Leser-Rezension zu „NETHERLAND” von Joseph O'Neill
Wolkenatlas
am 30.12.2008
When Hans van den Broek receives a call telling him about the finding of his friend Chuck Ramkissoon's body in a New York canal, the narrating stream of consciousness is set in motion.
His thoughts return to his stay in New York, living in Hotel Chelsea, to the rather weird lot of residents living in this hotel, to his friendship with Chuck, to Chuck's imaginative but rather utopistic concept of making cricket an accepted and loved sport in the United States, to the moment of his wife leaving him to return to London, start a new life, returning to a new state of being together after all, his thoughts touching the 9/11 aftermath, the New York region power failure and the American war in Iraq.
Joseph O'Neill allows Hans' narrating stream to react to happenings, with new memories, new thoughts appearing constantly, each leading to a new theme, or further thoughts on previous remembrances. The friendship of Hans and Chuck as main thread- with Hans trying to understand the mysterious death of his friend by putting together all puzzle parts of these New York years in his mind. Apart from that, this is also a novel about a marriage somehow gone wrong, with Hans a passive partner maybe lacking a kind of forward drive needed by his wife Rachel.
A novel, which is a declaration of love for cricket, a novel about New York, a tale of faltering and rediscovering of qualities worthy of love.
Breathtaking, beautiful prose, which made me slow down my reading pace at about half-time, prolonging my reading pleasure as long as possible.
"Netherland" is a wonderful novel, definetely worthy of repeated reading.
Exquisitely crafted, of intellectual and literary brilliance, "Netherland" is a more than worthy long-listed Booker Prize contender
