Wittgenstein's Mistress

by David Markson

Book Overview

Wittgenstein's Mistress is a novel unlike anything David Markson or anyone else has ever written before. It is the story of a woman who is convinced and, astonishingly, will ultimately convince the reader as well that she is the only person left on earth.

Presumably she is mad. And yet so appealing is her character, and so witty and seductive her narrative voice, that we will follow her hypnotically as she unloads the intellectual...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1628973919
• ISBN13: 9781628973914
• Release Date: July 2023
• Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press
• Length: 248 Pages
• Weight: 0.82 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.4" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Unspeakably magnificent

"Wittgenstein's Mistress" is a complex novel of simple sentences in short paragraphs describing thoughts that are all over the maps of history, the arts and the world itself. Presumably, the novel's structure is inspired by Wittgenstein's "Tractatus," a series of short propositions, sub-propositions, sub-sub etc. presented in a logical sequence culminating in the final proposition, "What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence." Similarly, the narrator of "Wittgenstein's Mistress," a one-time artist who has come to believe she is completely alone in the world, presents a series of short descriptions of whatever pops into her head as she's typing. Places, people, works of art, episodes of history give rise to anecdotes, apocrypha and tid-bits about other places, people, etc -often inaccurate but always illuminating both our world and hers. The narrator forms this jumble of information into innumerable weirdly wonderful, laugh-out-loud syntheses. For example, a story that Rembrandt's students painted on his studio's floor images of gold coins, which Rembrandt would stoop to pick up no matter how often the trick was repeated, leads to the recollection that Rembrandt eventually had to declare financial bankruptcy. The narrator then combines these two anecdotes with the fact that Rembrandt lived in Amsterdam as a contemporary of the philosopher Spinoza to produce an imagined conversation between the two famous men in a corner shop. " `Oh, hi, Rembrandt. How's the bankruptcy?' `Fine, Spinoza. How's the excommunication?' " Sprinkled among these fractured observations are obscure hints as to how and why the narrator has reached the point of what can only be madness. As the insights into her personal history increase in the final pages of the book, a repetitious list of seemingly haphazard commentaries on largely external matters becomes ever more personal. By the time it concludes with its four beautifully poetic lines, the book has created a deep, disquieting pathos made all the more poignant by the narrator's immersion in a world that is a kind of embodiment of Wittgenstein's final proposition. Like the narrators of "Flaubert's Parrot" (by Julian Barnes) and "Waterland" (by Graham Swift), the narrator of "Wittgenstein's Mistress" takes refuge in a world of facts--in her case cultural scattershot versus the meticulous biographical fact of "Flaubert's Parrot" and local historical fact of "Waterland"--to avoid confronting a terrible personal tragedy. That this novel addresses such a theme with even more originality and craft than those two excellent books makes this a truly magnificent piece of literature.

Heavens to Betsy

My, my, what a book. Such a difficult journey, for me: the endless art, historical and literary references were daunting. And the one-sentence-paragraph style and internal dialogue subject matter so jarring, especially after having just finished reading Infinite Jest (Wittgenstein's Mistress was a DFW recommendation). But I read on, aided by episodes of hilarity (such as the scene in which various painters and cats convene in the narrator's brain, or the speculation about whether Penelope really would have waited around for Odysseus' return) and moments of harrowing poignancy (the gravestone promised by a husband on a son's grave existing in the mind but not in reality). Well, it's hard to describe. But the last twenty or so pages were so intimate and frightening in their sadness as to make you want to reach into the book and hold her head to somehow stop the lonliness. Don't give up on this book.

No, it's not Joyce (and that's okay)

Who is it? Beattie making the Joyce comment? I don't find Joyce to be 'precise and dazzling', but Markson's book is absolutely that, if you allow it to be. Creates his own world, peoples it--well, puts a person and her remnants within it--and follows it through to a natural end. Yes, there are literary allusions throughout; yes, this fiction screams out for an annotated copy; yes, it requires some work on the reader's part, but oh, does it reward. A comment on being, on our being(s), on how we live, and on why. 'The world is everything that is the case', indeed.

The high point of modern experimental fiction

This book initially struck me as a little pretentious and, I dunno, sort of experimental simply for the sake of being experimental . . . but, once I'd read maybe twenty or thirty pages, it started moving with extraordinary momentum . . . and how Markson's able to get across such complex ideas, such heartbreaking sadness, out of, essentially, modulated repetitions of a bunch of anecdotes is beyond me. Absolutely magical.

A deconstruction of culture and a mind.

The form of this work is unsettling. This is a good thing, as the world is unsettling. Good writing takes us to places we would not otherwise experinces and presents us with a humaness we may deny, yet share. This is the beauty of our look into the mind of Kate (Markson), a deconstruction like that of no other. The metaphors and symbols of this pained mind are well worth the work for those who make the effort--especially for those who are versed in philosophy, history, literature and arts. By the way, I no longer have periods and am now taking hormones. ; )