Arts & Events: Books & Talks - Washington City Paper

Reviewed: The Lost Books of the Odyssey by Zachary Mason
Reinventing the man of twists and turns.

Book Reviews By Ted Scheinman

Odysseus was never at a loss for a story—or for a disguise. In the Cyclops’ cave he was Nobody; in Eumaeus’ hut, a Trojan; to Athena on Ithaca, a ruthless fugitive from Crete. Glib, watchful, quick with a lie, Odysseus is the original hoodwinking hero. Zachary Mason has taken that very equivocacy as a guiding principle for his first novel. In The Lost Books of the Odyssey, the man of twists and turns is all of the above and more: a coward, an ingrate, a doppelganger, a patient at a sanitarium, the inventor of Achilles, the lover of Helen, a reader of the Odyssey or its witting or unwitting author. Mason—computer programmer by day, revisionist mythologist by night—“retells” the epic in 44 episodes. Some episodes focus on a glossed-over scene from the 24-book original; some pose counterfactual dimensions. All involve a meticulous narrative refraction matched by the indelible precision of the prose—the language, at times, of myth. The book has been billed alternately as a hobbyist pastiche or a Borgesian mind-fuck; Mason, for his part, invokes Calvino and Polish science-fiction writer Stanislaw Lem, and at points The Lost Books recalls both Updike’s Gertrude and Claudius (a straight-narrative retelling whose language modernizes over the course of three acts) and Paul Bowles’ Points in Time (a series of disconnected, epigrammatic episodes that attempts a history of Morocco in just north of 100 pages). The real premise, meanwhile, is to engage the relationship between fiction and myth and the central weapon in Odysseus’ arsenal: the knowledge that whoever controls the story controls the war. Narrative threads unr... Continued

Reviewed: My Ear at His Heart: Reading My Father by Hanif Kureishi
A novelist known for thinly veiled autobiography traces his famililal relationships
Book Reviews By Rayyan Al-Shawaf
Reviewed: The Lost Books of the Odyssey by Zachary Mason
Reinventing the man of twists and turns.
Book Reviews By Ted Scheinman
Reviewed: Joshua Ferris' The Unnamed
A man with a mysterious ailment becomes a martyr to the unknown
Book Reviews By Amy Cavanaugh
Reviewed: Patti Smith's Just Kids
Patti Smith remembers the artist in her life, Robert Mapplethorpe.
Book Reviews By Eve Ottenberg
Reviewed: Don Lattin's The Harvard Psychedelic Club
How four radical scholars helped usher the ideas of the 1960s into the mainstream.
Book Reviews By Rayyan Al-Shawaf
The Year in Books
E-books demanded to be taken seriously, even if Kindle users can't make that claim.
Cover Story By Mark Athitakis
Reviewed: Diamonds in the Raw
A look at the D.C. rap scene beyond Wale
Book Reviews By Andrew Noz
Reviewed: Amy Bach's Ordinary Injustice: How America Holds Court
Bach pondering whether or not to let sleeping lawyers lie
Book Reviews By Eve Ottenberg

Books Picks

Split This Rock Poetry Festival
Thursday, March 11
In 2008, the Split this Rock Poetry Festival was successful enough to prompt this purple lead from the Post’s David Montgomery: “The poets are in town. Dozens—no, hundreds. Hundreds of poets. Can you...
Jules Feiffer at Politics and Prose
Thursday, March 18
Jules Feiffer, one of the best cartoonists alive, just turned 81 and published Backing into Forward: A Memoir. Feiffer’s best-known comic strip was Sick, Sick, Sick (later retitled Feiffer), an...
Jules Feiffer at Politics and Prose
Thursday, March 18
Jules Feiffer, one of the best cartoonists alive, just turned 81 and published Backing into Forward: A Memoir. Feiffer’s best-known comic strip was Sick, Sick, Sick (later retitled Feiffer), an...
Split This Rock Poetry Festival
Thursday, March 11
In 2008, the Split this Rock Poetry Festival was successful enough to prompt this purple lead from the Post’s David Montgomery: “The poets are in town. Dozens—no, hundreds. Hundreds of poets. Can you...

