's just never going to able to do it.�
With each of these boyhood and teenage flashbacks, we hear echoes of Joyce in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and also Karl Ove Knausgård's My Struggle, Book 3, thus, we're given a substantially more complete and rounded picture of Asle the artist.
Divine Light � Jon Fosse relates an accident he had at age seven which propelled him into a mystical experience with the light, which, in turn, became foundational in his becoming a writer. Asle has a similar accident and experience at the age of seven - “everything is shimmering slightly, in a mysterious light that he's part of and that's much bigger than him, yes, it's everything that exists, and from this light, yes, that's like it's put together out of tiny dots of flickering yellow, yes it's like a cloud of yellow dust.�
This event has a profound effect - “Asle should never have gotten confirmed, he thinks, because it's hard to imagine anything more idiotic than all that Christian nonsense...as soon as he turns sixteen he'll officially withdraw from The National Church, he thinks, he's sure of that, because he saw it when he almost bled to death, he saw it then, yes, he saw that no National Church and no Minister knows anything about it, and The Minister just babbled on and on, Asle thinks, because reality, facts, that's something no Minister knows anything about.�
It's this light, which, at times, strikes Asle as akin to a bright flame but most frequently as a shimmering darkness that adds depth to both Asle's life and his art. And it's this dimension of Jon Fosse's novel that, for me, makes the work incredibly compelling.
Fosse's Fluid Prose - The other Asle remains in the hospital, � “I see Asle lying there in bed and there are all kinds of tubes and things attached to his body that are hanging down from a metal stand and he's lying there asleep and his body is shaking.� However, Asle is told by the receptionist Asle is too sick to receive visitors. Asle's relationship with his namesake underscores Jon Fosse's seamless shifting and sliding from actual happenings to imagination, his juxtaposing past and present.
Ales � Many are the tender moments when Asle thinks of his now dead wife, Ales - “because Ales and I lived pretty much entirely on our own, it was like we didn't need any other people besides each other, we shared our world, that was it.� And, similar to Asle, Ales had strong opinions on knowing the light, knowing God - “Ales says, because actually it's her angel and my angel that are talking to each other now, and for an angel to exist you have to believe it does, and you have to have a word for it, the word angel...and then I say that I miss her and Ales says she misses me too, but even if we aren't together visibly on earth anymore we are still invisibly together and of course I can feel that.�
With his reflections on Ales, it's clear that although Asle is an older man now living in rural isolation in Norway and having minimal contact with others, he's a man capable of great intimacy and affection, a man still feeling the pain of Ales not being there with him. Perhaps Asle entertaining the prospect of giving up his painting is a consequence of his thinking about Ales every time he thinks about painting.
Listening to the audio book of this Jon Fosse novel can be like listening to Gregorian chant. And reading the words on the page, especially when Asle thinks about the link between the light in his painting and the light of knowing God, brings to mind the words of Meister Eckhart: “The eye through which I see God is the same eye through which God sees me; my eye and God's eye are one eye, one seeing, one knowing, one love.�
Norwegian author Jon Fosse, born 1959
September 6, 2021
I Is Another: Septology III-V picks up where Septology I-II left off* (see my review)
And I see myself standing and looking at the picture with the two lines, a purple line and a brown line, that cross in the middle and I think that it’s cold in the main room, and that it’s too early to get up
It is now Wednesday, and Asle is waking in the early hours in his house in Dylgja, the other Asle’s dog Bragi at his side. And his thoughts on the childhood of Asle also begin immediately where they left off the previous day with the boy in trouble after his mother finds the three coins he was given as hush money from The Bald Man.
Shortly afterwards, in the present day, Asle’s neighbour Åsleik comes to make his final choice of a picture for Sister as his annual Christmas present to her (and from Asle to Åsleik, as he gives him the picture for free, or rather as “Åsleik says yes well since you get lamb ribs and lutefisk and wood and other things in exchange for the painting I get to give Sister, mutton too�)
Parts III and IV both take place over Wednesday, with the present-day narration limited to a trip to and from Bjørgvin. The divide between the Parts comes when Asle has a brief nap in his car, after (of course) first praying with his rosary beads, waiting outside of Beyer’s gallery for the gallerist to return, and (of course) on waking his thoughts return to the picture with the cross that he painted earlier in the week.
As Asle recaps on his drive back to Dylgja towards the end of part IV:
and I feel so tired and that's not so strange, because I drove to Bjørgvin today despite everything, and I brought my paintings to Beyer, and now I'm driving home again, and I went to The Hospital, and I wasn't allowed to see Asle, and I went to The Coffeehouse and got some food and talked with Guro there and also saw someone who looked exactly like her, a woman sitting near the front door with a suitcase and two bags next to her, so no wonder I'm tired, I think
to the reader, the identity of this woman is rather clear, and it is later confirmed in the closing pages of Part V.
The reader finally gets to meet Beyer, whose thoughts on how he will arrange Asle’s paintings for the forthcoming exhibition are filtered through Asle’s own:
then he'll move the pictures around until they're in the order he sees in his mind and most of the time, when it comes to my paintings, he can feel sure of it pretty quickly but it doesn’t always go so well with other artists, but it's important that the whole show is like a single picture, because as soon as someone comes into the room they should feel like they've kind of entered into a picture, the room itself should be like a picture, a picture you can enter into, Beyer says and I think that it's obvious that the picture all my pictures come from would in a way fill the room, I think and Beyer says that he doesn't know what exactly makes it that way, it's not something to put into words, because you can't put what a good picture says into words, and as for my pictures the closest he can get is to say that there's an approaching distance, something far away that gets closer, in my pictures, it's as if something imperceptible becomes perceptible and yet still stays imperceptible, it's still hidden, it is something staying hidden, if you can say it that way, my pictures kind of talk to the person looking and at the same time it's impossible to say what the picture says, because it’s a silent kind of talking to you, yes, that's what it is for him Beyer says
The action of Part V is even more condensed, taking place on the Thursday, as Asle largely potters around his house, and then in the evening goes to Åsleik’s house for an advent meal of lamb.
The lack of ‘action� gives Asle even more time to think, and indeed to have an (imagined?) conversation with the deceased Ales, one in which he contemplates his own mortality, as well as the transcendence of art and the immanence within it of the divine (Ales compares his paintings to the theology of Meister Eckhart):
I think that that's how it is a person comes from God and goes back to God, I think, for the body is conceived and born, it grows and declines, it dies and vanishes, but the spirit is a unity of body and soul, the way form and content are an invisible unity in a good picture, yes, there's a spirit in the picture so to speak, yes, the same as in any work of art, in a good poem too, in a good piece of music, yes, there is a unity that's the spirit in the work and it's the spirit, the unity of body and soul, that rises up from the dead, yes, it's the resurrection of the flesh
He also fluctuates between feeling his latest painting is either a failure, or the culmination of his work, although either way increasingly thinking it should be his last.
The narration of the past story of Asle (Asle refers to him in the third person but it becomes clear he is talking about himself rather than the other Asle) is rather fasted paced than previously. Much of the past story in the previous book took place over one day, mirroring the concentration present-day narration, but here the story takes us through Asle’s school days, to his first meetings with Beyer, the other Asle (introduced as ‘The Namesake� by a mutual friend, who is astonished at the resemblance) and of his wife-to-be Ales, all three of them applying for admission to The Art School in Bjørgvin.
