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We Monks and Soldiers, We Monks and Soldiers, 0803239912, 0-8032-3991-2, 978-0-8032-3991-3, 9780803239913, Lutz Bassmann
Translated by Jordan Stump, , We Monks and Soldiers, 0803244649, 0-8032-4464-9, 978-0-8032-4464-1, 9780803244641, Lutz Bassmann
Translated by Jordan Stump
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We Monks and Soldiers
Lutz Bassmann Translated by Jordan Stump
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 From one of the most original French writers of our day comes a mysterious, prismatic, and at times profoundly sad reflection on humanity in its darker moments—one of which may very well be our own. In a collection of fictions that blur distinctions between dreaming and waking reality, Lutz Bassmann sets off a series of echoes—the “entrevoutes” that conduct us from one world to another in a journey as viscerally powerful as it is intellectually heady. While humanity seems to be fading around them, the members of a shadowy organization are doing their inadequate best to assist those experiencing their last moments. From a soldier-monk exorcising what seem to be spirits (but are they?) from an abandoned house, to a spy executing a mission whose meaning eludes him, to characters exploring cells, wandering through ruins, confronting political dissent and persecution, encountering—perhaps—the spirits once exorcised, these stories conduct us through a world at once ambiguous and sharply observed. This remarkable work, in Jordan Stump’s superb translation, offers readers a thrilling entry into Bassmann’s numinous world.
 Lutz Bassmann belongs to a community of imaginary authors invented, championed, and literarily realized by Antoine Volodine, a French writer of Slavic origins born in 1950. Volodine’s many celebrated, category-defying works include the award-winning Minor Angels (Nebraska, 2004), which blends science fiction, Tibetan myth, a ludic approach to writing, and a profound humanistic idealism. Jordan Stump is a professor of French at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. He is the author of The Other Book (Nebraska, 2011), has translated numerous texts, including Minor Angels, and was awarded the French-American Foundation’s translation prize.
 "Vividly imagined, thought provoking and spare, this is an unusual collection . . . worth searching out."—Sandy Amazeen, Monsters and Critics “A continually changing, continually new poetic force.”—Christophe Kantcheff, Politis
“Between a fragile lyricism and an almost silent poetic expression of an absolute, inevitable devastation.”—Hugo Pradelle, La Quinzaine Littéraire
“Cet ouvrage publié dans le cadre du programme d’aide à la publication bénéficie du soutien du Ministère des Affaires Etrangères et du Service Culturel de l’Ambassade de France représenté aux Etats-Unis. This work received support from the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States through their publishing assistance program.”
"Cet ouvrage a bénéficié du soutien des Programmes d'aide à la publication de l’Institut Français." This work, published as part of a program of aid for publication, received support from the Institut Français.” Publication of this book was assisted by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
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Also of Interest
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Coda
René Belletto
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Minor Angels
Antoine Volodine
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My Ántonia
Willa Cather
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O Pioneers!
Willa Cather
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