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Chronicle In Stone (Paperback, Main - Canons)
Ismail Kadare; Translated by David Bellos, Arshi Pipa; Edited by David Bellos; Afterword by David Bellos; Introduction by …
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R314
R253
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In a seamless mosaic of dreams and games, a young boy reflects on
events as his hometown in Albania falls to a series of invaders.
Amid floods and bombings, his own innocence and wonder are lost
forever in the madness and brutality of the Second World War. A
disturbing mix of tragedy and comedy, politics and sexuality,
Chronicle in Stone is a fascinating masterpiece about what it means
to grow up in a turbulent world.
Shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize 2013. In
September 1943, Nazi troops advance on the ancient gates of
Gjirokaster, Albania. The very next day, the Germans vanish without
a trace. As the townsfolk wonder if they might have dreamt the
events of the previous night, rumours circulate of a childhood
friendship between a local dignitary and the invading Nazi Colonel,
a reunion in the town square and a fateful dinner party that would
transform twentieth-century Europe. A captivating novel of
resistance in a dictatorship, and steeped in Albanian folklore, The
Fall of the Stone City shows Kadare at the height of his powers.
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A Dictator Calls (Paperback)
Ismail Kadare; Translated by John Hodgson
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R478
R372
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The Siege (Paperback)
Ismail Kadare; Translated by David Bellos
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R418
R351
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From Ismail Kadare, winner of the inaugural Man Booker
International Prize - a novelist in the class of Coetzee, Pamuk,
Marquez, and Rushdie - the stunning new translation of one of his
major works.
In the early fifteenth century, as winter falls away, the people of
Albania know that their fate is sealed. They have refused to
negotiate with the Ottoman Empire, and war is now inevitable. Soon
enough, dust kicked up by Turkish horses is spotted from a citadel.
Brightly coloured banners, hastily constructed minarets, and tens
of thousands of men fill the plain below. From this moment on, the
world is waiting to hear that the fortress has fallen.
The Siege tells the enthralling story of the weeks and months that
follow - of the exhilaration and despair of the battlefield, the
constantly shifting strategies of war, and those whose lives are
held in the balance, from the Pasha himself to the artillerymen,
astrologer, blind poet, and harem of women who accompany him.
"Believe me," the general said. "I've taken part in many sieges but
this," he waved towards the castle walls, "is where the most
fearful carnage of our times will take place. And you surely know
as well as I do that great massacres always give birth to great
books. You really do have an opportunity to write a thundering
chronicle redolent with pitch and blood, and it will be utterly
different from the graceful whines composed at the fireside by
squealers who never went to war."
Brilliantly vivid, as insightful as it is compelling, The Siege is
an unforgettable account of the clash of two great civilisations,
and a portrait of war that will resonate across the centuries.
"From the Hardcover edition."
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The Siege (Paperback, Main - Canons)
Ismail Kadare; Translated by David Bellos; Afterword by David Bellos
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It is the fifteenth century and war looms. The people of Albania
have refused to negotiate with the Ottoman Empire and they know
their fate is sealed. As they take refuge in a fortress in the
mountains, the army arrives and prepares to lay siege to the
Christian citadel.
In his compelling prequel to The Successor, Kadare draws us into a
land deprived of choice, a country under a reign of terror. The
spellbinding Agamemnon's Daughter was written in Albania in the
1980s and smuggled into France a few pages at a time. It reveals a
world where fear is an instrument of power, but the individual
survives despite the odds. From the winner of the first Man Booker
International Prize comes a searing story of love denied, then
shattered under the chilling wheels of the state. Through the
impeccably crafted, incisive tale of a thwarted lover's odyssey
through a single day, we are given a true sense of how hard it can
be to remain human in a world ruled by fear and suspicion.
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The Accident (Paperback, Main)
Ismail Kadare; Translated by John Hodgson
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R310
R249
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The new book from the winner of the inaugural International Man
Booker Prize is a modern-day love story of powerful obsession set
against the background of dark political intrigue.
On the autobahn in Vienna a taxi leaves the carriageway and strikes
the crash barrier, flinging its male and female passengers out of
its back doors as it spins through the air. The driver cannot
explain why he lost control; he only says that the mysterious
couple in the back seat seemed to be about to kiss . . .
Set against the tumultuous backdrop of war and its aftermath in the
Balkans, The Accident intimately documents an affair between two
people caught in each other's webs. The investigation into their
deaths uncovers a mutually destructive obsession that mirrors the
conflicts of the region. A destabilizing mixture of vivid
hallucination and cold reality, Ismail Kadare's new novel is a bold
and fascinating departure.
From the moment that Gjorg's brother is killed by a neighbour, his own life is forfeit: for the Kanun, the code of the blood feud that operates in the Albanian mountains, requires Gjorg to kill his brother's murderer and then in turn to become an outcast to be hunted down by the new victim's family. After lying in ambush and shooting his brother's killer, young Gjorg is entitled to thirty days' grace - not enough to see out the month of April. While the rites of death, bereavement, mourning and vengeance are fulfilled with traditional solemnity in the village, a visiting honeymoon couple, traveling to learn about the ways of the mountain folk, cross the path of the fugitive. The bride's heart goes out to Gjorg, and even these 'civilised' strangers from the city risk becoming embroiled in the fatal mechanism of vendetta.