On their first encounter the other Asle talks about his latest painting called Boat in a Storm, which is also the title of the painting that Åsleik chooses to give to his sister in the present-day, and perhaps mirrors the pub in Bjørgvin, The Last Boat, where both Asle drink together later in their life. The Namesake Asle is also with Liv, who is pregnant with their child ("the Son").
The novel ends in the present-day with Asle suffering a panic attack, one he links back to the panic he felt as a high school student when he was asked to read aloud in class. He abruptly leaves his meal with Åsleik and sits outside in his car and, as at the end of each part, prays using his rosary.
and I hold the brown wooden cross between my thumb and finger and then I say, over and over again inside myself while I breathe in deeply Lord and while I breathe out slowly Jesus and while I breathe in deeply Christ and while I breathe out slowly Have mercy and while I breathe in deeply On me
Another excellent volume in a wonderful novel (ultimately this will be one combined book, and I would recommend reading volume I-II before this).
Read a second time in September 2021 and part of a (re-)read of the whole Septology.
----------------------------------
[* as an aside there seemed a couple of small continuity errors in the early pages from the previous night's scene � firstly Åsleik had already narrowed his choice to two paintings, which he wanted to think on overnight, which didn't seem to be mentioned here. Secondly, and a clearer difference, here Asle laments that he doesn’t want to have to explain "again" to Åsleik, who has a habit of repeating conversations, where he sources the blankets he uses to protect his paintings, whereas in the previous novel, Asle specifically said that he had “sworn to myself never to tell him”]
And I see myself standing and looking at the picture with the two lines, a purple line and a brown line, that cross in the middle and I think that it’s cold in the main room, and that it’s too early to get up
It is now Wednesday, and Asle is waking in the early hours in his house in Dylgja, the other Asle’s dog Bragi at his side. And his thoughts on the childhood of Asle also begin immediately where they left off the previous day with the boy in trouble after his mother finds the three coins he was given as hush money from The Bald Man.
Shortly afterwards, in the present day, Asle’s neighbour Åsleik comes to make his final choice of a picture for Sister as his annual Christmas present to her (and from Asle to Åsleik, as he gives him the picture for free, or rather as “Åsleik says yes well since you get lamb ribs and lutefisk and wood and other things in exchange for the painting I get to give Sister, mutton too�)
Parts III and IV both take place over Wednesday, with the present-day narration limited to a trip to and from Bjørgvin. The divide between the Parts comes when Asle has a brief nap in his car, after (of course) first praying with his rosary beads, waiting outside of Beyer’s gallery for the gallerist to return, and (of course) on waking his thoughts return to the picture with the cross that he painted earlier in the week.
As Asle recaps on his drive back to Dylgja towards the end of part IV:
and I feel so tired and that's not so strange, because I drove to Bjørgvin today despite everything, and I brought my paintings to Beyer, and now I'm driving home again, and I went to The Hospital, and I wasn't allowed to see Asle, and I went to The Coffeehouse and got some food and talked with Guro there and also saw someone who looked exactly like her, a woman sitting near the front door with a suitcase and two bags next to her, so no wonder I'm tired, I think
to the reader, the identity of this woman is rather clear, and it is later confirmed in the closing pages of Part V.
The reader finally gets to meet Beyer, whose thoughts on how he will arrange Asle’s paintings for the forthcoming exhibition are filtered through Asle’s own:
then he'll move the pictures around until they're in the order he sees in his mind and most of the time, when it comes to my paintings, he can feel sure of it pretty quickly but it doesn’t always go so well with other artists, but it's important that the whole show is like a single picture, because as soon as someone comes into the room they should feel like they've kind of entered into a picture, the room itself should be like a picture, a picture you can enter into, Beyer says and I think that it's obvious that the picture all my pictures come from would in a way fill the room, I think and Beyer says that he doesn't know what exactly makes it that way, it's not something to put into words, because you can't put what a good picture says into words, and as for my pictures the closest he can get is to say that there's an approaching distance, something far away that gets closer, in my pictures, it's as if something imperceptible becomes perceptible and yet still stays imperceptible, it's still hidden, it is something staying hidden, if you can say it that way, my pictures kind of talk to the person looking and at the same time it's impossible to say what the picture says, because it’s a silent kind of talking to you, yes, that's what it is for him Beyer says
The action of Part V is even more condensed, taking place on the Thursday, as Asle largely potters around his house, and then in the evening goes to Åsleik’s house for an advent meal of lamb.
The lack of ‘action� gives Asle even more time to think, and indeed to have an (imagined?) conversation with the deceased Ales, one in which he contemplates his own mortality, as well as the transcendence of art and the immanence within it of the divine (Ales compares his paintings to the theology of Meister Eckhart):
I think that that's how it is a person comes from God and goes back to God, I think, for the body is conceived and born, it grows and declines, it dies and vanishes, but the spirit is a unity of body and soul, the way form and content are an invisible unity in a good picture, yes, there's a spirit in the picture so to speak, yes, the same as in any work of art, in a good poem too, in a good piece of music, yes, there is a unity that's the spirit in the work and it's the spirit, the unity of body and soul, that rises up from the dead, yes, it's the resurrection of the flesh
He also fluctuates between feeling his latest painting is either a failure, or the culmination of his work, although either way increasingly thinking it should be his last.
The narration of the past story of Asle (Asle refers to him in the third person but it becomes clear he is talking about himself rather than the other Asle) is rather fasted paced than previously. Much of the past story in the previous book took place over one day, mirroring the concentration present-day narration, but here the story takes us through Asle’s school days, to his first meetings with Beyer, the other Asle (introduced as ‘The Namesake� by a mutual friend, who is astonished at the resemblance) and of his wife-to-be Ales, all three of them applying for admission to The Art School in Bjørgvin.
On their first encounter the other Asle talks about his latest painting called Boat in a Storm, which is also the title of the painting that Åsleik chooses to give to his sister in the present-day, and perhaps mirrors the pub in Bjørgvin, The Last Boat, where both Asle drink together later in their life. The Namesake Asle is also with Liv, who is pregnant with their child ("the Son").
The novel ends in the present-day with Asle suffering a panic attack, one he links back to the panic he felt as a high school student when he was asked to read aloud in class. He abruptly leaves his meal with Åsleik and sits outside in his car and, as at the end of each part, prays using his rosary.
and I hold the brown wooden cross between my thumb and finger and then I say, over and over again inside myself while I breathe in deeply Lord and while I breathe out slowly Jesus and while I breathe in deeply Christ and while I breathe out slowly Have mercy and while I breathe in deeply On me
Another excellent volume in a wonderful novel (ultimately this will be one combined book, and I would recommend reading volume I-II before this).
Read a second time in September 2021 and part of a (re-)read of the whole Septology.
