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Om udregning af rumfang #1
On the Calculation of Volume I
Tara Selter, the heroine of On the Calculation of Volume, has involuntarily stepped off the train of time: in her world, November eighteenth repeats itself endlessly. We meet Tara on her 122nd November 18th: she no longer experiences the changes of days, weeks, months, or seasons. She finds herself in a lonely new reality without being able to explain why: how is it that she wakes every morning into the same day, knowing to the exact second when the blackbird will burst into song and when the rain will begin? Will she ever be able to share her new life with her beloved and now chronically befuddled husband? And on top of her profound isolation and confusion, Tara takes in with pain how slight a difference she makes in the world. (As she puts it: “That’s how little the activities of one person matter on the eighteenth of November.�)
Balle is hypnotic and masterful in her remixing of the endless recursive day, creating curious little folds of time and foreshadowings: her flashbacks light up inside the text like old flash bulbs.
The first volume’s gravitational pull―a force inverse to its constriction―has the effect of a strong tranquilizer, but a drug under which your powers of observation only grow sharper and more acute. Give in to the book's logic (its minute movements, its thrilling shifts, its slant wit, its slowing of time) and its spell is utterly intoxicating.
Solvej Balle’s seven-volume novel wrings enthralling and magical new dimensions from time and its hapless, mortal subjects. As one Danish reviewer beautifully put it, Balle’s fiction consists of writing that listens. “Reading her is like being caressed by language itself.�
Balle is hypnotic and masterful in her remixing of the endless recursive day, creating curious little folds of time and foreshadowings: her flashbacks light up inside the text like old flash bulbs.
The first volume’s gravitational pull―a force inverse to its constriction―has the effect of a strong tranquilizer, but a drug under which your powers of observation only grow sharper and more acute. Give in to the book's logic (its minute movements, its thrilling shifts, its slant wit, its slowing of time) and its spell is utterly intoxicating.
Solvej Balle’s seven-volume novel wrings enthralling and magical new dimensions from time and its hapless, mortal subjects. As one Danish reviewer beautifully put it, Balle’s fiction consists of writing that listens. “Reading her is like being caressed by language itself.�
160 pages, Paperback
First published February 2, 2020
1,019 people are currently reading
19.8k people want to read
About the author
Solvej Balle
20books235followersSolvej Balle er en særegen stemme i dansk litteratur. Hun var del af en gruppe hovedsageligt kvindelige forfattere, som debuterede eller slog deres navne fast i begyndelsen af 90’erne. Siden Balle debuterede i 1986 med romanen ”Lyrefugl�, har hun udgivet ganske få værker, så det var en overraskelse, da hun i 2020 annoncerede det ambitiøse og filosofiske syvbindsværk ”Om udregning af rumfang�, som hun i 2022 modtog Nordisk Råds Litteraturpris for, for de første fire bind
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April 9, 2025
Update 09.04 Shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025
I said at the end of my review that it has the potential to reach the shortlist and I was right. I do nto think it should win, but I still have two read 3 of the shortlisted books to form an opinion.
Book 1/13
Longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025
Translated into English by Barbara J. Haveland
Audiobook narrated by Elizabeth Liang
And here starts my 2025 IB prize longlist adventure. I am looking forward to reading the list this year as it seems to be a lot stronger than it has been the past two years. Let’s hope I will feel the same after actually reading the books.
On the Calculation of Volume 1 is the first in a 7 parts series of novellas written by the Danish author Solvej Balle.
One morning, the narrator wakes up and realizes she is reliving the previous day, 18th of November. She was visiting Paris for an auction of rare books, when, at breakfast, she is surprised to see that she already lived the events she was witnessing. After remaining in Paris one more day and after she wakes up again to the same day, she decides to go home. She explains to her husband what happened and he reluctantly believes her. The days repeat over and over, but only for her. For some time, each day she talks to her husband and they try together to understand what happened. After a while, she gives up and keeps to herself.
The prose also a bit from crisp and precise to a bit more frantic as the narrator realizes that she cannot go forward to the next day, no matter what she does.
I do not usually like books who use this narrative tactic of repeating the same day over and over but it worked here. It made for some interesting discussions about time and other themes. It becomes meditative and philosophic. Since it only part 1 of many more to come, if feels unfinished and I do not see it as a winner. It has shortlist potential though.
I said at the end of my review that it has the potential to reach the shortlist and I was right. I do nto think it should win, but I still have two read 3 of the shortlisted books to form an opinion.
Book 1/13
Longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025
Translated into English by Barbara J. Haveland
Audiobook narrated by Elizabeth Liang
And here starts my 2025 IB prize longlist adventure. I am looking forward to reading the list this year as it seems to be a lot stronger than it has been the past two years. Let’s hope I will feel the same after actually reading the books.
On the Calculation of Volume 1 is the first in a 7 parts series of novellas written by the Danish author Solvej Balle.
One morning, the narrator wakes up and realizes she is reliving the previous day, 18th of November. She was visiting Paris for an auction of rare books, when, at breakfast, she is surprised to see that she already lived the events she was witnessing. After remaining in Paris one more day and after she wakes up again to the same day, she decides to go home. She explains to her husband what happened and he reluctantly believes her. The days repeat over and over, but only for her. For some time, each day she talks to her husband and they try together to understand what happened. After a while, she gives up and keeps to herself.
The prose also a bit from crisp and precise to a bit more frantic as the narrator realizes that she cannot go forward to the next day, no matter what she does.
I do not usually like books who use this narrative tactic of repeating the same day over and over but it worked here. It made for some interesting discussions about time and other themes. It becomes meditative and philosophic. Since it only part 1 of many more to come, if feels unfinished and I do not see it as a winner. It has shortlist potential though.
April 19, 2025
I loveee a strange literary novel with philosophical commentary on time, finding joys in the mundane and the traces that we leave on the world!!!! on the calculation of volume was so unique and the fact that a new literary fiction series exists (when so little do) makes me so happy
This is absolutely a vibes > plot read and I would truly only recommend it to those who reach for these kinds of stories. following a protagonist who is stuck in a continuous loop of the eighteenth of November, the Groundhog Day can definitely feel repetitive.. however, the ways that solvej balle was able to capture such magic within all of the repetitiveness and mundanity, was superb! verryyy excited to read volume 2!
This is absolutely a vibes > plot read and I would truly only recommend it to those who reach for these kinds of stories. following a protagonist who is stuck in a continuous loop of the eighteenth of November, the Groundhog Day can definitely feel repetitive.. however, the ways that solvej balle was able to capture such magic within all of the repetitiveness and mundanity, was superb! verryyy excited to read volume 2!
April 8, 2025
As predicted in November 2024, now on the shortlist of the International Booker Prize 2025!
A fascinating, meditative literary version of Groundhog Day, and how being stuck in time isolates and alienates. I have so many questions still, so fortunately there are 6 more instalments coming!
Ik zeg niet dat ik de hoop heb opgegeven. Maar hij komt niet zo vaak langs. De hoop is vertrokken. Dat is zonder drama gebeurd, de hoop heeft niet met deuren gesmeten, is eerder als een dier naar andere jachtvelden geslopen, een kat die naar de buren is verhuisd, een plant die zijn zaden verspreid heeft op plekken waar die beter kunnen groeien.
brings us the seemingly ordinary life of two antique book traders in the North of France, Tara and Thomas Selter. Tara her life is upended by a fracture in time, having her relive 18 November endlessly while Thomas does not experience this repetition at all. Stuck in a secondary bedroom to avoid narrating the experience every morning to incredulous Thomas, we learn at the start of the book 18 November has already occurred 121 times (18 November #121). Tara narrates in luminous prose her investigations and tests. Initially she enjoys the weightlessness of being stuck in time, but soon uneasy truths seep into her perception of her overly familiar surroundings.
I still have so many questions on the mechanics and limitations of this repeat day. Could she theoretically get pregnant? Does her bank balance change (apparently not, this gives her near infinite options)? What happens when someone is killed, are they just resurrected? Why doesn’t she and her husband stay up a whole night and see if/how a reset works (this was tested later on in the novel but could be further explored, imagine sleeping on a plane, how would the reset look then mid flight over the ocean?)
This first part of is a slow, meditative and philosophical work, on what it means to not be remembered and not share the same experiences as a spouse.
I am very curious to the next parts of this novel in 7 parts. I feel this will be a hit series, it is strangely addictive!
Dutch quotes, without fail excellent in my view:
Het vreemde ogenblik waarop de vaste grond onder je voeten verdwijnt en de wereld niet langer voorspelbaar lijkt, alsof er plotseling existentiële alarmbellen afgaan, er een stille paniek uitbreekt die je noch doet vluchten noch om hulp doet roepen en waarvoor geen ambulance hoeft uit te rukken. Het is alsof dit alarm ergens in het bewustzijn sluimert, bijna als een grondtoon die je in het dagelijks leven niet hoort, maar pas afgaat op het ogenblik dat de onberekenbaarheid van de wereld tot je doordringt, een besef dat alles in een oogwenk kan veranderen, dat wat niet kan gebeuren, wat we absoluut niet verwachten, toch een mogelijkheid is. Dat de tijd stil blijft staan. Dat de zwaartekracht wordt opgeheven. Dat de logica van de wereld en de natuurwetten niet langer gelden. Dat we onder ogen moeten zien dat onze verwachting ten aanzien van de bestendigheid van de wereld op een onzeker fundament berust. Er zijn geen garanties, en achter alles wat we dagelijks beschouwen als iets vanzelfsprekends, gaan onwaarschijnlijke uitzonderingen, plotselinge breuken en ondenkbare afwijkingen van wetmatigheden schuil.
Vreemd dat het onwaarschijnlijke je zo van je stuk kan brengen, denk ik nu. We weten immers dat ons hele bestaan berust op eigenaardigheden en onwaarschijnlijke toevalligheden. Dat het aan deze eigenaardigheden te danken is dat we hier überhaupt zijn. Dat er mensen zijn op wat we onze planeet noemen, dat we ons kunnen voortbewegen op een ronddraaiende bol in een immense kosmos vol onbegrijpelijk grote objecten met zulke kleine deeltjes, dat onze geest niet kan bevatten hoe klein en talrijk ze zijn. Dat deze oneindig kleine objecten stand kunnen houden te midden van het onbegrijpelijk grote. Dat we blijven zweven. Dat we überhaupt bestaan. Dat elk van ons één van die onmetelijk vele mogelijkheden is geworden. Het ondenkbare is iets wat we de hele tijd met ons meedragen. Het is al gebeurd: we lopen rond op aarde en zijn onwaarschijnlijk, we zijn uit een wolk van ongelofelijke toevalligheden gestapt. Je zou denken dat we door dit besef een beetje toegerust waren om het onwaarschijnlijke tegemoet te treden. Maar het omgekeerde is kennelijk het geval. We zijn eraan gewend geraakt zonder dat het ons iedere ochtend duizelt, en in plaats van voorzichtig en aarzelend te handelen in voortdurende verwondering, lopen we rond alsof er niets gebeurd is, nemen we de eigenaardigheid voor lief en duizelt het ons als het bestaan blijkt te zijn zoals het is: onwaarschijnlijk, onvoorspelbaar, eigenaardig.
