Fiasco

Description

Translated into English at last, Fiasco joins its companion volumes Fatelessness (Vintage, 2004) and Kaddish for an Unborn Child (Vintage, 2004), describing the author's return from the Nazi death camps, only to find his country taken over by another totalitarian government. Life under the regime is depicted as a continuation of the camp. Forced into the army, the protagonist decides to feign insanity to be released from duty. Kafka-like and surprisingly funny, Fiasco confronts the Communist takeover of Hungary with unrelenting pessimistic clarity.

Reviews

Fiasco plays with the art of bearing witness with great risk and proclaims the magnitude of what's becoming an endangered species, the individual, whose death in this century has been repeatedly proclaimed, celebrated and here, denied.
- Hans-Harald Muller, "Die Welt" (Germany)