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Hi—
Well, after a mini-hiatus while I was attending BookExpo America and the Helen and Kurt Wolff Translation Symposium, we're back to our regularly scheduled weekly e-newsletters.
This week I want to tell you about our free book giveaway for Rupert: A Confession, but before I get into that, I just wanted to thank everyone who contributed to our recent fundraising campaign. This campaign was very successful, significantly increasing the number of donors (and amount donated) to the Press. Again, thanks for your support—in addition to all the financial benefits of a campaign like that, it's great to know that people really are interested in what we're doing.
And as a sort of thank you, this week we're giving away ten copies of Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer's Rupert: A Confession, which was translated from the Dutch by Michele Hutchison. I warn you in advance—Rupert is one of the creepiest characters to appear in any Open Letter title. The basic setup is that Rupert has been accused of a horrific crime, and in three separate "hearings" (which may or may not take place solely in Rupert's imagination), he tries to defend himself, mainly by presenting himself as a witty, charming, erudite person. But there are slippages, stories that quickly make it clear to the reader that Rupert is totally out of his mind . . . Along the way though, there are some seriously funny bits, like the section about "the art of the insult" that's available on our website. ("The first guideline is the principle of contamination. One can say: 'Jazz is music for imbeciles.' One can also say: 'Jazz is torture.' But it is better to say: 'Jazz was invented as torture for imbeciles.'")
We're also giving away copies of Rupert this week to celebrate our first review in Harper's magazine. (Actually, the July issue also contains a review of Lily Tuck's biography of Elsa Morante that references our forthcoming reissue of Aracoeli, but more on that later.) Benjamin Moser wrote a stunning review of the book, using Camus's The Stranger as a reference point on a couple of occasions: "In the final scene, Rupert wanders hopelessly into the city's upper quarter, an old, winding area of shady denizens and blind alleyways—a quarter that, as it happens, rather resembles the Kasbah of Camus's native Algiers—his testimony reaching a denouement that would be upsetting if it wasn't so cleverly absurd."
To enter the drawing for a free copy, simply e-mail me at chad...@rochester.edu with your mailing address by the end of the day on Sunday. And thanks again for all of your continued support.
Best,
Chad
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