----------------------------------
[* as an aside there seemed a couple of small continuity errors in the early pages from the previous night's scene � firstly Åsleik had already narrowed his choice to two paintings, which he wanted to think on overnight, which didn't seem to be mentioned here. Secondly, and a clearer difference, here Asle laments that he doesn’t want to have to explain "again" to Åsleik, who has a habit of repeating conversations, where he sources the blankets he uses to protect his paintings, whereas in the previous novel, Asle specifically said that he had “sworn to myself never to tell him”]
July 24, 2024
BETWEEN ART AND GOD
In this monumental work, Fosse manages to reflect in the most delicate way on life, art, love, religion, choices made in life. The protagonist Asle, an old man passing through a critical moment, relives certain important moments of his life over a period of several days around Christmas.
With the Scandinavian fjords in the background and the Norwegian desert landscape providing a perfect basis for reflection, the painter Asle wanders outside and inside himself, on the verge of a major existential crisis, determined by the loss of reference points: on the one hand painting, Art, on the other Faith, both accentuated by the death of his wife, an event he never managed to get over.
Fosse's prose is hypnotic because he follows Asle's inner struggle in sentences hundreds of pages long, and because he repeats the key concepts and scenes in his discourse dozens of times, while also revealing, when less expected, novelties and plot twists.
That’s to say I believe SEPTOLOGY could be regarded as a universal literary masterpiece focussed on the exploration of the meaning of life. From this perspective, it stands alongside other monumental works that share the common theme of existential inquiry, such as Proust's "In Search of Lost Time" and Musil's "The Man Without Qualities".
In this monumental work, Fosse manages to reflect in the most delicate way on life, art, love, religion, choices made in life. The protagonist Asle, an old man passing through a critical moment, relives certain important moments of his life over a period of several days around Christmas.
With the Scandinavian fjords in the background and the Norwegian desert landscape providing a perfect basis for reflection, the painter Asle wanders outside and inside himself, on the verge of a major existential crisis, determined by the loss of reference points: on the one hand painting, Art, on the other Faith, both accentuated by the death of his wife, an event he never managed to get over.
Fosse's prose is hypnotic because he follows Asle's inner struggle in sentences hundreds of pages long, and because he repeats the key concepts and scenes in his discourse dozens of times, while also revealing, when less expected, novelties and plot twists.
That’s to say I believe SEPTOLOGY could be regarded as a universal literary masterpiece focussed on the exploration of the meaning of life. From this perspective, it stands alongside other monumental works that share the common theme of existential inquiry, such as Proust's "In Search of Lost Time" and Musil's "The Man Without Qualities".
July 13, 2024
Jon Fosse's heptalogy reads as if Thomas Bernhard had written Molly's final monologue in "Ulysses". It is one long stream of consciousness that takes on a meditative character through its repetition, monotony and focus on details, developing a pull to which one gradually surrenders completely.
The recapitulation of a life is continued in "Ich ist ein Anderer". In this middle section, the painter Asle primarily recalls his youth - the band he quickly left, his time at grammar school and his meeting with the name, the other painter Asle, his second self.
At the same time, these memories merge again with the present: he feels the emptiness represented by the chair of his deceased companion Ales, he reflects on his friendship with Åsleik and on his relationship with the gallery owner Beyer and thinks again and again of Asle, who is still in hospital and struggling with life.
The novel is as quiet as its protagonist, as deep as a black Norwegian fjord, as enigmatic as the glow in Asle's paintings. You find yourself in it and then again you don't. It is a blueprint of melancholy and if you had to paint it, it would perhaps be a lonely farmstead in a barren landscape, in which a beautiful flower blooms here and there among the rocks and undergrowth. If you pick it, it withers and the picture loses its expression. The same applies to the interpretation of the novel's riddles: the more you accept them without interpreting them, the more the work shines.
The recapitulation of a life is continued in "Ich ist ein Anderer". In this middle section, the painter Asle primarily recalls his youth - the band he quickly left, his time at grammar school and his meeting with the name, the other painter Asle, his second self.
At the same time, these memories merge again with the present: he feels the emptiness represented by the chair of his deceased companion Ales, he reflects on his friendship with Åsleik and on his relationship with the gallery owner Beyer and thinks again and again of Asle, who is still in hospital and struggling with life.
The novel is as quiet as its protagonist, as deep as a black Norwegian fjord, as enigmatic as the glow in Asle's paintings. You find yourself in it and then again you don't. It is a blueprint of melancholy and if you had to paint it, it would perhaps be a lonely farmstead in a barren landscape, in which a beautiful flower blooms here and there among the rocks and undergrowth. If you pick it, it withers and the picture loses its expression. The same applies to the interpretation of the novel's riddles: the more you accept them without interpreting them, the more the work shines.
February 1, 2023
The second part of Fosse's Septology follows a similar pattern to the first part (), and adds power and weight to it.
The foreground stories of the five parts so far each describe a day in the life of its narrator Asle, a widowed painter in late middle age who lives a mostly solitary life in an isolated house by a fjord on the Norwegian coast, where his only companion is his farmer neighbour Åsleik.
Once again his account is dominated by memories, and this time we learn much more about Asle's background, how he first left home, and how he met his namesake/doppelganger, the alcoholic Asle he rescued and took to hospital in the first book. We also learn how he met the gallery owner Beyer after organising an exhibition in a local youth centre, and why he became a Catholic.
When talking about his own childhood and early adulthood, the narrator always refers to himself as Asle and recounts the stories in the third person, and this, combined with the circling repetitious nature of the narrative, makes it something of a puzzle to work out how the characters or personae interact.
As in the first book, the story is told as a stream of consciousness with no sentence breaks, the only line breaks being after reported speech, and most of the parts end with narrator Asle saying the rosary as he falls asleep.
The whole thing has a hypnotic power, and the images Fosse creates are enduring - I read the first part more than six months ago and all of the events Fosse comes back to in this one were instantly familiar. I look forward to seeing how the final part completes the project.
The foreground stories of the five parts so far each describe a day in the life of its narrator Asle, a widowed painter in late middle age who lives a mostly solitary life in an isolated house by a fjord on the Norwegian coast, where his only companion is his farmer neighbour Åsleik.
Once again his account is dominated by memories, and this time we learn much more about Asle's background, how he first left home, and how he met his namesake/doppelganger, the alcoholic Asle he rescued and took to hospital in the first book. We also learn how he met the gallery owner Beyer after organising an exhibition in a local youth centre, and why he became a Catholic.
When talking about his own childhood and early adulthood, the narrator always refers to himself as Asle and recounts the stories in the third person, and this, combined with the circling repetitious nature of the narrative, makes it something of a puzzle to work out how the characters or personae interact.
As in the first book, the story is told as a stream of consciousness with no sentence breaks, the only line breaks being after reported speech, and most of the parts end with narrator Asle saying the rosary as he falls asleep.
The whole thing has a hypnotic power, and the images Fosse creates are enduring - I read the first part more than six months ago and all of the events Fosse comes back to in this one were instantly familiar. I look forward to seeing how the final part completes the project.
October 5, 2023
Remembering things past and contemplating God
When I finished the first book in this trilogy (first two parts of septology), I wasn’t planning to continue. Yet months later I was still thinking about it sometimes, some scenes kept haunting me, like that wandering in a snowstorm limbo. Well I am not gonna be haunted by anything in this book, I can promise you that.
I think that one of the most important things when it comes to painting is being able to stop at the right time, to know when a picture is saying what it can say, if you keep going too long then more often than not the picture’ll be ruined
Same goes for books, am I right?
