Author: Anita Desai
Publisher: Vintage
Year: 1998
Language: English
Pages: 230
ISBN/UPC (if available): 0099428520
Description
Hugo Baumgartner, the central character of Anita Desai’s dazzling novel, is a wandering Jew all his life. From the agonizing scenes of his childhood in pre-war Berlin, through his spell in business in Calcutta and then Bombay, he simply does not belong. Too dark for Hitler’s society, he is too fair for India; he remains a firanghi, a foreigner, wherever he goes.
EXCERPTS FROM REVIEWS
One of the best English novelists writing in English
–INDEPENDENT
Beautifully observed… recovers a lost slice of history in its portrayal of a wounded survivor
-OBSERVER
Cleverly constructed, and full of sharp perceptions about human nature under the skin, whatever the color
-THE TIMES
Anita Desai writes beautifully, employing an opulent vocabulary to great effect in her physical descriptions… The achievement of a superior writer
-LITERARY REVIEW
A book that puts to shame all the little epithets and pert clichés that praise may offer.
-LONDON REVIEW OF BOOKS