Ik zou zijn onrust zien en zou snel zeggen dat hij zich geen zorgen hoefde te maken, dat ik nu hier was, we waren samen, er waren geen doden, geen gewonden gevallen. Ik was thuis, er was me niets overkomen, we leefden nog, alleen was de tijd ontwricht.
Er zaten onregelmatigheden in de tijd en we konden geen enkel patroon vinden dat hout sneed. Voor het eerst vond ik het angstaanjagend. Niet gewoon duizelingwekkend en merkwaardig en een beetje griezelig. Het was angstaanjagend, het was onzinnig en zonder magie, en de mist was volkomen verdwenen. Het was niet de onrust van het moment van het vallende stukje brood in het hotel, het was niet het gevoel van een schemergebied tussen ons. We waren geen wandelaars in nevelige landschappen, we waren geen duikers of schipbreukelingen. We waren geen tweeling of een span paarden, we waren geen bosarbeiders of twee dooiers in een ei. Waren we in Mesopotamië, dan hadden de rivieren een naam en stroomden ze terug in hun bedding. Het was helder weer, de zon brandde aan de hemel, de rivieren droogden uit, je kon troepenformaties vermoeden, scherpe silhouetten patrouilleerden langs de oever, het geluid van metaal. We leefden in twee tijden en we konden de verschillen niet langer negeren. Er waren territoria die tegen elkaar botsten, er waren grensconflicten en oncontroleerbare transacties dwars door de zones heen. We waren geliefden in landschappen vol conflicten, Thomas had geen herinnering aan onze dagen samen, we konden geen mistige dagen, overstromingen en nevelige ochtenden scheppen, we konden niet samen oplopen, we waren in het geheel niet dubbel of mistig of parallel. Ik kreeg geen helder beeld, ik zag geen patronen en ik wist niet hoe ik hier uit moest komen.
In feite ontbrak het ons niet aan verklaringen, we hadden er meer dan genoeg, maar verklaringen die onze kritische blik konden doorstaan en die tevens onze vele observaties omvatten, vonden we niet.
Ik wist nog niet wat er moest gebeuren, maar ik wist wel dat ik niet elke morgen kon vertellen over een steeds langere reeks variaties van dezelfde dag. We konden achttien november niet delen. Het was een dag die ik zelf moest dragen.
Ik zeg niet dat ik de hoop heb opgegeven. Maar hij komt niet zo vaak langs. De hoop is vertrokken. Dat is zonder drama gebeurd, de hoop heeft niet met deuren gesmeten, is eerder als een dier naar andere jachtvelden geslopen, een kat die naar de buren is verhuisd, een plant die zijn zaden verspreid heeft op plekken waar die beter kunnen groeien.
�-
Ik heb geen moeite om de dagen door te komen als ik me rustig houd. Dat wil zeggen, ik doe niets om de dagen voorbij te laten gaan. Ze gaan vanzelf voorbij. Ik hoef niets anders te doen dan ’s ochtends een getal in het notitieboekje te zetten. Ik hoef niets over de dagen te zeggen, de papieren blijven blanco en de tijd gaat sneller als ik niets zeg. Ik stroom door de dagen, of de dag stroomt, iets of iemand stroomt. Ik haal adem. Ik denk dat zinnen niet meer nodig zijn. Ik hoor de dag, die zijn patroon volgt, en voor ik het weet is de dag voorbij.
Ik zie hem niet naar buiten komen en ik weet zeker dat hij mij ook niet ziet, want ik loop in tegenovergestelde richting over de stoep. Maar ik hoor de deur die achter hem dichtvalt. De deur die zich sluit achter Thomas zonder pakketten. Thomas die zijn postkantoor verlaat. Thomas die de deur van geel metaal loslaat. Een deur te zijn. Aangeraakt te worden. En op rustige scharnieren langzaam weer terugdraaien en dichtgaan.
Maar ik ben geen deur. Ik ga niet dicht. Ik heb geen scharnieren. Er is geen enkel houvast. Ik blijf staan en draai me een beetje om terwijl hij om de hoek verdwijnt, en dan sta ik daar, half omgedraaid, want ik kan mijn benen niet bewegen, maar ik kan mijn lichaam draaien en hem om de hoek zien verdwijnen.
�-
Het is goed een plaats te kennen waar je niets kunt uitrichten.
Ik kon het aan hem zien. Hij vond het maar raar. Misschien had hij gelijk: ik was gek geworden. Maar hij had oorzaak en gevolg omgedraaid. Ik was niet zo gek geworden dat ik me inbeeldde dat ik al 339 keer achttien november had meegemaakt. Dat ik gek geworden was kwam doordat ik 339 keer achttien november had meegemaakt. Ik was vreemd geworden door achttien november. Ik wilde eruit
Het is moeilijk om geduldig te zijn als je niet weet waar je op wacht. Het is moeilijk om een verschil te zien in het dagelijkse gekrioel van de dingen
Longlist International Booker Prize 2025 ranking
Shortlisted books in bold
1 - 4.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
2 - 4.5 stars rounded down, review here: /review/show...
3 - 4 stars, review here: /review/show...
4 - 4 stars, review here: /review/show...
5 - 3.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
6 - 3.5 stars rounded down, review here:
/review/show...
7 - 3 stars, review here: /review/show...
8 - 3 stars, review here: /review/show...
9 - 3 stars, review here: /review/show...
10 - 3 stars, review here: /review/show...
11 - 2.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
12 - 2.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
13 - 2.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
A fascinating, meditative literary version of Groundhog Day, and how being stuck in time isolates and alienates. I have so many questions still, so fortunately there are 6 more instalments coming!
Ik zeg niet dat ik de hoop heb opgegeven. Maar hij komt niet zo vaak langs. De hoop is vertrokken. Dat is zonder drama gebeurd, de hoop heeft niet met deuren gesmeten, is eerder als een dier naar andere jachtvelden geslopen, een kat die naar de buren is verhuisd, een plant die zijn zaden verspreid heeft op plekken waar die beter kunnen groeien.
brings us the seemingly ordinary life of two antique book traders in the North of France, Tara and Thomas Selter. Tara her life is upended by a fracture in time, having her relive 18 November endlessly while Thomas does not experience this repetition at all. Stuck in a secondary bedroom to avoid narrating the experience every morning to incredulous Thomas, we learn at the start of the book 18 November has already occurred 121 times (18 November #121). Tara narrates in luminous prose her investigations and tests. Initially she enjoys the weightlessness of being stuck in time, but soon uneasy truths seep into her perception of her overly familiar surroundings.
I still have so many questions on the mechanics and limitations of this repeat day. Could she theoretically get pregnant? Does her bank balance change (apparently not, this gives her near infinite options)? What happens when someone is killed, are they just resurrected? Why doesn’t she and her husband stay up a whole night and see if/how a reset works (this was tested later on in the novel but could be further explored, imagine sleeping on a plane, how would the reset look then mid flight over the ocean?)
This first part of is a slow, meditative and philosophical work, on what it means to not be remembered and not share the same experiences as a spouse.
I am very curious to the next parts of this novel in 7 parts. I feel this will be a hit series, it is strangely addictive!
Dutch quotes, without fail excellent in my view:
Het vreemde ogenblik waarop de vaste grond onder je voeten verdwijnt en de wereld niet langer voorspelbaar lijkt, alsof er plotseling existentiële alarmbellen afgaan, er een stille paniek uitbreekt die je noch doet vluchten noch om hulp doet roepen en waarvoor geen ambulance hoeft uit te rukken. Het is alsof dit alarm ergens in het bewustzijn sluimert, bijna als een grondtoon die je in het dagelijks leven niet hoort, maar pas afgaat op het ogenblik dat de onberekenbaarheid van de wereld tot je doordringt, een besef dat alles in een oogwenk kan veranderen, dat wat niet kan gebeuren, wat we absoluut niet verwachten, toch een mogelijkheid is. Dat de tijd stil blijft staan. Dat de zwaartekracht wordt opgeheven. Dat de logica van de wereld en de natuurwetten niet langer gelden. Dat we onder ogen moeten zien dat onze verwachting ten aanzien van de bestendigheid van de wereld op een onzeker fundament berust. Er zijn geen garanties, en achter alles wat we dagelijks beschouwen als iets vanzelfsprekends, gaan onwaarschijnlijke uitzonderingen, plotselinge breuken en ondenkbare afwijkingen van wetmatigheden schuil.
Vreemd dat het onwaarschijnlijke je zo van je stuk kan brengen, denk ik nu. We weten immers dat ons hele bestaan berust op eigenaardigheden en onwaarschijnlijke toevalligheden. Dat het aan deze eigenaardigheden te danken is dat we hier überhaupt zijn. Dat er mensen zijn op wat we onze planeet noemen, dat we ons kunnen voortbewegen op een ronddraaiende bol in een immense kosmos vol onbegrijpelijk grote objecten met zulke kleine deeltjes, dat onze geest niet kan bevatten hoe klein en talrijk ze zijn. Dat deze oneindig kleine objecten stand kunnen houden te midden van het onbegrijpelijk grote. Dat we blijven zweven. Dat we überhaupt bestaan. Dat elk van ons één van die onmetelijk vele mogelijkheden is geworden. Het ondenkbare is iets wat we de hele tijd met ons meedragen. Het is al gebeurd: we lopen rond op aarde en zijn onwaarschijnlijk, we zijn uit een wolk van ongelofelijke toevalligheden gestapt. Je zou denken dat we door dit besef een beetje toegerust waren om het onwaarschijnlijke tegemoet te treden. Maar het omgekeerde is kennelijk het geval. We zijn eraan gewend geraakt zonder dat het ons iedere ochtend duizelt, en in plaats van voorzichtig en aarzelend te handelen in voortdurende verwondering, lopen we rond alsof er niets gebeurd is, nemen we de eigenaardigheid voor lief en duizelt het ons als het bestaan blijkt te zijn zoals het is: onwaarschijnlijk, onvoorspelbaar, eigenaardig.
