Introspection

Night Train to Lisbon
Pascal Mercier; ©2007
Fiction; 496pgs

This book received remarkable praise across the European continent. Given a dearth of US praise, I feared something might have gotten lost in translation. I began with minor expectations and was initially quite pleased with the book.

The nominal protagonist is a professor of languages, specifically Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. He works in a secondary school in Switzerland. A man bound by letters and an unfailing memory, his somewhat catatonic scholarly state is severely shaken by a somewhat crazed Portuguese woman. Inspired, he begins browsing in a book shop where he inadvertently stumbles across an enchanting book by a Portuguese doctor. Dropping everything, he leaves Switzerland for Portugal, determined to find this man. What progresses from this point forward is as much the story of Raimund the Professor as it is Amadeu the doctor/posthumous author.

While there are many pratfalls throughout the text, my biggest problems were with the endless quotations from Amadeu's writings. Initially, I found them rather engaging, but they soon traveled down hill and I began to detest these interludes to the story itself. Paradoxically, I was alternately more interested in Amadeu's life as a doctor, resistance fighter, brother, husband, and lover than in Raimund's staid life. There was no driving force in Raimund. No tense moments, nothing over which he might prevail. He was simply there, delving into his own mind, searching for answers to his life.

The work is no doubt intellectual, the work of a true and learned man. It is, however, something I would recommend skipping unless you are in a particularly confusing point of life and uncertain of the future. In that instance, some of what is discussed could be quite beneficial to those in need of some soul-searching.

Consider It