Text in English, Hungarian. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 240 p. Ceu Press Classics (Formerly Central European Classics). Audience: General/trade. near fine.

Text in English, Hungarian. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 240 p. Ceu Press Classics (Formerly Central European Classics). Audience: General/trade. near fine.

Budapest. 1998. January 1998. Central European University Press. 1st American

Budapest. 1998. January 1998. Central European University Press. 1st American Edition. Very Good in Wrappers. 9789639116122. CEU Press Classics (formerly Central European Classics). Translated from the Hungarian and with an introduction by George Szirtes. 240 pages. paperback. keywords: Europe Hungary Literature Eastern Europe Translated World Literature. DESCRIPTION-In these marvellously written tales, Sindbad, a voyager in the realms of memory and imagination, travels through the centuries in pursuit of an ideal of love that is directed as much at the feminine essence as at his individual lovers. He is by nature a melancholy sensualist, but whether the women he seduces and loves are projections of his desire, or he of theirs, is a moot question. These short stories flow without a strict narrative framework Sindbad journeys between the past and the present and is merely a ghost in many of his adventures. Although Sindbad can move through time, it is time that proves his chief enemy, and youth that remains his real love. This deeply autumnal book, full of resonances and associations, is an erotic elegy to the dying Habsburg Empire. The stories are taken from the omnibus triple-volume Hungarian edition published as The Three Books of Sindbad in Hungary in 1944, which includes The Travels of Sindbad (1912), The Resurrection of Sindbad (1916), and The Youth and Grief of Sindbad (1917). Editorial Reviews Hungarian writer Krudy (1878-1933) published the series of stories in magazines and individual volumes between 1911 and 1917. They pivot on a Hungarian adventurer who at one point changes himself into a sprig of mistletoe, and spends much of his time trying to come to terms with being dead. They also reflect the demise of the Hapsburg Empire and the sensuousness of the fin de siecle. The collection was first published in 1994 as Szindbad Harom Konyve by Singer and Wolfner, Budapest; notes and an introduction have been added to the edition. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or. -Booknews [Krúdy's] literary power and greatness are almost past comprehension. Few in world literature could so vivify the mythical in reality. With a few pencil strokes he draws apocalyptic scenes about sex, flesh, human cruelty and hopelessness. --Sándor Márai There is about Krúdy an absolutely railed-down otherworldliness. A brilliant spectrum where reality is just one possible colour. This book is just a gift. I am grateful to George Szirtes for making it possible for me to read it and praise it. --Michael Hofmann, The Times Literary Supplement The Adventures follows a dream-weaving seducer, and Krúdy's prose is appropriately seductive, a litany of long, languid, sighing sentences that introduce an element of enchantment to Sindbad's universe of provincial inns and restaurants in Pest where one might rendezvous with an actress or a goldsmith's wife. Sindbad's Adventures, then, are some of the loveliest violet-tinted lies ever put to paper--wreathed around some very nettling truths about what we call love. --The L Magazine-From the Publisher inventory # 44642.