Ik zou zijn onrust zien en zou snel zeggen dat hij zich geen zorgen hoefde te maken, dat ik nu hier was, we waren samen, er waren geen doden, geen gewonden gevallen. Ik was thuis, er was me niets overkomen, we leefden nog, alleen was de tijd ontwricht.
Er zaten onregelmatigheden in de tijd en we konden geen enkel patroon vinden dat hout sneed. Voor het eerst vond ik het angstaanjagend. Niet gewoon duizelingwekkend en merkwaardig en een beetje griezelig. Het was angstaanjagend, het was onzinnig en zonder magie, en de mist was volkomen verdwenen. Het was niet de onrust van het moment van het vallende stukje brood in het hotel, het was niet het gevoel van een schemergebied tussen ons. We waren geen wandelaars in nevelige landschappen, we waren geen duikers of schipbreukelingen. We waren geen tweeling of een span paarden, we waren geen bosarbeiders of twee dooiers in een ei. Waren we in Mesopotamië, dan hadden de rivieren een naam en stroomden ze terug in hun bedding. Het was helder weer, de zon brandde aan de hemel, de rivieren droogden uit, je kon troepenformaties vermoeden, scherpe silhouetten patrouilleerden langs de oever, het geluid van metaal. We leefden in twee tijden en we konden de verschillen niet langer negeren. Er waren territoria die tegen elkaar botsten, er waren grensconflicten en oncontroleerbare transacties dwars door de zones heen. We waren geliefden in landschappen vol conflicten, Thomas had geen herinnering aan onze dagen samen, we konden geen mistige dagen, overstromingen en nevelige ochtenden scheppen, we konden niet samen oplopen, we waren in het geheel niet dubbel of mistig of parallel. Ik kreeg geen helder beeld, ik zag geen patronen en ik wist niet hoe ik hier uit moest komen.
In feite ontbrak het ons niet aan verklaringen, we hadden er meer dan genoeg, maar verklaringen die onze kritische blik konden doorstaan en die tevens onze vele observaties omvatten, vonden we niet.
Ik wist nog niet wat er moest gebeuren, maar ik wist wel dat ik niet elke morgen kon vertellen over een steeds langere reeks variaties van dezelfde dag. We konden achttien november niet delen. Het was een dag die ik zelf moest dragen.
Ik zeg niet dat ik de hoop heb opgegeven. Maar hij komt niet zo vaak langs. De hoop is vertrokken. Dat is zonder drama gebeurd, de hoop heeft niet met deuren gesmeten, is eerder als een dier naar andere jachtvelden geslopen, een kat die naar de buren is verhuisd, een plant die zijn zaden verspreid heeft op plekken waar die beter kunnen groeien.
�-
Ik heb geen moeite om de dagen door te komen als ik me rustig houd. Dat wil zeggen, ik doe niets om de dagen voorbij te laten gaan. Ze gaan vanzelf voorbij. Ik hoef niets anders te doen dan ’s ochtends een getal in het notitieboekje te zetten. Ik hoef niets over de dagen te zeggen, de papieren blijven blanco en de tijd gaat sneller als ik niets zeg. Ik stroom door de dagen, of de dag stroomt, iets of iemand stroomt. Ik haal adem. Ik denk dat zinnen niet meer nodig zijn. Ik hoor de dag, die zijn patroon volgt, en voor ik het weet is de dag voorbij.
Ik zie hem niet naar buiten komen en ik weet zeker dat hij mij ook niet ziet, want ik loop in tegenovergestelde richting over de stoep. Maar ik hoor de deur die achter hem dichtvalt. De deur die zich sluit achter Thomas zonder pakketten. Thomas die zijn postkantoor verlaat. Thomas die de deur van geel metaal loslaat. Een deur te zijn. Aangeraakt te worden. En op rustige scharnieren langzaam weer terugdraaien en dichtgaan.
Maar ik ben geen deur. Ik ga niet dicht. Ik heb geen scharnieren. Er is geen enkel houvast. Ik blijf staan en draai me een beetje om terwijl hij om de hoek verdwijnt, en dan sta ik daar, half omgedraaid, want ik kan mijn benen niet bewegen, maar ik kan mijn lichaam draaien en hem om de hoek zien verdwijnen.
�-
Het is goed een plaats te kennen waar je niets kunt uitrichten.
Ik kon het aan hem zien. Hij vond het maar raar. Misschien had hij gelijk: ik was gek geworden. Maar hij had oorzaak en gevolg omgedraaid. Ik was niet zo gek geworden dat ik me inbeeldde dat ik al 339 keer achttien november had meegemaakt. Dat ik gek geworden was kwam doordat ik 339 keer achttien november had meegemaakt. Ik was vreemd geworden door achttien november. Ik wilde eruit
Het is moeilijk om geduldig te zijn als je niet weet waar je op wacht. Het is moeilijk om een verschil te zien in het dagelijkse gekrioel van de dingen
Longlist International Booker Prize 2025 ranking
Shortlisted books in bold
1 - 4.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
2 - 4.5 stars rounded down, review here: /review/show...
3 - 4 stars, review here: /review/show...
4 - 4 stars, review here: /review/show...
5 - 3.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
6 - 3.5 stars rounded down, review here:
/review/show...
7 - 3 stars, review here: /review/show...
8 - 3 stars, review here: /review/show...
9 - 3 stars, review here: /review/show...
10 - 3 stars, review here: /review/show...
11 - 2.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
12 - 2.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
13 - 2.5 stars rounded up, review here: /review/show...
September 25, 2023
November bjuder på karameller av granit.� /Tomas Tranströmer
Vem har inte en regnig och gråtrist novemberdag tröstat sig själv med att den snart är över. I morgon är en ny dag, säger man till sig själv. Men tänk om det plötsligt inte skulle vara det. För protagonisten Tara är det varje morgon när hon vaknar, som i Ulysses en och samma dag, den artonde november.
”Jag har kommit långt bort från den sjuttonde och jag vet inte om jag någonsin får se den nittonde. Men den artonde kommer om och om igen. […]
Det var därför jag började skriva. För att jag kan höra honom i huset. För att tiden har gått sönder. För att jag hittade en bunt papper i bokhyllan. För att jag försöker minnas. För att pappret minns. Kanske är det något helande med meningar.�
Vi kommer in i berättelsen (in media res) den artonde november nummer 121. Det är då hon börjar skriva om sin belägenhet och hur det hela började. Hon lämnade sin man Thomas och sitt hem för att åka på tjänsteresa den sjuttonde november. Den artonde genomförde hon bokinköp och träffade vänner, som planerat. Dagen avslutades med att hon kröp ner i sängen på hotellet. Vid frukosten ”morgonen efter� inser hon att allt omkring upprepar sig, vädret, människorna, tidningen visar att det åter är den artonde. Böckerna hon köpte är tillbaka hos handlaren. Alla andra tror att de upplever den artonde för första gången, bara Tara vet att det ständigt är samma dag.
Med en beskrivande detaljrik prosa som målar bilder och framställer ljud hypnotiserar den prisvinnande danska författaren Solvej Balle mig. Många upprepningar med små variationer håller spänningen vid liv genom hela det unika verket. Å ena sidan är det glasklart vad som händer och sker, å andra sidan är det fullkomligt obegripligt. Ungefär som med livet självt, gråzoner och obesvarade frågor hör till. Om uträkning av omfång är en existentiell och filosofisk mångbottnad roman om människans förhållande till universums märkligheter. Författaren överlämnar hela tolkningsarbetet åt läsaren. Tack för det!
Det ska � till min stora glädje � komma ytterligare sex böcker om Tara Selter. I den här första boken är hon helt fokuserad på revan i tiden och sin situation. Vi får veta väldigt lite om hennes tidigare liv och person.
När Balle skriver om Taras omständighet gestaltar hon enligt mig alienation, som i faktiskt utanförskap eller en känsla av detsamma. Således är temat något djupt mänskligt som rör oss alla. Som individ är du egentligen alltid ensam, det är bara du som är du, i din kropp, som tänker dina tankar och känner dina känslor. Att gång på gång behöva förklara för andra människor hur man har det och hoppas på att bli förstådd, men kanske aldrig fullt ut bli det, är allas vår verklighet. När Tara säger ”igår� avser ordets betydelse artonde november, till skillnad från Thomas tolkning av samma ord som betyder sjuttonde november. Jämför Sokrates som påpekade att samma vind kan kännas varm för en person och kylig för en annan. Beroende på vad man ätit innan kan sött vin upplevas surt. Surheten är alltså en avkomma av två föräldrar, vinet och den som smakar på det. På sätt och vis är varje människa sitt eget individuella mått för det som är.
”Vi var inga tvillingar eller något hästspann, vi var inga skogsarbetare eller dubbla gulor i ett ägg. Om vi var i Mesopotamien hade floderna fått namn och runnit tillbaka i sina bäddar. […].. vi kunde inte hitta tillsammans..�
Det här är ett konstverk som för mig också handlar om förlust och ensamhet. Balle ger form åt två älskande som skiljs från varandra. Tidigare försökte de som sant vetgiriga människor att lösa gåtan med revan i tiden tillsammans, de gör om vardagsrummet till ett ”kontrollrum� (haha!) men när 76 dagar har gått och hon varje morgon förklarat för Thomas att tiden stannat, klarar hon inte av det längre. Avståndet har blivit för stort. Då är det som att hon kliver ut ur Platons grotta och ser verkligheten för vad den är. Efter det börjar hon på ett mer noggrant sätt lägga märke till rummet omkring sig, ljuden, sinnesförnimmelserna. Hon känner av sitt humör. Hon vänder blicken mot himlen, som de gamla filosoferna, för att söka svar i stjärnorna. Det ser ut som att stjärnorna vrider sig men det är ju jorden som snurrar.
Tara drar sig undan och lever mol allena i gästrummet. Thomas jämförs med ett spöke som går igen och igen. Hon själv känner sig som ett monster som äter av världen, som tränger sig på och invaderar. Acceptansen, hoppet, humöret växlar men alltjämt är det den artonde november.
Balle skriver att �..våra förväntningar på världens konstans vilar på ett osäkert fundament.� Plötsligt kan förutsättningarna ändras. Det kan bli krig och pandemi � det är väl i princip lika stora ingrepp i individers liv som om tiden stannade. Men i denna kafkaliknande loop finns det ändå något som beter sig som förväntat; kroppen. Taras hår växer och sår läker. Den fysiska kroppens förhållande till tiden, åldrandet, tycks vara ett obestridligt faktum.
Människan räknar och mäter men transcendentala värden kan inte uttryckas i varken siffror eller ord även om meningar verkligen kan vara lugnande.