Event Calendar: This Week in Books

Fri. Mar. 5, 2010 - Thu. Mar. 11, 2010

ERIC YODER
Discusses and signs copies of One Minute Mysteries: 65 Short Mysteries You Solve with Math!
Reiter's Scientific Books,, 1990 K St., NW. Sat., 3/6, at 1:30 p.m. Free. (202) 223-3327.
LORRAINE ADAMS
Discusses and signs copies of The Room & the Chair.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Mon., 3/8, at 7 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
BASEBALL PROSPECTUS
Discusses Baseball Prospectus 2010.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Tue., 3/9, at 7 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
PETER BIRKENHEAD
Discusses and signs copies of Gonville: A Memoir.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Sun., 3/7, at 1 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
NANCY NAOMI CARLSON & STONE LYRE
Discuss and sign copies of The Poems of Rene Char; Dora Malech & Shore Order Ocean.
Writer’s Center,, 4508 Walsh St., Bethesda. Sun., 3/7, at 2 p.m. Free. (301) 654-8664.
CHRIS CLEAVE
Discusses and signs copies of Little Bee.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Fri., 3/5, at 7 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
SALLY DENTON
Discusses and signs copies of The Pink Lady: The Many Lives of Helen Gahagan Douglas.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Sat., 3/6, at 1 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
LINDA FAIRSTEIN
Discusses and signs copies of Hell Gate.
Borders Baileys Crossroads,, 5871 Crossroads Center Way, Baileys Crossroads. Thu., 3/11, at 7:30 p.m. Free. (703) 998-0404.
SETH GRAHAME-SMITH, BEN H. WINTERS, & REGINA JEFFERS
Discuss and sign copies of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, & Vampire Darcy’s Desire.
S. Dillon Ripley Center,, 1100 Jefferson Dr. SW. Tue., 3/9, 6:45 p.m. $30 members; $45 non members; $ students. (202) 633-3030.
MARK GREEK
Discusses and Signs copies of Washington, D.C. Protests: Scenes from Home Rule to the Civil Rights Movement.
Busboys & Poets 14th & V,, 2021 14th St. NW. Mon., 3/8, at 6:30 p.m. Free. (202) 387-7638.
SUJATHA HAMPTON
Discusses and signs copies of As It Was Written.
Barnes & Noble Reston, 1851 Fountain Dr., Reston Tue., 3/9, at 7 p.m. Free. (703) 437-9490.
JARRETT J. KROSOCZKA
Discusses and signs copies of Lunch Lady and the Author Visit Vendetta.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Tue., 3/9, at 10:30 a.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
CHANG-RAE LEE
Discusses and signs copies of The Surrendered.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Thu., 3/11, at 7 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
REVEREND ALLAN LOKOS
Discusses and signs copies of Pocket Peace.
Borders Friendship Heights,, 5333 Wisconsin Ave. NW. Mon., 3/8, at 7 p.m. Free. (202) 686-8270.
TREVOR OWENS
Discusses and signs copies of Fairfax County, Virginia.
Barnes & Noble Fairfax,, 12193 Fair Lakes Promenade Dr., Fairfax. Sat., 3/6, at 1 p.m. Free. (703) 278-0300.
SANDRA PARSHALL
Discusses and signs copies of Broken Pieces.
Barnes & Noble Reston, 1851 Fountain Dr., Reston. Thu., 3/11, at 7 p.m. Free. (703) 437-9490.
SARAH PEKKANEN
Discusses and signs copies of The Opposite of Me.
Barnes & Noble Bethesda,, 4801 Bethesda Ave., Bethesda. Tue., 3/9, at 7 p.m. Free. (301) 986-1761.
MIKE PERRY
Discusses and signs copies of Talking to Terrorists: Why America Must Engage with its Enemies.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Sat., 3/6, at 6 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
DAVID PLOTZ
Discusses and signs copies of Good Book: The Bizarre, Hilarious, Disturbing, Marvelous, and Inspiring Things I Learned When I Read Every Single Word of the Bible.
Jewish Community Center of Greater Washington,, 6125 Montrose Rd., Rockville. Tue., 3/9, at 7:30. $8 members; $10 non members. (301) 881-0100.
LAURIE STRONGIN
Discusses and signs copies of Saving Henry: A Mother's Journey.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Sun., 3/7, at 5 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.
PHYLLIS THEROUX
Discusses and signs copies of The Journal Keeper: A Memoir.
Politics and Prose,, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. Wed., 3/10, at 7 p.m. Free. (202) 364-1919.

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