Details

ISBN-10: 0375704434
ISBN-13: 9780375704437
Publisher: Knopf Publishing Group
Publish Date: 03/21/2000
Dimensions: 8.06" L, 5.38" W, 0.59" H

For the Relief of Unbearable Urges: Stories

Paperback

Price: $15.00

Overview

Energized, irreverent, and deliciously inventive stories from Pulitzer-nominated, bestselling author of What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank.

In the collection’s hilarious title story, a Hasidic man gets a special dispensation from his rabbi to see a prostitute. “The Wig” takes an aging wigmaker and makes her, for a single moment, beautiful. In “The Tumblers,” Englander envisions a group of Polish Jews herded toward a train bound for the death camps and, in a deft, imaginative twist, turns them into acrobats tumbling out of harm’s way.

For the Relief of Unbearable Urges is a work of startling authority and imagination–a book that is as wondrous and joyful as it is wrenchingly sad. It hearalds the arrival of a remarkable new storyteller.

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Reviews
"Englander's voice is distinctly his own–daring, funny and exuberant." –Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times"Taut, edgy, sharply observed. . . . A revelation of the human condition." –The New York Times Book Review"Remarkable art. . . .The author fills each of these pieces with vivid life, with characters that jump off the page." –Newsday"Every so often there's a new voice that entirely revitalizes the story. . . . It's happening again with Nathan Englander, whose precise, funny, heartbreaking, well-controlled but never contrived stories open a window on a fascinating landscape we might never have known was there. It's the best story collection I've read in ages." –Ann Beattie"His characters are marvelously sympathetic creations. . . . What is most striking about the collection is not the subject matter but Englander's genius for telling a tale. . . . Invite[s] comparison to some of the best storytellers–Gogol, Singer, Kafka and even John Cheever." –Time Out New York
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Details

ISBN-10: 0375704434
ISBN-13: 9780375704437
Publisher: Knopf Publishing Group
Publish Date: 03/21/2000
Dimensions: 8.06" L, 5.38" W, 0.59" H
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