Vem har inte en regnig och gråtrist novemberdag tröstat sig själv med att den snart är över. I morgon är en ny dag, säger man till sig själv. Men tänk om det plötsligt inte skulle vara det. För protagonisten Tara är det varje morgon när hon vaknar, som i Ulysses en och samma dag, den artonde november.
”Jag har kommit långt bort från den sjuttonde och jag vet inte om jag någonsin får se den nittonde. Men den artonde kommer om och om igen. […]
Det var därför jag började skriva. För att jag kan höra honom i huset. För att tiden har gått sönder. För att jag hittade en bunt papper i bokhyllan. För att jag försöker minnas. För att pappret minns. Kanske är det något helande med meningar.�
Vi kommer in i berättelsen (in media res) den artonde november nummer 121. Det är då hon börjar skriva om sin belägenhet och hur det hela började. Hon lämnade sin man Thomas och sitt hem för att åka på tjänsteresa den sjuttonde november. Den artonde genomförde hon bokinköp och träffade vänner, som planerat. Dagen avslutades med att hon kröp ner i sängen på hotellet. Vid frukosten ”morgonen efter� inser hon att allt omkring upprepar sig, vädret, människorna, tidningen visar att det åter är den artonde. Böckerna hon köpte är tillbaka hos handlaren. Alla andra tror att de upplever den artonde för första gången, bara Tara vet att det ständigt är samma dag.
Med en beskrivande detaljrik prosa som målar bilder och framställer ljud hypnotiserar den prisvinnande danska författaren Solvej Balle mig. Många upprepningar med små variationer håller spänningen vid liv genom hela det unika verket. Å ena sidan är det glasklart vad som händer och sker, å andra sidan är det fullkomligt obegripligt. Ungefär som med livet självt, gråzoner och obesvarade frågor hör till. Om uträkning av omfång är en existentiell och filosofisk mångbottnad roman om människans förhållande till universums märkligheter. Författaren överlämnar hela tolkningsarbetet åt läsaren. Tack för det!
Det ska � till min stora glädje � komma ytterligare sex böcker om Tara Selter. I den här första boken är hon helt fokuserad på revan i tiden och sin situation. Vi får veta väldigt lite om hennes tidigare liv och person.
När Balle skriver om Taras omständighet gestaltar hon enligt mig alienation, som i faktiskt utanförskap eller en känsla av detsamma. Således är temat något djupt mänskligt som rör oss alla. Som individ är du egentligen alltid ensam, det är bara du som är du, i din kropp, som tänker dina tankar och känner dina känslor. Att gång på gång behöva förklara för andra människor hur man har det och hoppas på att bli förstådd, men kanske aldrig fullt ut bli det, är allas vår verklighet. När Tara säger ”igår� avser ordets betydelse artonde november, till skillnad från Thomas tolkning av samma ord som betyder sjuttonde november. Jämför Sokrates som påpekade att samma vind kan kännas varm för en person och kylig för en annan. Beroende på vad man ätit innan kan sött vin upplevas surt. Surheten är alltså en avkomma av två föräldrar, vinet och den som smakar på det. På sätt och vis är varje människa sitt eget individuella mått för det som är.
”Vi var inga tvillingar eller något hästspann, vi var inga skogsarbetare eller dubbla gulor i ett ägg. Om vi var i Mesopotamien hade floderna fått namn och runnit tillbaka i sina bäddar. […].. vi kunde inte hitta tillsammans..�
Det här är ett konstverk som för mig också handlar om förlust och ensamhet. Balle ger form åt två älskande som skiljs från varandra. Tidigare försökte de som sant vetgiriga människor att lösa gåtan med revan i tiden tillsammans, de gör om vardagsrummet till ett ”kontrollrum� (haha!) men när 76 dagar har gått och hon varje morgon förklarat för Thomas att tiden stannat, klarar hon inte av det längre. Avståndet har blivit för stort. Då är det som att hon kliver ut ur Platons grotta och ser verkligheten för vad den är. Efter det börjar hon på ett mer noggrant sätt lägga märke till rummet omkring sig, ljuden, sinnesförnimmelserna. Hon känner av sitt humör. Hon vänder blicken mot himlen, som de gamla filosoferna, för att söka svar i stjärnorna. Det ser ut som att stjärnorna vrider sig men det är ju jorden som snurrar.
Tara drar sig undan och lever mol allena i gästrummet. Thomas jämförs med ett spöke som går igen och igen. Hon själv känner sig som ett monster som äter av världen, som tränger sig på och invaderar. Acceptansen, hoppet, humöret växlar men alltjämt är det den artonde november.
Balle skriver att �..våra förväntningar på världens konstans vilar på ett osäkert fundament.� Plötsligt kan förutsättningarna ändras. Det kan bli krig och pandemi � det är väl i princip lika stora ingrepp i individers liv som om tiden stannade. Men i denna kafkaliknande loop finns det ändå något som beter sig som förväntat; kroppen. Taras hår växer och sår läker. Den fysiska kroppens förhållande till tiden, åldrandet, tycks vara ett obestridligt faktum.
Människan räknar och mäter men transcendentala värden kan inte uttryckas i varken siffror eller ord även om meningar verkligen kan vara lugnande.
February 15, 2025
I am a fan of Groundhog Day and a massive fan of Palm Springs. I often come away from viewing those films with a host of additional questions that I mull over in my mind for days on end. This is one of the only “would you rather”esque ideas that remains with me. Flight or invisibility, infinite money or infinite health, immortality or power, none of that. What happens if you are living the same day over and over again?
I have thought of it all. You freak out. You go through bouts of intense depression and anxiety. You may lose your mind. If you don’t, you start having fun. Do you learn new trades? Languages? Read and watch everything? What the fuck is the point, if you are stuck in an endless loop of 24 hours? This book goes over most of my questions.
I have also messed up big time. Reading this book is addictive and it does not leave your mind when you are in it. The only issue is that it is the first volume of what is set to be a 7-volume series. 5 books have been published in Danish, and only 2 are currently available in English. I’m so cooked.
I have thought of it all. You freak out. You go through bouts of intense depression and anxiety. You may lose your mind. If you don’t, you start having fun. Do you learn new trades? Languages? Read and watch everything? What the fuck is the point, if you are stuck in an endless loop of 24 hours? This book goes over most of my questions.
I have also messed up big time. Reading this book is addictive and it does not leave your mind when you are in it. The only issue is that it is the first volume of what is set to be a 7-volume series. 5 books have been published in Danish, and only 2 are currently available in English. I’m so cooked.
April 5, 2025
Danish author Solvej Balle’s novel, the first in an ongoing series, is structured like a diary but each entry is for the same day November 18th. A day that 29-year-old Tara Selter is inexplicably living over and over again. But, unlike commercial stories with similar plots � Happy Death Day or Russian Doll � the chronicling of Tara’s experiences isn't tied to solving a crime or similar mystery, instead it has a distinctly semi-philosophical, almost metaphysical flavour. When the novel opens, it’s already iteration 121 of the same day, Tara an antiquarian bookseller recounts how a visit to a Paris book fair somehow left her trapped, separate in time from everyone around her. Tara recalls how at first she returned home to her husband Thomas, convinced that together they could puzzle out what was happening to her. But when these attempts failed, Tara retreated further and further into isolation, caught up in the dilemmas presented by her predicament and their possible significance. So that she becomes part of a highly personal experiment, both scientist and subject, hoping to find some way back to her previous life.
It’s a very literary piece, detailed and reflective, and one which conjures a range of ideas and associations. There’s an obvious commentary on the banality and repetitiveness of many people’s everyday lives; but there’s also a plea for attentiveness, for the rewards that hyperawareness of time and space might bring � Tara is attuned to every sound, to the weather, to the sky, to the movements of the birds in her cottage garden, the minutiae of existence that’s so often overlooked. Tara’s confronted too with her individual impact on the outside world. Although each day’s technically the same one, her purchases deplete the stock in local shops, the vegetables she plucks from the earth are still gone when she wakes up. Balle is clearly thinking about the environment and climate change here. But equally contemporary consumption practices which themselves have brought about a different logic of time � the vegetables we eat no longer limited by seasons or even by specific countries and climate zones. Tara being out of sync with Thomas also opens up a series of meditations on intimacy versus distance. Isolation is, in some ways, liberating for Tara who’s free to pursue her own agenda but at the same time she’s cut off from her society and community in unnerving, potentially damaging ways. It’s a process of transformation that possibly marks her out as monstrous, both to herself and to the people she tries to confide in.
It’s a difficult piece to confidently interpret because there’s so much that might change in later instalments. Balle was partly inspired by her debut novel which also featured a woman abruptly estranged from the wider world, in that scenario stranded on a desert island where she's confronted with her feelings and her understanding of the nature of existence. Balle too is interested in exploring concepts of time relating to memory and nostalgia: moments which seem to take us back in time, days when we feel time has slowed or we’ve grown suddenly older. Another important theme is the connection between time and storytelling: the process of writing is central to the novel, as is the influence of books like Ulysses, The Arabian Nights, and works like Waiting for Godot. I found the intricacies of Balle’s narrative consistently intriguing, it might be a little dry for some, but I was quickly bound up in its rhythms. Translated by Barbara J. Haveland.
Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Faber for an ARC
It’s a very literary piece, detailed and reflective, and one which conjures a range of ideas and associations. There’s an obvious commentary on the banality and repetitiveness of many people’s everyday lives; but there’s also a plea for attentiveness, for the rewards that hyperawareness of time and space might bring � Tara is attuned to every sound, to the weather, to the sky, to the movements of the birds in her cottage garden, the minutiae of existence that’s so often overlooked. Tara’s confronted too with her individual impact on the outside world. Although each day’s technically the same one, her purchases deplete the stock in local shops, the vegetables she plucks from the earth are still gone when she wakes up. Balle is clearly thinking about the environment and climate change here. But equally contemporary consumption practices which themselves have brought about a different logic of time � the vegetables we eat no longer limited by seasons or even by specific countries and climate zones. Tara being out of sync with Thomas also opens up a series of meditations on intimacy versus distance. Isolation is, in some ways, liberating for Tara who’s free to pursue her own agenda but at the same time she’s cut off from her society and community in unnerving, potentially damaging ways. It’s a process of transformation that possibly marks her out as monstrous, both to herself and to the people she tries to confide in.
It’s a difficult piece to confidently interpret because there’s so much that might change in later instalments. Balle was partly inspired by her debut novel which also featured a woman abruptly estranged from the wider world, in that scenario stranded on a desert island where she's confronted with her feelings and her understanding of the nature of existence. Balle too is interested in exploring concepts of time relating to memory and nostalgia: moments which seem to take us back in time, days when we feel time has slowed or we’ve grown suddenly older. Another important theme is the connection between time and storytelling: the process of writing is central to the novel, as is the influence of books like Ulysses, The Arabian Nights, and works like Waiting for Godot. I found the intricacies of Balle’s narrative consistently intriguing, it might be a little dry for some, but I was quickly bound up in its rhythms. Translated by Barbara J. Haveland.
Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Faber for an ARC
Read
April 15, 2025Some books you can read desultorily and get away with it. Other books, desultory themselves, don't hold up so well under this treatment. Finally figuring this out, I made a rush of reading the second half of this book yesterday on the couch with some classical music and no one else in the house. I calculated the volume of my attention span well.
Thing is, this book is getting attention because it is a) unusual and b) ambiguous. Yes, ambiguity can be good if it leaves you wondering. Trouble is, some readers identify "wondering" as "frustrated," so if you want to know what the hell was going on when the day Nov. 18th (no groundhogs in sight) keeps looping for one woman named Tara and her only (everyone else is unaware that they're looping so, philosophically, they're not...am I right?), God help you.
Tell, tell, tell. Yes, we're told as writers to SHOW, but some writers are good tellers and if there's one thing author Solvej Balle is good at, it's description, especially minutiae, especially via sensory details. Thing is, you're parked in the protagonist's increasingly antagonized mind, making the narrator more and more unreliable.
Do you like unreliable narrators? Do you like psychological Rubik's cubes? Then twist and click away for 160 slow pages and have at it. You might find something to like -- or loathe. I leave it to you, Lady or the Tiger style...
Thing is, this book is getting attention because it is a) unusual and b) ambiguous. Yes, ambiguity can be good if it leaves you wondering. Trouble is, some readers identify "wondering" as "frustrated," so if you want to know what the hell was going on when the day Nov. 18th (no groundhogs in sight) keeps looping for one woman named Tara and her only (everyone else is unaware that they're looping so, philosophically, they're not...am I right?), God help you.
Tell, tell, tell. Yes, we're told as writers to SHOW, but some writers are good tellers and if there's one thing author Solvej Balle is good at, it's description, especially minutiae, especially via sensory details. Thing is, you're parked in the protagonist's increasingly antagonized mind, making the narrator more and more unreliable.
Do you like unreliable narrators? Do you like psychological Rubik's cubes? Then twist and click away for 160 slow pages and have at it. You might find something to like -- or loathe. I leave it to you, Lady or the Tiger style...
March 17, 2025
Nicely written, but subject to a problem that afflicts a large proportion of contemporary fiction, especially speculative novels and stories. Namely: the 'presenting' -- rather than the 'building' -- of a world that subsequently runs the risk of failing to suspend the reader's disbelief, as happened in this instance. I've had the same problem with some award-winning novels, so these books are clearly landing elsewhere, and I always go in wanting to be taken along by such works.
When you're dealing with -- as this short novel (part of a series) does -- a day that continually recurs for no apparent reason (November 18, which resets for the narrator at the end of each basically identical iteration) it surely behooves the writer to make such an outlandish setup as believable as possible. But here, what you get instead is an immediate acceptance by the partner of the protagonist that her explanation of what she is experiencing, a looping, repeating 24hrs, is almost undoubtedly the case. Very few questions asked: just shared disconcertion. This is admirable from the partner's point of view--he trusts what she's saying--but (for me) it doesn't work in fiction. It 'presents' an immediately accepted case on behalf of the reader, rather than 'building' one. It's 'baffling' to both protagonist and partner, but such bafflement is quickly and casually dispelled. Which consequently means that the protagonist's partner -- who doesn't experience repeating days, but lives each November 18 as though it's the first -- feels like little more than a prop, as opposed to a flesh and blood character, despite shorthand descriptions of an 'atomic' connection the couple apparently share.
The central conceit is initially intriguing, and there are some thought-provoking moments that consider how we allow time to become a homogenous mass, and fail to truly see things for what they are, since we're rolled into a series of run-on days. But for this reader such moments were broadly hampered by the author's insistence that we simply go along with the concept, an urging that doesn't feel earned. As a younger reader, I could easily go along with such writing. 'He's a werewolf, so it's probably a good idea to watch out when there's a full moon.' That may well have sufficed -- then. Now I need a bit more -- I need convincing substance to enable me to furnish my delusion that a man has grown full body hair and fangs. It's not enough, in this case, to tell us that Groundhog Day is really happening, so that we can move on to other plot points. We need to feel more jeopardy and more external pressure on such a seismic central idea, or, for this reader, the whole project represents no more than a slack line along which numerous ideas are haphazardly hung.
When you're dealing with -- as this short novel (part of a series) does -- a day that continually recurs for no apparent reason (November 18, which resets for the narrator at the end of each basically identical iteration) it surely behooves the writer to make such an outlandish setup as believable as possible. But here, what you get instead is an immediate acceptance by the partner of the protagonist that her explanation of what she is experiencing, a looping, repeating 24hrs, is almost undoubtedly the case. Very few questions asked: just shared disconcertion. This is admirable from the partner's point of view--he trusts what she's saying--but (for me) it doesn't work in fiction. It 'presents' an immediately accepted case on behalf of the reader, rather than 'building' one. It's 'baffling' to both protagonist and partner, but such bafflement is quickly and casually dispelled. Which consequently means that the protagonist's partner -- who doesn't experience repeating days, but lives each November 18 as though it's the first -- feels like little more than a prop, as opposed to a flesh and blood character, despite shorthand descriptions of an 'atomic' connection the couple apparently share.
The central conceit is initially intriguing, and there are some thought-provoking moments that consider how we allow time to become a homogenous mass, and fail to truly see things for what they are, since we're rolled into a series of run-on days. But for this reader such moments were broadly hampered by the author's insistence that we simply go along with the concept, an urging that doesn't feel earned. As a younger reader, I could easily go along with such writing. 'He's a werewolf, so it's probably a good idea to watch out when there's a full moon.' That may well have sufficed -- then. Now I need a bit more -- I need convincing substance to enable me to furnish my delusion that a man has grown full body hair and fangs. It's not enough, in this case, to tell us that Groundhog Day is really happening, so that we can move on to other plot points. We need to feel more jeopardy and more external pressure on such a seismic central idea, or, for this reader, the whole project represents no more than a slack line along which numerous ideas are haphazardly hung.
March 5, 2025
[3.5 stars] Very cool concept. Wonderfully written and excellently translated. I just think it being the start of a series made me feel like, by the end, I wanted more (a good thing! I will continue) but that this one didn't satisfy as much as a 1st book in a series should, in my opinion. It's making me question whether this whole concept needs to be broken out into more volumes or could be instead one large volume or maybe 2-3 bigger ones. We shall see! Maybe I'll eat my words and see, in hindsight, why she ended this one where she did. But for now I liked, didn't love, and hope subsequent volumes provide a bit more meat.
November 28, 2024
It’s the 18th of November, and Tara Setter wakes yet again to the same day, every morning it’s precisely the same and so she no longer expects to get to the 19th of November as this day has been repeated 121 times so far. Along with her husband Thomas, Tara is an antiquarian book dealer. On the 17th of November she travels by train from her home in Clairon-Sous-Bous in Northern France to a book auction in Bordeaux, she buys a few books and takes the return journey, staying overnight in Paris as she has an appointment the next day. In addition Thomas asks her to collect and find a few rare book titles. The following day does not seem unusual, errands are run and appointments are kept and she spends a pleasant evening with a coin dealer friend and his girlfriend. Fast forward to the 364th Groundhog Day, can she break the pattern?
If you want to read something a little bit different that is well written than this book may very well fit the bill. However, it is worth noting that this is the first of a series of seven. Book one is comparatively short and although I think it’s a little bit slow it’s not in least bit dull, in fact it’s an intense read.
The sensation she feels of the state of stasis, of the constant repetition are beautifully described. It’s so unsettling with the improbability of it all. You witness how her feelings change with every repeated day, her close intense observations of other changes and the hunger for an answer accompanying the fears she inevitably feels.
It is obviously all on the same theme with the monotony of the repetition of each day and of course her inevitable desire to finally get to the 19th but I find something intriguing in the high-quality writing and of course, she does notice some tiny points of difference. I especially like how the author deals with Tara‘s relationship with Thomas which is a fascinating thing and you witness his bafflement and willingness to understand but also how things change between them.
The ending can be viewed in one of two ways, either it’s not at all satisfactory because �. spoiler� or you’ll be eager to see what happens next in the next volume. Where do I stand? I’m intrigued enough to want to continue to volume two, as to whether my enthusiasm will be sustained to volume seven entirely depends on what happens next!
Overall, I think this is a beautiful written novel with a terrific, smooth translation from the original Danish.
With thanks to NetGalley and especially to the publishers for the much appreciated arc in return for an honest review.
If you want to read something a little bit different that is well written than this book may very well fit the bill. However, it is worth noting that this is the first of a series of seven. Book one is comparatively short and although I think it’s a little bit slow it’s not in least bit dull, in fact it’s an intense read.
The sensation she feels of the state of stasis, of the constant repetition are beautifully described. It’s so unsettling with the improbability of it all. You witness how her feelings change with every repeated day, her close intense observations of other changes and the hunger for an answer accompanying the fears she inevitably feels.
It is obviously all on the same theme with the monotony of the repetition of each day and of course her inevitable desire to finally get to the 19th but I find something intriguing in the high-quality writing and of course, she does notice some tiny points of difference. I especially like how the author deals with Tara‘s relationship with Thomas which is a fascinating thing and you witness his bafflement and willingness to understand but also how things change between them.
The ending can be viewed in one of two ways, either it’s not at all satisfactory because �. spoiler� or you’ll be eager to see what happens next in the next volume. Where do I stand? I’m intrigued enough to want to continue to volume two, as to whether my enthusiasm will be sustained to volume seven entirely depends on what happens next!
Overall, I think this is a beautiful written novel with a terrific, smooth translation from the original Danish.
With thanks to NetGalley and especially to the publishers for the much appreciated arc in return for an honest review.
December 26, 2024
La propuesta que nos hace Solvej Balle es interesante, aunque no sea lo más original del mundo. Tema muy trabajado en la ficción de películas y novelas este de las brechas en el tiempo y la cuestión temporal: Regreso al futuro, Memento, G. H. Wells y su máquina del tiempo, y como no, resulta inevitable la comparación con esa magnífica película que protagonizó Bill Murray, traducida aquí como Atrapado en el tiempo, pero que todos conocemos como El día de la marmota. Aquí existen diferencias con la película que no explicaré para quien quiera leerlo, solamente que parece un poco más interior y recogido. Parece huir del tono de comedia de la película y entrar en algo más personal, narrado en primera persona busca la intimidad, parece que el detalle apenas perceptible y se hace preguntas más profundas.
