The Invention of Solitude (utgåvan 1988)

Like many other reviewers, I enjoyed the first part of the book, the second part, not so much. ( )

"Impossible, I realize, to enter another’s solitude. If it is true that we can ever come to know another human being, even to a small degree, it is only to the extent that he is willing to make himself known. A man will say: I am cold. Or else he will say nothing, and we will see him shivering. Either way, we will know that he is cold. But what of the man who says nothing and does not shiver?" ( )

> Par Jean (De la solitude - unBlog.fr) : Paul Auster : L’invention de la solitude – 1992
16-12-2009 ... « Paul Auster est devenu écrivain parce que son père, en mourant, lui a laissé un petit héritage qui l’a soustrait à la misère. Le décès du père n’a pas seulement libéré l’écriture, il a littéralement sauvé la vie du fils. Celui-ci n’en finira jamais de payer sa dette et de rembourser en bonne prose le terrifiant cadeau du trépassé. » Là se trouve – Pascal Bruckner le note d’emblée dans sa lecture – la clef de voûte du système Auster. L’invention de la solitude est le premier livre du jeune écrivain, c’est aussi le livre fondateur de son oeuvre, son art poétique. Dans les deux parties – Portrait d’un homme invisible (le père) et le Livre de la mémoire –, Paul Auster interroge la mémoire familiale et met en place un univers que l’on retrouvera dans chacun de ses romans.

> Par Le Livre de Poche (Psychologies magazine) : Les 50 romans qui changent la vie

> L'Invention de la solitude, de Paul AUSTER (Actes Sud, 1988)
Se reporter à la critique de André GIRARD
In: (1989). Compte rendu de [Littérature étrangère]. Nuit blanche, (37), p. 46… ; (en ligne),
URL : https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/20167ac

The second section, "The Book of Memory", was a very interesting thing to read. I found myself switching within a page from maddening boredom (luckily i read most of it on a plane) to intense interest (i wished i was in a library so i could chase down some of the allusions) and back. Overall, it felt like the author was slowly wading through the bog of his own loss and pity, trying to think himself back out to normality.
It's a self-referential, introspective, literate, personal investigation of memory, identity, maturity (and childhood), solitude, art, Pinocchio, Jonah, Rembrandt, Van Gaugh, baseball, magic ... When it intersected with my own interests it was really great, lots to consider, to quote, to remember. But when he lost me, he lost me quicker than any writer i can remember, sometimes mid-paragraph. ( )

Granted, the first section dealing with the death of his father was nothing short of amazing. I loved it as have most who have read it and felt it necessary to say something about their personal experience. And yes, the second section, The Book of Memory did focus on his son Daniel and I think he used Daniel as a conduit in which to enable his own act of recollection. The second section dealt with his marriage and divorce from his first wife, his time living in France, the mirrors and rhymes of his life that seemed to be reflected more often than not. The section bogged down on me early but only because I believed Auster might resort to a pitiful voice I have heard in some of his later works, that being too much involved in the sentimental and his even acting silly about it at times. But that wasn't the case at all. It was philosophically moving, it was based on memory and recollection, it was a vehicle in which he could try his hand at writing something besides poems and translations. Auster was learning for himself on the page what it meant to be a writer. He was saving himself. He was looking for the uncanny in his life, the unheimliche, and he quoted Freud and others in the process of his demonstrating to us his seriousness in getting to the bottom of this writing craft.

From Wikipedia: The uncanny (Ger. Das Unheimliche - "the opposite of what is familiar") is a Freudian concept of an instance where something can be familiar, yet foreign at the same time, resulting in a feeling of it being uncomfortably strange or uncomfortably familiar. Because the uncanny is familiar, yet strange, it often creates cognitive dissonance within the experiencing subject due to the paradoxical nature of being attracted to, yet repulsed by an object at the same time. This cognitive dissonance often leads to an outright rejection of the object, as one would rather reject than rationalize.

I was wrong about my thinking the second section of this book was of measure less than the first. It was a very good memoir, an important attempt for Auster in which to begin his long, literary accomplishment. We should all wish to be so lucky. ( )