- Paperback: 129 pages
- Publisher: New Canadian Library; New Canadian Library edition (Jun 5 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0771034717
- ISBN-13: 978-0771034718
- Product Dimensions: 17.3 x 10.7 x 0.3 cm
- Shipping Weight: 68 g
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
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Amazon Bestsellers Rank:
#208,286 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #58 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Canadian > French Canadian
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
Hubert Aquin was, briefly, Quebec's great warrior-intellectual. His life was short and intense: between the late '50s and his suicide in 1977 he wore the hats of novelist, essayist, terrorist agitator, politician, prisoner, film producer, literary editor, and stockbroker. Next Episode, Aquin's first novel, is a brilliant offshoot of its author's early political career. Written while Aquin was being held at a Montreal psychiatric hospital, pending trial for the possession of a stolen automobile and an automatic firearm, Next Episode is narrated by a young revolutionary, an Aquin double who's also imprisoned in a psychiatric institution. In an attempt to while away the hours, the narrator begins writing a kind of political thriller concerning a Québécois terrorist who, while abroad in Switzerland, unexpectedly rediscovers his long-lost lover, K., a sort of eternal-feminine figure and personification of the nation of Quebec. K. instructs the narrator to murder one H. de Heutz, a spy-banker-historian-aristocrat who has apparently been sending information about radical Québécois bank accounts to the RCMP. The convoluted chase that ensues is a Kafkaesque exercise in futility, in which the twinned agents pursue one another through a symbol-strewn landscape of cultural memory.
Two factors are likely to keep Next Episode from ever gaining a wide readership in English Canada. Aquin's French is too rich and lyrical to translate well; the ever-capable Sheila Fischman has produced a workable version of the text, but the florid, romantic prose of Next Episode will always sound forced in English. Furthermore, this is a book of great political and cultural specificity. Readers who have never lived in Quebec or are unfamiliar with its history will likely find the most crucial elements of the novel incomprehensible. Many readers will be able to enjoy the novel's acute deconstruction of the political thriller, but Next Episode's true fire lies in its nationalist fervour. --Jack Illingworth
Review
Amazing. -- Canada Reads panelist Justin Trudeau
The search is over. Here is our great writer. -- Le Devoir
Unbearably moving. -- Joyce Marshall, CBC Radio --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.
The search is over. Here is our great writer. -- Le Devoir
Unbearably moving. -- Joyce Marshall, CBC Radio --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.
Inside This Book
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Riveting story - interesting psychological journey,
By Easy listener (Toronto, Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Next Episode (Paperback)
I began reading this book hearing about how difficult it would be. In fact, I had difficulty getting into the first few pages. After going this far, however, I could not put this book down. When you consider the setting for this novel -- a young Quebec separatist in a Montreal psychiatric prison -- the parallels between the character's tale and the character's real-life peril are obvious. This novel provides fantastic insight into the desperation felt during the "Quiet Revolution" of the 1960's.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
5.0 out of 5 stars (1 customer review)
5.0 out of 5 stars
Riveting story - interesting psychological journey,
By Easy listener - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Next Episode (Paperback)
I began reading this book hearing about how difficult it would be. In fact, I had difficulty getting into the first few pages. After going this far, however, I could not put this book down. When you consider the setting for this novel -- a young Quebec separatist in a Montreal psychiatric prison -- the parallels between the character's tale and the character's real-life peril are obvious. This novel provides fantastic insight into the desperation felt during the "Quiet Revolution" of the 1960's.
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