In 1958, Kadare was selected to pursue his writing and literary
studies as a graduate student in Moscow at the prestigious Gorky
Institute for World Literature. "Twilight of the Eastern Gods" is
Kadare's fictionalized recreation of his time spent at this
"factory of the intellect," a place created to produce a new
generation of poets, novelists, and playwrights, all adhering to
the state-sanctioned "socialist realist" aesthetic.
During his time at the Gorky Institute, a kind of miniature Soviet
Union where writers from deepest Siberia, Kazakhstan, and the
Caucasus all came to study, Kadare was caught up in the furore over
Boris Pasternak's Nobel Prize win, when the Soviet Union demanded
that Pasternak refuse the foreign, bourgeois award, or be sentenced
to exile. Kadare's time at the Institute, the drunken nights,
corrupt professors, and enforced aesthetics are fictionalized in a
novel that entwines Russian and Albanian myth with history.
"Twilight of the Eastern Gods" is a portrait of a city and a story
of youth, disenchantment, and the incredible importance of the
written word.
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The Doll (Paperback)
Ismail Kadare; Translated by John Hodgson
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R223
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'A fascinating study of a difficult love' John Burnside, Guardian
Young Ismail's world centres around his mother. Naive and fragile
as a paper doll, she is an unlikely presence in her husband's
imposing house, with its hidden rooms and infamous dungeon. Yet
despite her youthful nature, she is not without her own enigmas.
Most of all, she fears that her intellectual, radical son will
exchange her for a superior mother when he becomes a famous writer.
From the winner of the first ever Man Booker International Prize,
this is a disarming story of home and creative ambition, of
personal and political freedom. Rooted in the author's own
childhood in Albania, it is dedicated to the memory of his mother.
'Laconic, sinister and drily funny' Spectator
Translated by Barbara Bray from the French version of the Albanian
by Jusuf Vrioni At the heart of the Sultan's vast empire stands the
mysterious Palace of Dreams. Inside, the dreams of every citizen
are collected, sorted and interpreted in order to identify the
'master-dreams' that will provide the clues to the Empire's destiny
and that of its Monarch. An entire nation's consciousness is thus
meticulously laid bare and at the mercy of its government... The
Palace of Dreams is Kadare's macabre vision of tyranny and
oppression, and was banned upon publication in Albania in 1981.
This book makes the case for the independence of Kosova the former
province of old-Yugoslavia' and now temporarily a United
Nations-led International protectorate at a time in which
international diplomacy is deeply involved in solving the contested
issue of its 'Final Status'. Negotiations began in January 2006
under the auspices of a United Nations Special Envoy, and have been
given renewed impetus by the international community's
determination to arrive at a solution. The Case for Kosova aims to
contribute to these negotiations, by providing informed arguments
for a different approach to the issue of Kosova's status beyond the
limitations of current debates. Its aim is to counteract the
anti-Albanian propaganda waged by some parties, but never to
propose a counter-propaganda hostile to others or to the goals of a
democratic Kosova. Debates on Kosova have largely concentrated on a
specific aspect of the issue: either on ideology and myth
construction (ignoring translations into practice); on geo-politics
(missing the deep implications for stability and security); or on
policy (lacking a conceptual understanding of both ideologies and
processes). Until now, no book has linked these different fields in
a persuasive manner. The Case for Kosova fills this gap with an
intellectually challenging and politically relevant commentary from
key players in the debate.
'Comrade Stalin wishes to speak with you.' A fascinating
exploration of the relationship between writers and tyranny, from
the winner of the first Man Booker International Prize. In June
1934, Joseph Stalin allegedly telephoned the famous novelist and
poet Boris Pasternak to discuss the arrest of fellow Soviet poet
Osip Mandelstam. In a fascinating combination of dreams and dossier
facts, Ismail Kadare reconstructs the three minutes they spoke and
the aftershocks of this tense, mysterious moment in modern history.
Weaving together the accounts of witnesses, reporters and writers
such as Isaiah Berlin and Anna Akhmatova, Kadare tells a gripping
story of power and political structures, of the relationship
between writers and tyranny. The telling brings to light uncanny
parallels with Kadare's experience writing under dictatorship, when
he received an unexpected phone call of his own. Translated from
the Albanian by John Hodgson 'Kadare is one of Europe's most
consistently interesting and powerful contemporary novelists, a
writer whose stark, memorable prose imprints itself on the reader's
consciousness.' Los Angeles Times
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General Of The Dead Army (Paperback)
Ismail Kadare; Introduction by David Smiley; Translated by Derek Coltman
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This sweeping epic of post-war Albania was Kadare's first novel.