De inicio te provoca curiosidad, ganas de entrar en lo que quiera que sea la historia y el mensaje que te quiera trasladar el autor. ¿Será bueno este libro? ¿Qué plantea? De momento no le da para 4* y me extraña que las buenas opiniones que ha cosechado (publicidad de lanzamiento de críticos y pocos lectores de a pie todavía) se basen exclusivamente en la lectura de esta primera entrega y no en la lectura completa. Como digo el arranque del libro es bueno, aunque luego se queda estancado en un punto en que no va ni para adelante ni para atrás: la protagonista y su circunstancia.
Para valorarlo hay que leer alguna entrega más de los próximos libros, aunque realmente no tengo nada claro que llegue a la finalización de los 7 libros, la propuesta es buena pero me parece un poco lento. Ahora no le puedo dar más de 3. El tema de la veta en el tiempo propone algo distinto que ese Día de la marmota que era muy nuevo y gracioso y con cierto contenido. Esto es más interior...ya veremos.
De inicio te provoca curiosidad, ganas de entrar en lo que quiera que sea la historia y el mensaje que te quiera trasladar el autor. ¿Será bueno este libro? ¿Qué plantea? De momento no le da para 4* y me extraña que las buenas opiniones que ha cosechado (publicidad de lanzamiento de críticos y pocos lectores de a pie todavía) se basen exclusivamente en la lectura de esta primera entrega y no en la lectura completa. Como digo el arranque del libro es bueno, aunque luego se queda estancado en un punto en que no va ni para adelante ni para atrás: la protagonista y su circunstancia.
Para valorarlo hay que leer alguna entrega más de los próximos libros, aunque realmente no tengo nada claro que llegue a la finalización de los 7 libros, la propuesta es buena pero me parece un poco lento. Ahora no le puedo dar más de 3. El tema de la veta en el tiempo propone algo distinto que ese Día de la marmota que era muy nuevo y gracioso y con cierto contenido. Esto es más interior...ya veremos.
April 8, 2025
Winner of the 2022 Nordic Council Literature Prize, in the original and for Volume I-III
And in translation:
Shortlisted for the 2025 International Booker Prize
Longlisted for the 2024 National Book Award for Translated Literature
My name is Tara Selter. I am sitting in the back room overlooking the garden and a woodpile. It is the eighteenth of November. Every night when I lie down to sleep in the bed in the guest room it is the eighteenth of November and every morning, when I wake up, it is the eighteenth of November. I no longer expect to wake up to the nineteenth of November and I no longer remember the seventeenth of November as if it were yesterday.
On the Calculation of Volume I is Barbara J. Haveland's translation of Om udregning af rumfang #1 by Solvej Balle.
As the name suggests this is just the first instalment of a longer novel, to be published in 7 volumes, five of which have appeared in the Danish original, with this and the second Volume to be published on the same day in the UK in April 2025 (I read the US version, which was published last year). I'm a little surprised/disappointed that the International Booker judges didn't take the braver decision to nominate both Volume I and II together as one choice in the same way that the Nordic Council did.
The basic premise of the book is like that of Groundhog Day - although the author has said in an that she had the idea in 1987, and didn't watch the movie for sometime: "when I finally saw it, I realised, ah, that’s a lot of nice research for my idea, because I realised it was so different."
The novel is told from the perspective of Tara Selter, living in 'a two-story stone cottage on the outskirts of the town of Clairon-sous-Bois in northern France' with her husband Thomas, who she first met 5 years ago, both antiquarian book-dealers specialising in illustrated works from the eighteenth century.
I am the one who travels to auctions and visits antiquarian bookshops while Thomas takes care of cataloging and shipping. To begin with we did everything together, but we have gradually split the responsibilities between us. I’m not sure why it fell to me to do the traveling. Maybe because I don’t mind traveling so much and maybe because I very quickly developed a certain instinct for the books, a feel for the paper, an eye for the quality of the printing, for a well-crafted binding. I don’t know what it is, but it’s almost physical, like an inchworm testing whether a leaf is worth creeping across, or a bird listening to insects moving in the bark of a tree. It might be a detail: the sound when you flick through the pages, the feel of the lettering, the depth of the imprint, the saturation of the colors in an illustration, the precision of the details in a plate, the hues of the edges.
But Tara is locked into a repetition of the 18th November. As the novel opens she tells us I have counted the days and if my calculations are correct today is the eighteenth of November #121 ... That is why I began to write. ... Because time has fallen apart. Because I found a ream of paper on the shelf. Because I’m trying to remember. Because the paper remembers. And there may be healing in sentences.
The novel consists of a series of journal entries which Tara makes to document her experiences, over the first year and a day of her experience, starting on that 121st day, the first entries necessarily rather backward-looking and with lengthy explanations of her stories, but the later entries sporadic and sometimes quite brief.
We learn early on that Tara's first November 18th took place on a trip, via a book fair in Bordeaux, to Paris, where she was to spend the nights of November 17th and 18th, visiting book shops in search of certain works as well as seeeing her friend, Philip Maurel, at his antique coin shop, specialising in Roman coins (which, I believe, becomes more significant in later volumes). The only real incident of note that day is that, while spending the evening with Philip and his girlfriend Marie, she burns her hand on a heater:
I let out a cry, an expletive probably. Marie came over and managed to move the heater while I stood there, paralyzed by the pain for a moment. Having deposited our plates in the kitchen Philip promptly reappeared with a bowl of cold water into which I plunged my hand, and for the rest of the evening I sat like that, with my hand immersed in a bowl of water, although this did nothing to ease the pain. That was the only unusual thing to happen that night.
Tara's hand immersed in water is a link to Archimedes 'Eureka' moment, and gives the series its title, the author noting "however, she has to take a long journey towards understanding, while Archimedes only had to submerge himself for a moment to gain insight into how to calculate volume" (from an ), although Balle herself seems unclear if this was or was not a crucial moment, and indeed one of the interesting things in this Volume, and the work generally, is the sense of a writer working through the implications of their ideas, alongside Tara, as each writes.
But when she wakes the next morning it is November 18th again, as she realised at the hotel breakfast, first noticing that the newspapers are the ones she read yesterday: It was only when one of the hotel’s other guests dropped a piece of bread on the floor that I began to worry. Not because I don’t know that this sort of thing happens again and again in hotels all over the world, but because the same guest had dropped a piece of bread at that same spot the day before.
Unlike Groundhog Day, Tara is free to escape the confines of Paris, and, crucially she doesn't start each day physically renewed, her burn healing rather than disappearing, even though she doesn't reenact the accident: This is the 121st time I have lived through the eighteenth of November and the burn is still visible as a slender scar on my hand. It started out as an angry, puffy weal. This soon began to weep, then a long, brownish scab formed over it. Little by little the scab loosened and fell off, leaving a shiny pink mark.
Her initial reaction on that first repeated day is to call Thomas, explain what had happened, and, both rather confused, return to him and their house in Clairon-sous-Bois. But when they both wake the next morning, it is November 18th again, and he has no memory of their conversation and indeed can't understand how she can be there given she was in Paris on the night of the 17th.
He didn’t doubt that I was telling the truth. He had spoken to me and had forgotten it. That was what scared him. It was one thing for me to have encountered a fracture in the normal progression of time, but the idea that he had played a part in my day and that he had had conversations and done things he could not remember obviously gave him the same feelings of faintness and unease which I had had when I saw that slice of bread drifting floorward. That strange moment when the ground under one’s feet falls away and all at once it feels as though all predictability can be suspended, as though an existential red alert has suddenly been triggered, a quiet state of panic which prompts neither flight nor cries for help, and does not call for police, fire brigade or ambulance ... that something which cannot happen and which we absolutely do not expect, is nonetheless a possibility. That time stands still. That gravity is suspended. That the logic of the world and the laws of nature break down. That we are forced to acknowledge that our expectations about the constancy of the world are on shaky ground. There are no guarantees and behind all that we ordinarily regard as certain lie improbable exceptions, sudden cracks and inconceivable breaches of the usual laws.
[which is an aside, is rather how most of us are feeling about the world in the new US administration]
At first, she starts each day explaining her predicament to Thomas (who doesn't doubt her, and who she is easily able in any case to convince with predictions of certain external events such as a neighbour passing by) and the two try to work through the implications of what has happened, and is happening, although only she retains memories of where they had got to in their thinking in previous days.
We could not find the mistake. We could not find the reason why time had fallen apart. There was no reason. I could not find a reason, Thomas could not find a reason. We could find patterns and we could find inconsistencies. Thomas was the pattern, I was disturbance.
We devised theories and frameworks which we compared to the events of the eighteenth of November. We debated perceptions of reality and mental dysfunctions, we considered whether I might be generating trains of fictional experiences or whether everyone else had been struck by some form of amnesia, or whether we had stepped into a wave of psychological incongruence. We propounded theories and mounted counterarguments. We read about parataxic views of time and variable chronometry, we unearthed descriptions of fractures in time and chronotoxic recurrence. We explored theories on parallel universes, multiple worlds and relative temporal structures. We found stories of the morphology of memory and of rare cases of amnesiac chronopathy. We discussed theories of repetition and mnemonic defects. We studied mental processes, the objects of the world, temporal sequences. We collected theories and explanations. Actually, though, we had no shortage of explanations, we had plenty of those, but explanations which could stand up to critical scrutiny and at the same time embody all our many observations, those we could not find.
And meanwhile she tries to prolong that sense of waking each morning, unsure if it really is November 18th
I don’t think it was an act of will, but slowly and almost imperceptibly I managed to extend my sense of neutral, indefinite morning. I concentrated it, intensified that pale-gray awakening and with each morning I found it possible to carry that sensation with me further into the day. After only a few mornings I could hold onto the moment long enough for it to encompass everything in the room around me: the bed linens and Thomas’s body beside me, the wall behind the bed and the wardrobe on the other side of the room, a chair with clothes on it, the morning light, the faint sound of a chimney flue door rattling in the wind. These are familiar sounds and sensations and it is still an ordinary morning, it is spacious and open, and I lie in bed while fragments of the world drift in and dissolve: a brief riff of birdsong, a blackbird defying the gray skies or a robin singing into a pause in the rain, three or four notes to start with, then six or seven, then eight, and each one as it burst forth dissolving in my fog.
But as time goes on, around the 76th day, she realises this is getting nowhere - "I stood in the kitchen with the notebook in my hand and knew that too many days had come between us" - and starts to withdraw, moving to a spare room, and trying to conceal her presence from Philip, observing but not interacting with him, as he goes about his daily routine, one which, of course, never varies.
