Puede parecer una novela policiaca y detectivesca más pero, a lo largo de la lectura uno se va dando cuenta de que no lo es. Auster juega con la identidad, la locura, la realidad y la ficción de manera magistral, introduciendo al lector en un laberinto del que parece imposible salir y del cual el protagonista de la novela se niega a abandonar. La conexión con El Quijote es de los elementos que más me han gustado.

wtf es esto

تاحالا همچین چیزی نخونده بودم! البته شنیدمش

“bir nesne işlevini artık yerine getirmezse ne olur? hâlâ o nesne midir yoksa başka bir şey mi olmuştur?”

Postmodernist literature is weird. Sometimes it’s weird in an annoying way. In a way that breaks the 4th wall with the author’s own bloated delight in his clever, clever intellect. Blech!

And sometimes it’s weird in the way that draws me in, and makes my brain cells dance about like sugar plums on crack. I really like that kind.

So far, The New York Trilogy is falling into the sugar plum category. I came away from City of Glass thinking, “This was weird; (but/so) I liked it.”

It’s written in the narrative voice of the hard-boiled detective novel, which is fun. And I found myself tagging along as if Phillip Marlowe had a Jimmy Olsen.

Then as Daniel Quinn/Paul Auster/William Williamson continues to share his notes/thoughts/perspective the story gets darker and quirkier. Until you’re unsure what was real and what was madness. In a good way.
(I think.)

I’m looking forward to the next part, Ghosts, but I have no idea what to expect. Fingers crossed!

Years ago, on a vacation I was without a book. At a nearby bookstore I picked out this one due to the cover attracting me. Up until then I read books of realism mostly plot driven. After the first few pages of City of Glass I threw it against the wall. My wife must have packed it. Our next stop was further out in the countryside with no bookstore in sight. I tried Auster's book again and after a few pages I fell in love with it. Thus began my ever growing interest in reading a different kind of writing.

So I went back to this book as a reunion. Waiting for the kindling again to light. Other than some sentimentality, some peeks at enjoyment, it was mainly bare leaving me at the end feeling the same way.

I'm sorry I did it. The feeling of that first literary thrill is now gone. Definitely not worth the haggard journey down memory's lane.

Müstear adla romanlar yayınlayan karakterin, kendini Paul Auster olarak tanıtarak dedektif yapmaya çalışmasını anlatıyor Auster. New York’ta soruşturmayı sürdürürken bir yandan kendi benliğinin de peşinde karakter. Polisiye kurguyu varoluşçu bir temada kullanıyor. Şehirde gezen romanları severim. Auster farklı anlatım yöntemleri de deniyor. Ama yine sevemedim. Auster’ı her deneyişimde bir şekilde tatmin olmadığım bir nokta buluyorum. Üçlemeye devam etmeyeceğim muhtemelen. Kimlik bunalımlarını polisiye ve şehirde birleştirmesi çok iyi bir fikir yine de.

2,5 ✨

Tengo sentimientos encontrados con esta novela porque a ratos es entretenida y a ratos es aburrida y pedante. No he conseguido empatizar en ningún momento con el protagonista (de hecho me ha caído mal desde el principio). La historia en sí es original porque combina la novela de misterio con el ensayo pero no me parece que destaque por ninguna de estas. Sinceramente creo que es una novela compleja pero que, al mismo tiempo, no deja de ser un batiburrillo de ideas y reflexiones.

City of Glass as the name suggest is more about a city, characters are belonged to city, to its streets,layers of big city's spirits.Timing,pursuing and being alone.

Daniel Quinn is a mystery writer who lost his wife and son and now spends an almost meaningless and boring life. Everything changes when he get a call from a scared man asking for a private detective named Paul Auster.

Maybe to run from his empty life Quinn pretend to be Paul Auster and starts to follow the man's father that he believe is going to kill him. The father had been once a Professor in university and Quinn starts to read his books of strong religious beliefs.

in the now madman book English immigrants to the us are described as humans following command of God to be "fertile and ... fill the earth" as is said in the book .

What more western land in all Christendom,Dark asked, than America?

So the US is become the salvation place of humanity but it's now in its down and the madman wants to create a Babel again, which words have true meaning and not only because they are only words.

Quinn in playing along with the madman loses himself more and more and sink in the streets of New York.

In this books words are important they do have meaning and at the same time they simply present something else as the characters. Quinn is him for a second then he is Paul Auster or even some fictional character in a book.

Consider a word that refers to a thing - 'Umbrella' when I say it you see the object in your mind. You see a kind of stick,with collapsible metal spokes on top that form an armature for a waterproof material which,when opened , will protect you from rain...... what happens when a thing no longer performs its functions? is it still the thing or it become something else?When you rip the cloth off the umbrella, is the umbrella still an umbrella?...in General people do.At the very limit, they will say the umbrella is broken. to me this is a serious error, the source of our all troubles.

Once again an author I have always meant to read has died before I read more than one of his books. Clearly I am getting old and nothing worries me as much as the fact that I am running out of reading time.

Early in the 21st century a friend lent me Paul Auster’s first book: Hand to Mouth, A Chronicle of Early Failure. I found it fascinating. It tells of a life of extreme austerity while he developed himself into a writer. His most important practice was to safeguard his writing time. He finally published City of Glass, the first in his New York Trilogy, with a tiny press but was then picked up by Penguin.

City of Glass is essentially a novella but felt like a big fat novel to me in terms of substance. Quinn, the protagonist, is a writer of mysteries under a pen name and has no interaction with his public. One night he gets a phone call after midnight. The caller asks to speak to Paul Auster!

Uh oh!

Quinn takes on the identity of Paul Auster, detective. He takes on the case needing to be solved. Somehow, though the story gets quite strange, I had no trouble following it and in fact became completely drawn in. I read it in one day. This is one of those tales that probably means unique things to unique readers.

Siri Hustvedt, one of my most favorite authors, is Paul Auster’s wife. That makes me happy!

The next book in the New York Trilogy is Ghosts. I will be reading it soon!

I had mixed feelings going into this novel given Auster's ambiguous relationship with critics; but he pulls a rabbit out of a hat here, weaving a metaphysical "detective" novel that might be considered a primer for postmodernism. All the elements are here: the author appearing as a character, questions about what is real, works-within-the-work, etc. Auster asks the big questions and gives us a relentless work that never quite answers any of them. Auster writes a tough lean prose that reminds one of Hemingway but it keeps the pace moving furiously: stylistically he's managed to make a philosophical piece that you can read in one night. After putting the book down, I couldn't help but call it brilliant. Shades of Beckett throughout, a little Kafka, certainly some Hemingway and Melville, a little Poe, a lot of Cervantes. A great primer for anyone interested in the postmodernist novel; for the experienced, the only downside is that you feel at times that you're reading a book you've already read--The Unnamable meets Don Quixote meets A Farewell to Arms. Otherwise, a real gem, highly recommended.

girl....."Quinn guessed her age at around twenty. There were several pimples on her left cheek, obscured by a pinkish smear of pancake makeup, and a wad of chewing gum was crackling in her mouth. She was, however, reading a book." mannn come onnnnnnn