Twenty years after the end of the Second World War, an Italian
general is dispatched to Albania to recover his country's dead.
Once there he meets a German general who is engaged upon an
identical mission and their conversations bring out into the open
the extent of their horror and guilt, newly exacerbated by their
present task. As they descend from the callous trivialities of
their gruesome business, past and present, to suffering
self-disgust, the author gives us glimpses of the lives of the
people whose graves they are unearthing.
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A Girl in Exile (Paperback)
Ismail Kadare; Translated by John Hodgson
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R306
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When a girl is found dead with a signed copy of Rudian Stefa's
latest book in her possession, the author finds himself summoned
for an interview by the Party Committee. Unable to guess what
transgression he has committed Rudian goes fearfully to meet his
interrogators. He has never met the girl in question but he
remembers signing the book. As the influence of a paranoid regime
steals up on him, Rudian finds himself swept along on a surreal
quest to discover what really happened to the mysterious girl to
whom he wrote the dedication - to Linda B.
LONGLISTED FOR THE 2017 MAN BOOKER INTERNATIONAL PRIZE At the heart
of the Ottoman Empire, in the main square of Constantinople, a
niche is carved into ancient stone. Here, the sultan displays the
severed heads of his adversaries. Tundj Hata, the imperial courier,
is charged with transporting heads to the capital - a task he
relishes and performs with fervour. But as he travels through
obscure and impoverished territories, he makes money from illicit
side-shows, offering villagers the spectacle of death. The head of
the rebellious Albanian governor would fetch a very high price. A
surreal tale of rebellion and tyranny from the master of European
literature.
28 June 1389, the Field of the Blackbirds. A Christian army made up
of Serbs, Bosnians, Albanians and Romanians confront an Ottoman
army. In ten hours the battle is over, and the Muslims possess the
field; an outcome that has haunted the vanquished ever since. 28
June 1989, the Serb Leader Slobodan Milosevic launches his campaign
for a fresh massacre of the Albanians, the majority population of
Kosovo. In three short narratives Kadare shows how legends of
betrayal and defeat simmered in European civilisation for six
hundred years, culminating in the agony of one tiny population at
the end of the twentieth century.
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The Ghost Rider (Paperback, Main)
Ismail Kadare; Translated by Jon Rothschild, David Bellos; Introduction by David Bellos
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R306
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A classic medieval mystery from the winner of the inaugural Man
Booker International Prize, a writer in the class of Atwood,
Coetzee, Marquez, and Rushdie An old woman is awoken in the dead of
night by knocks at her front door. The woman opens it to find her
daughter, Doruntine, standing there alone in the darkness. She has
been brought home from a distant land by a mysterious rider she
claims is her brother Konstandin. But unbeknownst to her,
Konstandin has been dead for years. What follows is chain of events
which plunges a medieval village into fear and mistrust. Who is the
ghost rider?
As spring arrives in the Albanian mountain town of B-, some strange things are emerging in the thaw. Bank robbers strike the National Bank. The ghastly Kanun, regulator of medieval Albania's blood vendettas, is dredged up from the shipwreck of history. And the ultra-explosive secrets of the state archives, rumoured to be buried in the area, are threatening to flood the entire nation. As Mark, an artist, struggles to complete portraits of his inextricably disturbed girlfriend and of the iceberg that struck the Titanic, he finds the dreamy, peaceful rhythms of his life turned upside down by ancient love and modern barbarism, by the renaissance of Brezhnev and Oedipus and by the peculiar brutality of a country surprised and divided by its new freedom.
1958. In a dorm room in Moscow, a young writer is woken by the
sound of angry voices on the radio. Through the fog of a hangover
he hears the news that a novel called Doctor Zhivago has earned its
author the Nobel Prize. There is uproar. The author, Boris
Pasternak, faces exile, the press hound him and demand that he
refuse the award. A few days earlier the young writer found a copy
of this book - could those simple pages really be so dangerous?
Based on Ismail Kadare's own experience, Twilight of the Eastern
Gods is a portrait of a city, a story of youthful disenchantment
and a reminder of the incredible importance of the written word.
It's the 1970s and cracks are starting to appear in the alliance
between China and its Communist cohort Albania. When an Albanian
steps on the foot of a Chinese diplomat the tension cranks up -
couriers between Tirana and Beijing carry annotated x-rays of the
foot back and forth. The Chinese intend to punish their interfering
little ally discreetly. But is the Sino-Albanian axis about to come
adrift? This is Kadare's surreal black comedy about the inner
sanctums of political power and the mysterious causal chains that
transform ordinary lives.
When the construction of a bridge built to link the Balkans to
Europe is repeatedly and mysteriously sabotaged, an old ballad
starts making the rounds at local taverns. The bards sing of a
legend - a woman immured in a castle wall to prevent it from
falling. Some say the bridge is being damaged by local ferrymen,
others blame the vengeful water spirits. But this is a town where
terror and superstition reign and a solution must be reached. So it
is decreed: a willing person must be plastered into the bridge...
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