My Goodreads review: The Golem

[ankh_hpl]

The Golem by Gustav Meyrink

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This “review” is more in the nature of a few comments on my first-time reading experience. I am frankly not qualified to discuss German language literature – even in what I’m told is an excellent translation. I know little about Gustav Meyrink, beyond a couple of biographical articles, and I’ve never read anything by him before.

That said, I’ve just had a truly mind-bending excursion through the Jewish ghetto of pre-WW I Prague. The atmosphere is pure Gothic. The narrator is thoroughly unreliable, even to himself. He may or may not be dreaming the entire story – though he denies it – and he spends a lot of that time in various altered states. In the process, he is introduced to a dizzying variety of occult concepts (and traditions!). He falls in and out of love, meets up with a cast of grotesque villains and hapless heroes, gets drawn into a murder plot, finds himself imprisoned . . . on and on, in the sort of dream-logic plot that never fully resolves.

Or maybe it does, and I was just too bewildered to recognize that.

I can’t say that this was the clearest narrative I’ve ever read, but it was definitely one of the weirdest (in a very good way). The Golem is currently celebrating its hundredth year since publication, so this one’s got staying power. If you enjoy the Gothic, the weird, or the dark esoteric, it’s probably well worth your time.




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