Overview
""Deliciously wicked ... readers will also find plenty to enjoy (one sequence of unwitting cannibalism is particularly memorable).""-Publishers Weekly ""Fast-moving and witty in style and tone, this novel is one not soon forgotten.""-World Literature Today ""There's considerable charm to Bursa's clever variation on the story of youth seeking purpose ... A nicely off-beat little novel.""-The Complete Review ""The Polish postwar firebrand Andrzej Bursa acquired a reputation as a quick-burning, existentially tormented rebel. . . . Yet Bursa's dark humor and deadpan satire . . . keep utter bleakness at bay.""-The Independent ""A revolution against the banality of everyday life.""-Gazeta Krakowska A young university student named Jurek, with no particular ambitions or talents, is adrift. After his doting aunt asks him to perform a small chore, he decides to kill her for no good reason other than, perhaps, boredom. Killing Auntie follows Jurek as he seeks to dispose of the corpse-a task more difficult than one might imagine-and then falls in love with a girl he meets on a train. Can he tell her what he's done? Will that ruin everything? ""I'm convinced-simply-that we are all guilty,"" says Jurek, and his adventures with nosy neighbors, false-toothed grandmothers, and love-making lynxes shed light on how an entire society becomes involved in the murder and disposal of dear old Auntie. This is a short comedic masterpiece combining elements of Fyodor Dostoevsky, Jean-Paul Sartre, Franz Kafka, and Joseph Heller, coming together in the end to produce an unforgettable tale of murder and-just maybe-redemption. Andrzej Bursa was born in 1934 in Krakow, Poland, and died twenty-five years later. In his brief lifetime he composed some of the most original Polish writing of the twentieth century. Killing Auntie is his only novel. His brilliant career and tragic early death established him as a cult figure among restless and disenchanted youth.
Full Product Details
Author: Andrzej Bursa ,
Wiesiek Powaga
Publisher: New Vessel Press
Imprint: New Vessel Press
Dimensions:
Width: 13.20cm
, Height: 1.00cm
, Length: 20.40cm
Weight: 0.113kg
ISBN: 9781939931214
ISBN 10: 1939931215
Pages: 110
Publication Date: 17 September 2015
Audience:
Children/juvenile
,
Children / Juvenile
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: Temporarily unavailable
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Reviews
The haunting theme of the novel may bring to mind Dostoevsky, but its macabre originality is strictly that of the author ... Andrzej Bursa emerges from the pages ... as a provocative, interesting, original and highly talented though always angry young man. - World Literature Today Dead at 25 in 1957, the Polish postwar firebrand Andrzej Bursa acquired a reputation as a quick-burning, existentially tormented rebel ... Yet Bursa's dark humor and deadpan satire - finely captured here by translator Wiesiek Powaga - keep utter bleakness at bay. -- The Independent A revolution against the banality of everyday life. -- Gazeta Krakowska
Author Information
Andrzej Bursa was born in 1932 in Krakow, Poland, and died twenty-five years later of a heart attack. In his brief lifetime he composed some of the most original Polish writing of the 20th century. Killing Auntie is his only novel. His brilliant career and tragic early death established him as a cult figure among restless and disenchanted youth.