I'm not going to remember Asle suddenly leaving his band for no reason or his father fearfully driving his car ridiculously slow. Or something else that I can't recall already.
Once again, a very very slow internal repetitive narration with countless digressions and no plot, yet not entirely unenjoyable. There’s something in the rhythm of the prose that is hypnotic for this reader (I’ve seen people saying it’s emulating Catholic prayers but I can’t tell you anything about anything Catholic).
And yet with all the criticisms, I, for mysterious reasons, enjoyed this book perhaps more than it deserved. I don't know who I would even recommend them to, yet I keep coming back to them. I definitely want to see how it all ties together at this point.
how good or bad something is doesn’t have anything to do with how much I like it or don’t like it, only with how good or bad it is, whether it’s good art or bad art, because art is about quality, not about liking or not liking it, not at all, and it’s not about taste either, quality is something that just exists in the picture whether it’s beautiful or ugly,
I have my doubts at this point...
When I finished the first book in this trilogy (first two parts of septology), I wasn’t planning to continue. Yet months later I was still thinking about it sometimes, some scenes kept haunting me, like that wandering in a snowstorm limbo. Well I am not gonna be haunted by anything in this book, I can promise you that.
I think that one of the most important things when it comes to painting is being able to stop at the right time, to know when a picture is saying what it can say, if you keep going too long then more often than not the picture’ll be ruined
Same goes for books, am I right?
I'm not going to remember Asle suddenly leaving his band for no reason or his father fearfully driving his car ridiculously slow. Or something else that I can't recall already.
Once again, a very very slow internal repetitive narration with countless digressions and no plot, yet not entirely unenjoyable. There’s something in the rhythm of the prose that is hypnotic for this reader (I’ve seen people saying it’s emulating Catholic prayers but I can’t tell you anything about anything Catholic).
And yet with all the criticisms, I, for mysterious reasons, enjoyed this book perhaps more than it deserved. I don't know who I would even recommend them to, yet I keep coming back to them. I definitely want to see how it all ties together at this point.
how good or bad something is doesn’t have anything to do with how much I like it or don’t like it, only with how good or bad it is, whether it’s good art or bad art, because art is about quality, not about liking or not liking it, not at all, and it’s not about taste either, quality is something that just exists in the picture whether it’s beautiful or ugly,
I have my doubts at this point...
January 22, 2024
"Ich ist ein anderer" enthält die Teile drei bis fünf der Heptalogie des Literaturnobelpreisträgers Jon Fosse. Es beginnt am Mittwoch. Der Maler Asle wacht auf. Der mitreißende Gedankenstrom aus dem ersten Heptalogie-Band setzt sich nahtlos fort. Die Kindheitserinnerungen, die er kurz vor dem Einschlafen hatte, drehen sich weiter in seinem Kopf. Dort spielt sich eine Entwicklungsgeschichte ab.
Ging es in den ersten beiden Teilen noch stark um sein gegenwärtiges Künstlerdasein, rückt hier nun die Künstlerwerdung stärker in den Fokus. Dem Mittwoch sind zwei Teile (drei und vier) gewidmet. Der fünfte Teil beginnt am Donnerstag. Asle mag das Andreaskreuz-Bild nicht mehr. Er überlegt, es zu übermalen, aber zugleich hat er keine Lust mehr zu malen. "vielleicht habe ich genug gemalt, bin leergemalt" Deutet sich hier das Ende des Künstlers an?
Alles Positive aus meiner Rezension zum ersten Buch über die rauschhafte Sprache, trifft auch für "Ich ist ein anderer" zu. Es ist für mich ein zusammenhängendes Werk ohne Bruch. Es gibt unterschiedliche inhaltliche Schwerpunkte. Das liegt aber nur daran, dass unterschiedliche Ereignisse und Situationen unterschiedliche Gedanken auslösen. Der Fluss der Gedanken bleibt auf demselben hohen sprachlichem Niveau.
Der Folgeband mit den abschließenden Teilen sechs und sieben der Heptalogie heißt "Ein neuer Name". Ich werde ihn lesen, jau.
Ging es in den ersten beiden Teilen noch stark um sein gegenwärtiges Künstlerdasein, rückt hier nun die Künstlerwerdung stärker in den Fokus. Dem Mittwoch sind zwei Teile (drei und vier) gewidmet. Der fünfte Teil beginnt am Donnerstag. Asle mag das Andreaskreuz-Bild nicht mehr. Er überlegt, es zu übermalen, aber zugleich hat er keine Lust mehr zu malen. "vielleicht habe ich genug gemalt, bin leergemalt" Deutet sich hier das Ende des Künstlers an?
Alles Positive aus meiner Rezension zum ersten Buch über die rauschhafte Sprache, trifft auch für "Ich ist ein anderer" zu. Es ist für mich ein zusammenhängendes Werk ohne Bruch. Es gibt unterschiedliche inhaltliche Schwerpunkte. Das liegt aber nur daran, dass unterschiedliche Ereignisse und Situationen unterschiedliche Gedanken auslösen. Der Fluss der Gedanken bleibt auf demselben hohen sprachlichem Niveau.
Der Folgeband mit den abschließenden Teilen sechs und sieben der Heptalogie heißt "Ein neuer Name". Ich werde ihn lesen, jau.
February 3, 2024
Tras reciente relectura (año y medio después de la lectura original), era evidente que le iba a subir la puntuación (de 3 a 5).
Puesta en contexto la historia gana, aunque el estilo envolvente e hipnótico sigue siendo el mismo. Conocemos mucho más al amigo Asle. Conocemos más los mecanismos de Fosse, en concreto pintar toda la vida y contorno de un personaje jugando con distintos espacios temporales suyos propios, y como si se tratara de distintos personajes y no sólo uno (interactúan esos personajes entre si como si fueran distintas personas), hay elementos que crean la ficción de que se trata de personajes distintos (un detalle tan tonto como es el perro Brage es un nexo de unión de la historia, para mí importantísimo).
En fin, no me extiendo y sigo con la magia de esta obra y expectante de la última entrega. No borro la reseña original para recordar lo que es una mala interpretación de una obra por distintas causas.
�--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jon Fosse es un autor que no permite dudar mucho al lector; te sumerge en su submundo de forma inmediata, en su lenguaje un tanto circular, que salta hacia adelante y hacia atrás, combinando de forma continua el pasado y el presente, que confunde las personas que intervienen con la propia narración de estas, la mezcla tremenda de unos mismos nombres e identidades, curioso... Una vez salvadas esas dificultades, luego ya el resto es "sencillo". Es una narración novedosa, muy plástica y teatral (es dramaturgo Fosse) y visual, como con mucha puesta en escena.