She also develops their theory that "Thomas was the pattern, I was disturbance" to another "Thomas is the ghost and I am the monster", as she realises that while his actions leave no trace on the day (food he eats is there to be eaten the next day), that's not true of her own actions, realising that the local supermarket is gradually becoming depleted.
And as the 366th day approaches - the day that had time progressed normally would be, once again, November 18th of the following year - she decides to return to Paris and Philip's shop, reasoning that she may be able to break out of the cycle somehow. But given this is Volume I of VII it doesn't need a spoiler alert to say things don't work out that way.
This isn't a novel for those looking for science-fiction like explanations of what may have happened, but what distinguishes it is the wonderful prose, in Haveland's exceptional translation, and, as mentioned previously the sense of an author working through her ideas - on his Substack, appositely describes the novel as "Groundhog Day written by Rachel Cusk."
It's something of a frustating choice for a prize list, as this does feel like part of a larger work, rather than a whole, but still a fascinating choice, and this passes the test that I immediately wanted to read Volume II.
The judges' take
On the Calculation of Volume I takes a potentially familiar narrative trope � a protagonist inexplicably stuck in the same day � and transforms it into a profound meditation on love, connectedness and what it means to exist, to want to be alive, to need to share one’s time with others. The sheer quality of the sentences was what struck us most, rendered into English with deft, invisible musicality by the translator. This book presses its mood, its singular time signature and its philosophical depth into the reader. You feel you are in it, which is sometimes unnerving, sometimes soothing, and this effect lingers long after the book is finished.
And in translation:
Shortlisted for the 2025 International Booker Prize
Longlisted for the 2024 National Book Award for Translated Literature
My name is Tara Selter. I am sitting in the back room overlooking the garden and a woodpile. It is the eighteenth of November. Every night when I lie down to sleep in the bed in the guest room it is the eighteenth of November and every morning, when I wake up, it is the eighteenth of November. I no longer expect to wake up to the nineteenth of November and I no longer remember the seventeenth of November as if it were yesterday.
On the Calculation of Volume I is Barbara J. Haveland's translation of Om udregning af rumfang #1 by Solvej Balle.
As the name suggests this is just the first instalment of a longer novel, to be published in 7 volumes, five of which have appeared in the Danish original, with this and the second Volume to be published on the same day in the UK in April 2025 (I read the US version, which was published last year). I'm a little surprised/disappointed that the International Booker judges didn't take the braver decision to nominate both Volume I and II together as one choice in the same way that the Nordic Council did.
The basic premise of the book is like that of Groundhog Day - although the author has said in an that she had the idea in 1987, and didn't watch the movie for sometime: "when I finally saw it, I realised, ah, that’s a lot of nice research for my idea, because I realised it was so different."
The novel is told from the perspective of Tara Selter, living in 'a two-story stone cottage on the outskirts of the town of Clairon-sous-Bois in northern France' with her husband Thomas, who she first met 5 years ago, both antiquarian book-dealers specialising in illustrated works from the eighteenth century.
I am the one who travels to auctions and visits antiquarian bookshops while Thomas takes care of cataloging and shipping. To begin with we did everything together, but we have gradually split the responsibilities between us. I’m not sure why it fell to me to do the traveling. Maybe because I don’t mind traveling so much and maybe because I very quickly developed a certain instinct for the books, a feel for the paper, an eye for the quality of the printing, for a well-crafted binding. I don’t know what it is, but it’s almost physical, like an inchworm testing whether a leaf is worth creeping across, or a bird listening to insects moving in the bark of a tree. It might be a detail: the sound when you flick through the pages, the feel of the lettering, the depth of the imprint, the saturation of the colors in an illustration, the precision of the details in a plate, the hues of the edges.
But Tara is locked into a repetition of the 18th November. As the novel opens she tells us I have counted the days and if my calculations are correct today is the eighteenth of November #121 ... That is why I began to write. ... Because time has fallen apart. Because I found a ream of paper on the shelf. Because I’m trying to remember. Because the paper remembers. And there may be healing in sentences.
The novel consists of a series of journal entries which Tara makes to document her experiences, over the first year and a day of her experience, starting on that 121st day, the first entries necessarily rather backward-looking and with lengthy explanations of her stories, but the later entries sporadic and sometimes quite brief.
We learn early on that Tara's first November 18th took place on a trip, via a book fair in Bordeaux, to Paris, where she was to spend the nights of November 17th and 18th, visiting book shops in search of certain works as well as seeeing her friend, Philip Maurel, at his antique coin shop, specialising in Roman coins (which, I believe, becomes more significant in later volumes). The only real incident of note that day is that, while spending the evening with Philip and his girlfriend Marie, she burns her hand on a heater:
I let out a cry, an expletive probably. Marie came over and managed to move the heater while I stood there, paralyzed by the pain for a moment. Having deposited our plates in the kitchen Philip promptly reappeared with a bowl of cold water into which I plunged my hand, and for the rest of the evening I sat like that, with my hand immersed in a bowl of water, although this did nothing to ease the pain. That was the only unusual thing to happen that night.
Tara's hand immersed in water is a link to Archimedes 'Eureka' moment, and gives the series its title, the author noting "however, she has to take a long journey towards understanding, while Archimedes only had to submerge himself for a moment to gain insight into how to calculate volume" (from an ), although Balle herself seems unclear if this was or was not a crucial moment, and indeed one of the interesting things in this Volume, and the work generally, is the sense of a writer working through the implications of their ideas, alongside Tara, as each writes.
But when she wakes the next morning it is November 18th again, as she realised at the hotel breakfast, first noticing that the newspapers are the ones she read yesterday: It was only when one of the hotel’s other guests dropped a piece of bread on the floor that I began to worry. Not because I don’t know that this sort of thing happens again and again in hotels all over the world, but because the same guest had dropped a piece of bread at that same spot the day before.
Unlike Groundhog Day, Tara is free to escape the confines of Paris, and, crucially she doesn't start each day physically renewed, her burn healing rather than disappearing, even though she doesn't reenact the accident: This is the 121st time I have lived through the eighteenth of November and the burn is still visible as a slender scar on my hand. It started out as an angry, puffy weal. This soon began to weep, then a long, brownish scab formed over it. Little by little the scab loosened and fell off, leaving a shiny pink mark.
Her initial reaction on that first repeated day is to call Thomas, explain what had happened, and, both rather confused, return to him and their house in Clairon-sous-Bois. But when they both wake the next morning, it is November 18th again, and he has no memory of their conversation and indeed can't understand how she can be there given she was in Paris on the night of the 17th.
He didn’t doubt that I was telling the truth. He had spoken to me and had forgotten it. That was what scared him. It was one thing for me to have encountered a fracture in the normal progression of time, but the idea that he had played a part in my day and that he had had conversations and done things he could not remember obviously gave him the same feelings of faintness and unease which I had had when I saw that slice of bread drifting floorward. That strange moment when the ground under one’s feet falls away and all at once it feels as though all predictability can be suspended, as though an existential red alert has suddenly been triggered, a quiet state of panic which prompts neither flight nor cries for help, and does not call for police, fire brigade or ambulance ... that something which cannot happen and which we absolutely do not expect, is nonetheless a possibility. That time stands still. That gravity is suspended. That the logic of the world and the laws of nature break down. That we are forced to acknowledge that our expectations about the constancy of the world are on shaky ground. There are no guarantees and behind all that we ordinarily regard as certain lie improbable exceptions, sudden cracks and inconceivable breaches of the usual laws.
[which is an aside, is rather how most of us are feeling about the world in the new US administration]
At first, she starts each day explaining her predicament to Thomas (who doesn't doubt her, and who she is easily able in any case to convince with predictions of certain external events such as a neighbour passing by) and the two try to work through the implications of what has happened, and is happening, although only she retains memories of where they had got to in their thinking in previous days.
We could not find the mistake. We could not find the reason why time had fallen apart. There was no reason. I could not find a reason, Thomas could not find a reason. We could find patterns and we could find inconsistencies. Thomas was the pattern, I was disturbance.
We devised theories and frameworks which we compared to the events of the eighteenth of November. We debated perceptions of reality and mental dysfunctions, we considered whether I might be generating trains of fictional experiences or whether everyone else had been struck by some form of amnesia, or whether we had stepped into a wave of psychological incongruence. We propounded theories and mounted counterarguments. We read about parataxic views of time and variable chronometry, we unearthed descriptions of fractures in time and chronotoxic recurrence. We explored theories on parallel universes, multiple worlds and relative temporal structures. We found stories of the morphology of memory and of rare cases of amnesiac chronopathy. We discussed theories of repetition and mnemonic defects. We studied mental processes, the objects of the world, temporal sequences. We collected theories and explanations. Actually, though, we had no shortage of explanations, we had plenty of those, but explanations which could stand up to critical scrutiny and at the same time embody all our many observations, those we could not find.
And meanwhile she tries to prolong that sense of waking each morning, unsure if it really is November 18th
I don’t think it was an act of will, but slowly and almost imperceptibly I managed to extend my sense of neutral, indefinite morning. I concentrated it, intensified that pale-gray awakening and with each morning I found it possible to carry that sensation with me further into the day. After only a few mornings I could hold onto the moment long enough for it to encompass everything in the room around me: the bed linens and Thomas’s body beside me, the wall behind the bed and the wardrobe on the other side of the room, a chair with clothes on it, the morning light, the faint sound of a chimney flue door rattling in the wind. These are familiar sounds and sensations and it is still an ordinary morning, it is spacious and open, and I lie in bed while fragments of the world drift in and dissolve: a brief riff of birdsong, a blackbird defying the gray skies or a robin singing into a pause in the rain, three or four notes to start with, then six or seven, then eight, and each one as it burst forth dissolving in my fog.
But as time goes on, around the 76th day, she realises this is getting nowhere - "I stood in the kitchen with the notebook in my hand and knew that too many days had come between us" - and starts to withdraw, moving to a spare room, and trying to conceal her presence from Philip, observing but not interacting with him, as he goes about his daily routine, one which, of course, never varies.
She also develops their theory that "Thomas was the pattern, I was disturbance" to another "Thomas is the ghost and I am the monster", as she realises that while his actions leave no trace on the day (food he eats is there to be eaten the next day), that's not true of her own actions, realising that the local supermarket is gradually becoming depleted.
And as the 366th day approaches - the day that had time progressed normally would be, once again, November 18th of the following year - she decides to return to Paris and Philip's shop, reasoning that she may be able to break out of the cycle somehow. But given this is Volume I of VII it doesn't need a spoiler alert to say things don't work out that way.
