FORGETTING ELENA

by Edmund White ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 20, 1973

When first met -- the original mistake -- the nameless, identityless and memoryless narrator is staying in a cottage with a group of young men who float up to the hotel or palace in the late evening -- to dance. This also takes place on some equally anonymous island where the south wind of love stirs the inbred and languid landscape. There are all kinds of disembodied characters -- The Minister, the Pale Stranger, the Negress, and a woman who is finally identified as Elena and through whom he for a moment retrieves some of himself. Not surprisingly, there are a number of scenes in the bathroom, on the toilet or effecting the ""toilette"" occasioning further remarks from Herbert, who owns the cottage, who owns him?, such as this: ""Removing hairs should become part of the douceur. It should be done, slowly, meditatively. . . It should be done en douceur, should be a way de dire des douceurs a whomsoever"" although whomsoever is nobody that we could think of offhand.

Pub Date: March 20, 1973

ISBN: 0307764508

Page Count: -

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1973

Categories: FICTION