Hay partes de la historia, que creo se deben completar con la saga completa de la septología para tener una visiónde conjunto, he tomado una parte central que ni me permite tener opinión objetiva sobre la obra completa, ni tan siquiera sobre el comienzo o arranque de la propuesta de Fosse. Aun así el resultado es hipnótico y positivo: mezcla de una personalidad tan curiosa como la del protagonista que por otra parte parece el alter ego del autor, con sus traumas, miedos, adicciones, creo que no obstante es un personaje literario y con características de tal tipo: creo que parte del protagonista es el alter ego de J. Fosse, pero es evidente que se trata de un personaje literario sobre el que se agudizan estas supuestas condiciones del autor en beneficio de la narración. La mezcla de este personaje, el estilo narrativo, la religión y por momentos el abuso del alcohol, dan un buen resultado de conjunto. 3 *
Puesta en contexto la historia gana, aunque el estilo envolvente e hipnótico sigue siendo el mismo. Conocemos mucho más al amigo Asle. Conocemos más los mecanismos de Fosse, en concreto pintar toda la vida y contorno de un personaje jugando con distintos espacios temporales suyos propios, y como si se tratara de distintos personajes y no sólo uno (interactúan esos personajes entre si como si fueran distintas personas), hay elementos que crean la ficción de que se trata de personajes distintos (un detalle tan tonto como es el perro Brage es un nexo de unión de la historia, para mí importantísimo).
En fin, no me extiendo y sigo con la magia de esta obra y expectante de la última entrega. No borro la reseña original para recordar lo que es una mala interpretación de una obra por distintas causas.
�--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jon Fosse es un autor que no permite dudar mucho al lector; te sumerge en su submundo de forma inmediata, en su lenguaje un tanto circular, que salta hacia adelante y hacia atrás, combinando de forma continua el pasado y el presente, que confunde las personas que intervienen con la propia narración de estas, la mezcla tremenda de unos mismos nombres e identidades, curioso... Una vez salvadas esas dificultades, luego ya el resto es "sencillo". Es una narración novedosa, muy plástica y teatral (es dramaturgo Fosse) y visual, como con mucha puesta en escena.
Hay partes de la historia, que creo se deben completar con la saga completa de la septología para tener una visiónde conjunto, he tomado una parte central que ni me permite tener opinión objetiva sobre la obra completa, ni tan siquiera sobre el comienzo o arranque de la propuesta de Fosse. Aun así el resultado es hipnótico y positivo: mezcla de una personalidad tan curiosa como la del protagonista que por otra parte parece el alter ego del autor, con sus traumas, miedos, adicciones, creo que no obstante es un personaje literario y con características de tal tipo: creo que parte del protagonista es el alter ego de J. Fosse, pero es evidente que se trata de un personaje literario sobre el que se agudizan estas supuestas condiciones del autor en beneficio de la narración. La mezcla de este personaje, el estilo narrativo, la religión y por momentos el abuso del alcohol, dan un buen resultado de conjunto. 3 *
September 12, 2021
Now re-read immediately after and immediately prior to i.e. I am reading all 3 volumes (or all 7 books, depending how you look at it) back to back.
ORIGINAL REVIEW
As preparation for reading this book, I read it back-to-back with “The Other Name: Septology I-II� which means I read Septology I-V without a break over a period of 6 days (although that did include a non-reading day because it was my wife’s 60th birthday). It’s some experience and I am really looking forward to Septology VI-VII (and I think it’s likely I will at that point read Septology I-VII as a complete work - this is a book that can withstand multiple readings).
Each section of the Septology so far begins in a very similar way:
"And I see myself standing and looking at the picture with the two lines, a purple line and a brown line, that cross in the middle and I think that it’s cold in the main room, and that it’s too early to get up�"
And this painting is one of a multitude of recurring motifs that swirl around. The books are structured without full stops and with jumps from one topic to another. As we read, it seems that every time Asle’s gaze falls on something empty (the sea, white snow etc.) he sees memories projected onto that canvas and there are several stories to which his memory (or maybe something more than that because he sees a lot of things that he can’t possibly remember and this is part of the magic of the book) returns again and again, gradually filling in details that began to emerge in Part I and become slowly clearer.
It’s hypnotic and the nagging doubt in the reader’s mind about what is real and what imagined just adds to the atmosphere created by the “slow prose� with its lack of full stops, its circling motifs and its sudden switches.
I think it’s fair to say that reading both these books back-to-back is pretty much the highlight of my reading year. I’ve read a lot of books this year that I have really enjoyed, but it’s hard to argue that any are more significant works of literature than this is building into.
ORIGINAL REVIEW
As preparation for reading this book, I read it back-to-back with “The Other Name: Septology I-II� which means I read Septology I-V without a break over a period of 6 days (although that did include a non-reading day because it was my wife’s 60th birthday). It’s some experience and I am really looking forward to Septology VI-VII (and I think it’s likely I will at that point read Septology I-VII as a complete work - this is a book that can withstand multiple readings).
Each section of the Septology so far begins in a very similar way:
"And I see myself standing and looking at the picture with the two lines, a purple line and a brown line, that cross in the middle and I think that it’s cold in the main room, and that it’s too early to get up�"
And this painting is one of a multitude of recurring motifs that swirl around. The books are structured without full stops and with jumps from one topic to another. As we read, it seems that every time Asle’s gaze falls on something empty (the sea, white snow etc.) he sees memories projected onto that canvas and there are several stories to which his memory (or maybe something more than that because he sees a lot of things that he can’t possibly remember and this is part of the magic of the book) returns again and again, gradually filling in details that began to emerge in Part I and become slowly clearer.
It’s hypnotic and the nagging doubt in the reader’s mind about what is real and what imagined just adds to the atmosphere created by the “slow prose� with its lack of full stops, its circling motifs and its sudden switches.
I think it’s fair to say that reading both these books back-to-back is pretty much the highlight of my reading year. I’ve read a lot of books this year that I have really enjoyed, but it’s hard to argue that any are more significant works of literature than this is building into.
January 15, 2023
The “middle� portion of Septology. My rating reflects acclimation to the story, not necessarily a dropoff in quality from The Other Name. Perhaps that’s why it’s slightly unfair to rate these books as individual books, as opposed to looking at Septology as a whole. I think any story will have ups and downs, and this portion was a bit more down. The energy was calmer, the memories more mellow. More Asle and Asle lore was uncovered. Asle (the main narrator, that is) is beautifully plain - a soulful human being. If anyone can be said to live in the moment, it must be him. Looking forward to the final movement.
A quote I loved from the book:
"I think that dogs understand so much but they can't say anything about it, or else they can say it with their dog's eyes, and in that way they're like good art, because art can't say anything either, not really, it can only say something else while keeping silent about what it actually wants to say, that's what art is like and faith and dog's silent understanding too"
A quote I loved from the book:
"I think that dogs understand so much but they can't say anything about it, or else they can say it with their dog's eyes, and in that way they're like good art, because art can't say anything either, not really, it can only say something else while keeping silent about what it actually wants to say, that's what art is like and faith and dog's silent understanding too"
May 2, 2024
A esta parte tengo que darle cinco cerrados. Y es que si durante El otro nombre I y II (las dos primeras partes de Septología) Fosse demostró su destreza narrativa al desarrollar una historia en un solo párrafo sin puntos que es finalmente una sola oración, haciendo un juego de espejos con el tema del doble pero dentro de la bifurcación temporo-espacial de la coexistencia de dos posibilidades de vida simultáneas, aquí llega a un nivel más alto. El dispositivo narrativo se vuelve más complejo: la visión del narrador no es solo un monólogo interior, sino una especie de embarcación que lleva al lector al encuentro de pasado y presente, en sólidas prolepsis y analepsis (idas al pasado y al futuro) que conducen la narración de una forma particular, quizás poco o nada vista. Un verdadero tratamiento vanguardista de la forma dentro de la literatura contemporánea. Así como el arriesgado mecanismo literario del encuentro de dos personajes que son y no son el mismo personaje (Asle, el pintor), en el flujo narrativo que converge en un mismo punto y luego se bifurca, pero ahora en varios pasados y futuros vistos desde ese pasado (como el encuentro de las dos líneas que pinta Asle en el cuadro de la Cruz de San Andrés). Una verdadera encrucijada narrativa. (*Incluso con coexistencia doble de otro personaje que no es el yo narrador: Guro, la hermana de Asleik, el vecino de granja de Asle). Claramente líneas temporales paralelas que se interconectan. Todo esto, admirablemente, no vuelve la narración intrincada o inexpugnable, todo lo contrario, está construida su prosa de tal manera que resulta una lectura ágil, completamente inteligible y hasta simple en su gran profundidad.
