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2666: A Novel Roberto Bolano
Publisher: Picador

When I read it, I will be completely absorbed by it. Bolaño's final, posthumously published novel, 2666, is dominated by the void. It wasn't as if I had been dying to read it. Obviously there's a part of me that applauds the willingness of all three critics, at a time when 2666 was the Hot Hot Book in the US, to swim against the current. Roberto Bolaño's 2666 is an obsessive and world-shifting epic. You can't talk about 2666 without mentioning the book design. That is the basis for their connection. Kevin Nguyen interviews Charlotte Strick, the designer of 2666's U.S. A few weeks ago I said that I was considering doing the group read of Robert Bolano's novel 2666. The reason I bought 2666 wasn't because I knew I was getting stomach flu, but because of my occasional worry that I'm too old to experience a new novel as a masterpiece. In the first section of Bolano's 2666, the academics have Archembolo's books in common. Since Bolaño's mind tends to work most powerfully in self-contained bursts (anecdotes, images, monologues) rather than in narrative continuity, skipping around is far less of a ño-ño than it would be in a traditional novel. The novel's cryptic title is one of its many grim jokes; there is no reference to this figure in its 900 pages. Roberto Bolaño's final novel 2666, released posthumously, is a sprawling literary tome. That's not something very many people are willing to do. Reading "2666", "it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish Roberto Bolaño's genius from his excess. If the streets of Santa Teresa and the style of 2666 are anarchic and the epigraph refers to our corrosive modernity and its abuses of freedom and desires, then we can anticipate an even more sprawling post-modern novel. I'd say further, among many other attributes, that both novels offer nice examples of viable political fiction, contrary to certain claims. I'd say 2666 stands with the very short By Night in Chile as the best of these.