Y por otro lado están las disquisiciones filosófico-espirituales del Alter ego de Fosse, Asle, la idea de la existencia de Dios detrás de todas las cosas, de su existencia en la oscuridad, y el símil planteado de lo Divino con el arte: un cuadro es una verdad no dicha, inexpresable, al igual que Dios; y los cuadros pintados por Asle, son, según su sentir, en realidad un mismo cuadro (y esos son los buenos cuadros), como un mensaje que se repite, como eso que él cree que es Dios, el Dios de todas las cosas. Todo esto narrado con una especie de simpleza y claridad, cierta clarividencia, transparencia, un tono que podría sonar hasta ingenuo, pero que es parte de la construcción más íntima del personaje Alter ego de Fosse. Por lo demás, si eres no creyente, Fosse te hará rezar de todos modos. "Cristo Jesús ten piedad de mí".
Y por otro lado están las disquisiciones filosófico-espirituales del Alter ego de Fosse, Asle, la idea de la existencia de Dios detrás de todas las cosas, de su existencia en la oscuridad, y el símil planteado de lo Divino con el arte: un cuadro es una verdad no dicha, inexpresable, al igual que Dios; y los cuadros pintados por Asle, son, según su sentir, en realidad un mismo cuadro (y esos son los buenos cuadros), como un mensaje que se repite, como eso que él cree que es Dios, el Dios de todas las cosas. Todo esto narrado con una especie de simpleza y claridad, cierta clarividencia, transparencia, un tono que podría sonar hasta ingenuo, pero que es parte de la construcción más íntima del personaje Alter ego de Fosse. Por lo demás, si eres no creyente, Fosse te hará rezar de todos modos. "Cristo Jesús ten piedad de mí".
December 16, 2023
When Fosse was given the Nobel, my first thought was the world could now end, wouldn't it be such a lovely round thing, history, with the author of Septology winning the last Nobel given to anyone...
This book is probably the best thing literature can give to humanity. As opposed to other great books that outshine their peers and leave you with a temporary sense that nothing else is worth reading, this one's light brightens even the other books one may read, as well.
This book is probably the best thing literature can give to humanity. As opposed to other great books that outshine their peers and leave you with a temporary sense that nothing else is worth reading, this one's light brightens even the other books one may read, as well.
January 21, 2024
Ich bin weiterhin begeistert. Nach Teil V sind die Rätsel um Asle und Asle sowie um Guro und Guro gelöst. Ich freue mich jetzt auf die Teile VI und VII. Jau!
Read
May 11, 2023I think if you read my review of Jon Fosse's first Septology book, you'll have a good idea about my thoughts on this one. They aren't much different, so how would my thoughts be much different?
Caveat: In this case, I didn't have to get used to Fosse's repetitive style. You know, all the "I think" stuff and "yes" stuff and "no" stuff and "Well" stuff and assorted quirks we all share in the ways we speak and think every day.
That and the "A" names. That and the dopplegängers with their lovely umlauts.
I have this thing about umlauts.
And so, same. Rating, ravings, rantings -- same.
Will I read the last book, then? I'll ask Aen when I see him. And trust me. I'll see him.
P.S. Never mind cow bell. More Bragi.
Caveat: In this case, I didn't have to get used to Fosse's repetitive style. You know, all the "I think" stuff and "yes" stuff and "no" stuff and "Well" stuff and assorted quirks we all share in the ways we speak and think every day.
That and the "A" names. That and the dopplegängers with their lovely umlauts.
I have this thing about umlauts.
And so, same. Rating, ravings, rantings -- same.
Will I read the last book, then? I'll ask Aen when I see him. And trust me. I'll see him.
P.S. Never mind cow bell. More Bragi.
October 26, 2023
133rd book of 2023.
Not quite as good as I-II, but really it's just one continuation. The rhythm is the same and so are the themes: memory, grief, art, faith. It's great stuff and Fosse continues to put me under a spell as I read, pages disappear on the train and in bed. In fact, I don't understand how it can be so readable. An 800-page sentence, but it just flows with such ease. True talent, I suppose. I'll be finishing off the Septology soon and then digging into some of his smaller works.
Not quite as good as I-II, but really it's just one continuation. The rhythm is the same and so are the themes: memory, grief, art, faith. It's great stuff and Fosse continues to put me under a spell as I read, pages disappear on the train and in bed. In fact, I don't understand how it can be so readable. An 800-page sentence, but it just flows with such ease. True talent, I suppose. I'll be finishing off the Septology soon and then digging into some of his smaller works.
November 3, 2024
Fosse hat einen Suchtfaktor, den ich gar nicht so genau erklären kann. Band 2 der Heptalogie ausgelesen und schon Band 3 in der Hand. Aber ich zögere noch, denn danach war’s das dann. Mehr gibt es nicht, alles von Fosse gelesen� Nachschub ungewiss.
In Band 2 kommt es zur Begegnung mit Der Name, dem anderen Asle. Viele Erinnerungen an Kindheit, Jugend und Studentenzeit. Und das Kennenlernen von Ales, seiner geliebten und mittlerweile verstorbenen Frau. Die Stimmung schwankt zwischen Regen und Schnee.
Konstanten sind das schöne braune Häuschen, Brage der Hund, die Galerie Beyer und natürlich der Nachbar Asleik.
In Band 2 kommt es zur Begegnung mit Der Name, dem anderen Asle. Viele Erinnerungen an Kindheit, Jugend und Studentenzeit. Und das Kennenlernen von Ales, seiner geliebten und mittlerweile verstorbenen Frau. Die Stimmung schwankt zwischen Regen und Schnee.
Konstanten sind das schöne braune Häuschen, Brage der Hund, die Galerie Beyer und natürlich der Nachbar Asleik.
January 6, 2025
Non è un capolavoro come i primi tre capitoli, ma è e rimane un grandissimo libro di un autore che, finalmente, ha meritato il Nobel che gli spettava.
Jon Fosse scrive in maniera ipnotica trascinandoti dentro il suo mondo, dentro ai quadri del protagonista, tra le vie innevate davanti a una galleria d'arte, dentro alla vita di un giovane talentuoso. Non vi prende per mano, non vi racconta una storia, vi prende e vi butta in un turbinio di pensieri e di salti temporali e di nomi tutti uguali da cui ne uscirete meravigliati e scompigliati.
Meno bello del primo solo perché è un po' svanito l'effetto sorpresa e ho preso confidenza con lo stile dell'autore ma, ugualmente, un grand libro.
Jon Fosse scrive in maniera ipnotica trascinandoti dentro il suo mondo, dentro ai quadri del protagonista, tra le vie innevate davanti a una galleria d'arte, dentro alla vita di un giovane talentuoso. Non vi prende per mano, non vi racconta una storia, vi prende e vi butta in un turbinio di pensieri e di salti temporali e di nomi tutti uguali da cui ne uscirete meravigliati e scompigliati.
Meno bello del primo solo perché è un po' svanito l'effetto sorpresa e ho preso confidenza con lo stile dell'autore ma, ugualmente, un grand libro.
March 26, 2021
Love the thematic quality of this septology, and of course the calming prose of Fosse. Exploring art, faith, time and death, Fosse seems to be a man of depth. The only thing holding this back from getting the full five stars is the repetitiveness of thoughts and dialogue. I understand why Fosse uses this approach- it is meant to mimic the internal thoughts and communications of an insecure man- but it can be just slightly annoying to hear the same thoughts and words repeated over and over. Once the third and final installment is published (hopefully soon), I believe this septology will be greater than the sum of its parts. It would be cool if Transit decided to offer an edition with the full septology sometime in the future as well. I'm very excited to see where this one heads. Highly recommended
January 10, 2025
Leer a Fosse es una experiencia distinta. No le encuentro semejante. Su profunda mirada hacia dentro del personaje principal, Asle, desafía la percepción del tiempo y la realidad, abordando la trascendencia y espiritualidad humana.
El noruego lleva la técnica del fluir de la conciencia a un nuevo nivel. Asle nos conmueve hondamente, sufrimos con sus avatares y nos lleva a cambiar en cada párrafo el ángulo de la lectura.
En “El otro hombre� (Septología I y II) conocemos a este pintor solitario que ha dejado el alcohol y que busca sosiego mientras recuerda su vida y se preocupa por el otro Asle, también pintor. Sobreviene el conflicto existencial: ¿Cómo habría sido su vida si hubiera tomado otro camino?
En “Yo es otro� (Septología III-V) mientras el protagonista envejece, su doble pasa ser el “tocayo�, un amigo que sigue precisando ser ayudado y rescatado. Son dos vidas que transcurren al mismo tiempo y se encuentran constantemente, aunque con tramas diferentes.
Nos hipnotiza leer repetidamente que Asle está sentado en su sillón, mirando un punto fijo de la ventana, con el mar nevado de fondo mientras discurre su diálogo interno y reza el padrenuestro.
El noruego lleva la técnica del fluir de la conciencia a un nuevo nivel. Asle nos conmueve hondamente, sufrimos con sus avatares y nos lleva a cambiar en cada párrafo el ángulo de la lectura.
En “El otro hombre� (Septología I y II) conocemos a este pintor solitario que ha dejado el alcohol y que busca sosiego mientras recuerda su vida y se preocupa por el otro Asle, también pintor. Sobreviene el conflicto existencial: ¿Cómo habría sido su vida si hubiera tomado otro camino?
En “Yo es otro� (Septología III-V) mientras el protagonista envejece, su doble pasa ser el “tocayo�, un amigo que sigue precisando ser ayudado y rescatado. Son dos vidas que transcurren al mismo tiempo y se encuentran constantemente, aunque con tramas diferentes.
Nos hipnotiza leer repetidamente que Asle está sentado en su sillón, mirando un punto fijo de la ventana, con el mar nevado de fondo mientras discurre su diálogo interno y reza el padrenuestro.
May 3, 2021
A generous rating, more for the project as a whole and the approach, the themes and motifs (skewed cross), sort of like My Struggle Book 1 playing in a band but then abruptly switching to painting. The parts with the first gallery show, his parents and other people saying he should keep painting houses and fjords and mountains instead of abstractions, when he first met his dealer and his present-day meeting much older, all that was great, totally engaging, but much of the rest of it seemed to either revisit if not quite extend what appeared in the first book (and what all came back to me easily after a year, all of it not quite seared but definitely odd and striking enough to impress into memory). The last seventy-five pages or so I didn't look forward to reading, read only a handful of pages at a time, really had to force myself through without much enjoyment, getting a little tired of the density and the spare (despite long sentences) translated Norwegian. Great pages about God. I'll probably continue with the last volume when it comes out but I'm not quite jumping up and down about this at this point.
Read
April 3, 2023I've talked about this volume in my review of the final one, because it's as difficult to separate them as it is to separate the two Asle characters who feature in them.
Notes on the way time is treated in the Septology books:
Septology I deals with the first day, Monday
Septology II happens on Tuesday
The third day, Wednesday, is spread over Septology III and IV.
III ends when Asle falls asleep in his car in front of Beyer's gallery after driving from Dylgja to Bjørgvin for the third time in three days. IV begins when he wakes up in his car and ends when he goes to sleep back in Dylgja.
V begins on the fourth day, Thursday.
VI seems to be weeks later but it is a Friday
VII begins on a Saturday and ends on a Sunday.
Notes on the way time is treated in the Septology books:
Septology I deals with the first day, Monday
Septology II happens on Tuesday
The third day, Wednesday, is spread over Septology III and IV.
III ends when Asle falls asleep in his car in front of Beyer's gallery after driving from Dylgja to Bjørgvin for the third time in three days. IV begins when he wakes up in his car and ends when he goes to sleep back in Dylgja.
V begins on the fourth day, Thursday.
VI seems to be weeks later but it is a Friday
VII begins on a Saturday and ends on a Sunday.
January 31, 2023
(3.5) As with the first book, this middle book puts you in a trance. Somewhat calming, somewhat serene, yet at times a little on the edge. The stream of consciousness blends points of view and memory in a way that is confusing, yet fits at the same time. It's quite a unique take, yet not surprising. Fosse's writing is cerebral, yet straight-forward, making you think while you concentrate. As I move onto the last book, I find myself thinking I would've enjoyed Septology more if it had been shorter, but I shall keep going after a break to let it sink in.
December 29, 2023
Vicino al massimo equilibrio tra la noia e il punto in cui il linguaggio non passa più informazioni, ma crea esperienza. A memoria, difficilmente ho letto salti temporali (presente/passato) e di persona (prima/terza) di questo livello.
Un nuovo classico.
[83/100]
Un nuovo classico.
[83/100]
May 5, 2022
A future classic I say.
April 28, 2024
Então, Paulo, acabaste o livro, sim, acabei, respondo eu e depois ele diz, agora aposto que vais escrever alguma coisa sobre ele nas redes, nao é, assim é, eu escrevo sempre alguma coisa sobre um livro quando o termino, e é nas redes, sim, sempre nas redes, pelo menos nas redes, digo eu, mas tem de ser logo a seguir a terminar a leitura, não é, sim, logo a seguir, nunca percebi porque é que fazes isso logo a seguir e sobre todos os livros, mas assim é, diz ele, sim, é assim, logo a seguir, respondo eu, e depois ficamos algum tempo sem falar, porque não sabemos o que dizer.
February 26, 2025
Second collection of Fosse's Septology. I'm synched with Fosse's rhythm now. I love his slow burn, his repetition. Certain parts feel like clicking through rosary beads or Misbaha prayer beads. He thought. He thought. He thought. Anyway, on to the last section. I can definitely see his influence on Knausgaard too. Spent a lot of time the last couple days looking at St Andrew's Cross art.
June 11, 2024
a masterpiece !!!!
two-thirds through jon fosse’s undeniable magnum opus.
there is no formal plot-related review here.
the main gist is already captured in a previous post.
instead, a simple reflection.
page upon page, section upon section, i keep thinking � how will he sustain this?
though, i think that would be somewhat of a lie.
in hindsight yes, i look back at the book i’ve just read and wonder how we was able to sustain it throughout.
a continuous monologue constantly shifting perspectives, jumping timelines, riddled with contradictions.
ordinary scenes that catch you off guard with a word mention, and suddenly � tension.
mundane moments that get colored in a little different and just sticks to your mind.
masterful use of repetition written with a delicate melody that holds your attention all throughout.
but no, to my previous point, i didn’t really question how he’s doing it while reading.
it really just……worked.
reading the septology up to this point so far is a lot like finding yourself lost somewhere unfamiliar,
and yet finding a strange sense of comfort and calmness with it that really shouldn’t make sense.
yet it does.
and on my end, the first two-thirds of the septology have served as a mental crutch for what has been a
mentally and emotionally tedious first few days of june, ending my days with a sense of calmness by
simply getting lost in jon fosse’s work.
and as i previously mentioned � i really do not want this to end.
i want fosse to continue his singular monologue, both the calm and horror of it.
his existential crises, constant contradictions,
nostalgic reminiscing, the terror of his thoughts.
the tension in the mundane.
i want all of it,
and i want it ‘till i grow and old and die.
� now i’m off to pick up the last book of what has been an amazing journey.
a book that i’m sure will go down as one of my all time favorites,
if anything, for the company it has given me during the reading experience.
two-thirds through jon fosse’s undeniable magnum opus.
there is no formal plot-related review here.
the main gist is already captured in a previous post.
instead, a simple reflection.
page upon page, section upon section, i keep thinking � how will he sustain this?
though, i think that would be somewhat of a lie.
in hindsight yes, i look back at the book i’ve just read and wonder how we was able to sustain it throughout.
a continuous monologue constantly shifting perspectives, jumping timelines, riddled with contradictions.
ordinary scenes that catch you off guard with a word mention, and suddenly � tension.
mundane moments that get colored in a little different and just sticks to your mind.
masterful use of repetition written with a delicate melody that holds your attention all throughout.
but no, to my previous point, i didn’t really question how he’s doing it while reading.
it really just……worked.
reading the septology up to this point so far is a lot like finding yourself lost somewhere unfamiliar,
and yet finding a strange sense of comfort and calmness with it that really shouldn’t make sense.
yet it does.
and on my end, the first two-thirds of the septology have served as a mental crutch for what has been a
mentally and emotionally tedious first few days of june, ending my days with a sense of calmness by
simply getting lost in jon fosse’s work.
and as i previously mentioned � i really do not want this to end.
i want fosse to continue his singular monologue, both the calm and horror of it.
his existential crises, constant contradictions,
nostalgic reminiscing, the terror of his thoughts.
the tension in the mundane.
i want all of it,
and i want it ‘till i grow and old and die.
� now i’m off to pick up the last book of what has been an amazing journey.
a book that i’m sure will go down as one of my all time favorites,
if anything, for the company it has given me during the reading experience.
August 25, 2023
[late update for after reading the whole Septology having dreamt the following hallucination: ]
Truly amazing work this Septology - it is hard to imagine any other living writer doing with prose what Jon Fosse is doing here.
In this second volume, you have all the unique elements from the first volume , e.g., the slow spiraling prose, the doppelgangers, the meditations on art and religion, but now I think we get deeper and deeper into the main character, Asle, gaining a lot more background information on him and the people around- it is hard to explain, but Fosse is actually allowing us a true glimpse of Asle's spirit, I think, I really feel gaining access to some inner essence of Asle, to his invisible uniqueness, and what actually is his being- hard to describe with words but that is what the "picture" that Fosse has "painted" with words manages to impress on me.
I think first volume had more absurd dialogues and situations, verging on Beckett, now on the second volume, it feels maybe more real, I think, less absurd, even though Beckett makes a brief appearance.
Referring to one of my favorite passages in the book, this is what I mean when I say that Fosse makes us look into Asle's spirit (and maybe Fosse's as well):
"I think, for the body is conceived and born, it grows and declines, it dies and vanishes, but the spirit is a unity of body and soul, the way form and content are an invisible unity in a good picture, yes, there’s a spirit in the picture so to speak, yes, the same as in any work of art, in a good poem too, in a good piece of music, yes, there is a unity that’s the spirit in the work and it’s the spirit, the unity of body and soul, that rises up from the dead, yes, it’s the resurrection of the flesh, and it happens all the time and it always happens when a person dies because then the person is washed clean of sin, what separates the person from God is gone, because then the person is back with God, yes, the innermost picture inside me that all the pictures I’ve tried to paint are attempting to look like, this innermost picture, that’s a kind of soul and a kind of body in one, yes, that’s my spirit, what I call spirit, it goes back to God and becomes part of God at the same time as it stays itself,"
Amazing, amazing literature - looking forward to the final volume.
Truly amazing work this Septology - it is hard to imagine any other living writer doing with prose what Jon Fosse is doing here.
In this second volume, you have all the unique elements from the first volume , e.g., the slow spiraling prose, the doppelgangers, the meditations on art and religion, but now I think we get deeper and deeper into the main character, Asle, gaining a lot more background information on him and the people around- it is hard to explain, but Fosse is actually allowing us a true glimpse of Asle's spirit, I think, I really feel gaining access to some inner essence of Asle, to his invisible uniqueness, and what actually is his being- hard to describe with words but that is what the "picture" that Fosse has "painted" with words manages to impress on me.
I think first volume had more absurd dialogues and situations, verging on Beckett, now on the second volume, it feels maybe more real, I think, less absurd, even though Beckett makes a brief appearance.
Referring to one of my favorite passages in the book, this is what I mean when I say that Fosse makes us look into Asle's spirit (and maybe Fosse's as well):
"I think, for the body is conceived and born, it grows and declines, it dies and vanishes, but the spirit is a unity of body and soul, the way form and content are an invisible unity in a good picture, yes, there’s a spirit in the picture so to speak, yes, the same as in any work of art, in a good poem too, in a good piece of music, yes, there is a unity that’s the spirit in the work and it’s the spirit, the unity of body and soul, that rises up from the dead, yes, it’s the resurrection of the flesh, and it happens all the time and it always happens when a person dies because then the person is washed clean of sin, what separates the person from God is gone, because then the person is back with God, yes, the innermost picture inside me that all the pictures I’ve tried to paint are attempting to look like, this innermost picture, that’s a kind of soul and a kind of body in one, yes, that’s my spirit, what I call spirit, it goes back to God and becomes part of God at the same time as it stays itself,"
Amazing, amazing literature - looking forward to the final volume.
February 24, 2021
Best of the year so far and I don’t see that changing easily.
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