This isn't a novel for those looking for science-fiction like explanations of what may have happened, but what distinguishes it is the wonderful prose, in Haveland's exceptional translation, and, as mentioned previously the sense of an author working through her ideas - on his Substack, appositely describes the novel as "Groundhog Day written by Rachel Cusk."
It's something of a frustating choice for a prize list, as this does feel like part of a larger work, rather than a whole, but still a fascinating choice, and this passes the test that I immediately wanted to read Volume II.
The judges' take
On the Calculation of Volume I takes a potentially familiar narrative trope � a protagonist inexplicably stuck in the same day � and transforms it into a profound meditation on love, connectedness and what it means to exist, to want to be alive, to need to share one’s time with others. The sheer quality of the sentences was what struck us most, rendered into English with deft, invisible musicality by the translator. This book presses its mood, its singular time signature and its philosophical depth into the reader. You feel you are in it, which is sometimes unnerving, sometimes soothing, and this effect lingers long after the book is finished.
January 2, 2024
Fin och filosofisk men aningens för långsam och repetitiv för min smak. Jag vill så gärna gilla det, men jag kan inte låta bli att känna att det blir lite tråkigt i längden.
December 13, 2024
Kokia gera idėja � Tara Selter įstringa lapkričio 18 dienoje. Sėdėjo sau Paryžiuj, o laikas kažkodėl sulūžo. Iš pradžių bandė surasti priežastį ir perprasti „schemą�, tačiau veltui. Gyvenimas eina toliau, o aplinkybės nesikeičia � ji tampa vaiduokliu savo pasaulyje. Kasdien kartojasi žmonių nuostabos, jų rutina ir ta pati lapkričio bjauruma. Tara vis dar ten.
Solvej Balle apie tai rašo septynių dalių kūrinį. Dėsto skaidriai, atmosferiškai, todėl su Tara lengva išbūti jos eilinėje lapkričio 18-oje. Iš pradžių mąsčiau, kad „Apie tūrio apskaičiavimą� yra savotiška studija, apmąstanti šiuolaikinio žmogaus nerimą, tačiau pasakojimas nuolat mirgėjo įvairiais aspektais � socialiniu, egzistenciniu, filosofiniu, poetiniu. Jis liūdnas, bet nedepresyvus: kartotės ir ritmas įkalina, bet gali padėti išsipildyti. Tas pojūtis įkvepia. O taip pat skaityti literatūrą � pasirodo, dar įmanoma iš musės sukurti gerą dramblį.
Ir šiaip sveika tokius laiką stabdančius tekstus skaityti greiteigiame pasaulyje. Labai laukiu antros dalies. Man buvo atradimas, rekomenduoju.
Solvej Balle apie tai rašo septynių dalių kūrinį. Dėsto skaidriai, atmosferiškai, todėl su Tara lengva išbūti jos eilinėje lapkričio 18-oje. Iš pradžių mąsčiau, kad „Apie tūrio apskaičiavimą� yra savotiška studija, apmąstanti šiuolaikinio žmogaus nerimą, tačiau pasakojimas nuolat mirgėjo įvairiais aspektais � socialiniu, egzistenciniu, filosofiniu, poetiniu. Jis liūdnas, bet nedepresyvus: kartotės ir ritmas įkalina, bet gali padėti išsipildyti. Tas pojūtis įkvepia. O taip pat skaityti literatūrą � pasirodo, dar įmanoma iš musės sukurti gerą dramblį.
Ir šiaip sveika tokius laiką stabdančius tekstus skaityti greiteigiame pasaulyje. Labai laukiu antros dalies. Man buvo atradimas, rekomenduoju.
March 1, 2025
Nominiert für den international Booker Prize 2025
Eines der stärksten Leseerlebnisse, das ich bisher in diesem Jahr 2024) hatte, übertroffen nur von Katharina Winkler, die mich mit Blauschmuck und Siebenmeilenherz völlig weggeblasen hat und immer noch nachwirkt, aber noch vor Claire Keegan (Foster) und Emily St. John Mandel (Das Meer der letzten Ruhe), die ich allesamt großartig fand. Keegan hat mehr Herzschmerz und Mandel mehr Action, aber
was alle gemeinsam haben, ist der sorgfältige Umgang mit Sprache.
Worte, Sätze geschliffen und angespitzt. Der nächste Satz wird immer schon mitgedacht, sodass die Übergänge fließend bleiben. Wie beim Autofahren mit DSG Automatikgetriebe, völlig ruckelfrei beim Beschleunigen und Runterbremsen.
Bei Solvej Balle schätze ich zudem ihre Fähigkeit, schöne Sätze zu formulieren ohne künstliches Aufblasen von Metaphern. Metaphern kommen viele vor, aber sie sind im Fluss und ganz authentisch, folgen den Gedanken der Heldin, die Orientierung und Erklärungen für das Unmögliche sucht. Sie verwendet die Ich-Perspektive, als Leser folge ich ihren Wahrnehmungen ganz unmittelbar, was sie sieht, hört, schmeckt, riecht, ich bin in ihren Gedanken und in der Unruhe oder Gelassenheit, die Wahrnehmung und Gedanken auslösen.
Atmosphärisch hat es gewisse Parallelen zu Mandel, aber noch viel stärker hat sich mir die Assoziation mit Marlen Haushofers „Die Wand� aufgedrängt. Allerdings besser geschrieben, atemloser, während die Wand doch auch langatmige Stellen hat.
Die Berechnung des Rauminhalts I habe ich gestern nachts beendet und die Geschichte hämmerte gefühlt eine weitere Stunde in meinem Kopf, bevor ich einschlafen konnte. Sie öffnet Räume im Kopf, die man nicht unbedingt betreten wollte, das klaustrophobische Gefühl gefangen zu sein, gefangen in der Zeit und gleichzeitig die Freiheiten, die diese Situation ermöglicht �. im Kopf rattert die Geschichte weiter, dennoch kann ich sagen, ich muss die Folgebände nicht sofort lesen, um zu erfahren wie es weitergeht; Band 1 ist in sich abgeschlossen genug, um eine Atempause einlegen zu können. Aber ich will die Folgebände lesen! Unbedingt! Wenn auch nicht sofort.
Das bringt mich zum einzigen Wermutstropfen an der Sache. Bisher sind 5 Bände (3 auf deutsch) erschienen (und wahrscheinlich werden es noch mehr) und es ist abzusehen, dass die Kernfragen nicht gelöst werden, solange die Serie nicht beendet ist (und vielleicht auch dann nicht, denn welche befriedigenden Antworten für die aus den Fugen geratene Zeit sollte es denn geben?).
Das heißt vorläufig 5 Bände a 22 Euro. Macht in Summe 110 Euro für nicht ganz 1000 Seiten, die ja rein theoretisch auch in einem kompletten Band erscheinen könnten. Man könnte das aus Marketingperspektive als ziemlich frechen Geniestreich sehen, wirtschaftlich betrachtet werden die Einnahmen fast verdreifacht, ich hoffe die Autorin hat auch was davon. Neu ist das ja nicht, es scheint sogar ein gewisser Trend zu sein und als Leser kommt es mir in gewisser Weise auch entgegen, da ich vor 1000 Seiten Büchern meist zurückschrecke.
Und so gesehen ist es auch wieder fair, denn so kann jeder für einen moderaten Preis in die Geschichte eintauchen und dann zu entscheiden ob man weitertauchen will.
Also schlucke ich den Wermutstropfen gerne, denn das muss ich nochmal betonen, man muss die Folgebände nicht lesen, um vollen Genuss an dem ersten Band zu haben. Das ist eine Parallele zu Knausgards Morgenstern, wobei bei diesem die Notwendigkeit die Folgebände zu lesen, noch viel weniger ausgeprägt ist.
Eines der stärksten Leseerlebnisse, das ich bisher in diesem Jahr 2024) hatte, übertroffen nur von Katharina Winkler, die mich mit Blauschmuck und Siebenmeilenherz völlig weggeblasen hat und immer noch nachwirkt, aber noch vor Claire Keegan (Foster) und Emily St. John Mandel (Das Meer der letzten Ruhe), die ich allesamt großartig fand. Keegan hat mehr Herzschmerz und Mandel mehr Action, aber
was alle gemeinsam haben, ist der sorgfältige Umgang mit Sprache.
Worte, Sätze geschliffen und angespitzt. Der nächste Satz wird immer schon mitgedacht, sodass die Übergänge fließend bleiben. Wie beim Autofahren mit DSG Automatikgetriebe, völlig ruckelfrei beim Beschleunigen und Runterbremsen.
Bei Solvej Balle schätze ich zudem ihre Fähigkeit, schöne Sätze zu formulieren ohne künstliches Aufblasen von Metaphern. Metaphern kommen viele vor, aber sie sind im Fluss und ganz authentisch, folgen den Gedanken der Heldin, die Orientierung und Erklärungen für das Unmögliche sucht. Sie verwendet die Ich-Perspektive, als Leser folge ich ihren Wahrnehmungen ganz unmittelbar, was sie sieht, hört, schmeckt, riecht, ich bin in ihren Gedanken und in der Unruhe oder Gelassenheit, die Wahrnehmung und Gedanken auslösen.
Atmosphärisch hat es gewisse Parallelen zu Mandel, aber noch viel stärker hat sich mir die Assoziation mit Marlen Haushofers „Die Wand� aufgedrängt. Allerdings besser geschrieben, atemloser, während die Wand doch auch langatmige Stellen hat.
Die Berechnung des Rauminhalts I habe ich gestern nachts beendet und die Geschichte hämmerte gefühlt eine weitere Stunde in meinem Kopf, bevor ich einschlafen konnte. Sie öffnet Räume im Kopf, die man nicht unbedingt betreten wollte, das klaustrophobische Gefühl gefangen zu sein, gefangen in der Zeit und gleichzeitig die Freiheiten, die diese Situation ermöglicht �. im Kopf rattert die Geschichte weiter, dennoch kann ich sagen, ich muss die Folgebände nicht sofort lesen, um zu erfahren wie es weitergeht; Band 1 ist in sich abgeschlossen genug, um eine Atempause einlegen zu können. Aber ich will die Folgebände lesen! Unbedingt! Wenn auch nicht sofort.
Das bringt mich zum einzigen Wermutstropfen an der Sache. Bisher sind 5 Bände (3 auf deutsch) erschienen (und wahrscheinlich werden es noch mehr) und es ist abzusehen, dass die Kernfragen nicht gelöst werden, solange die Serie nicht beendet ist (und vielleicht auch dann nicht, denn welche befriedigenden Antworten für die aus den Fugen geratene Zeit sollte es denn geben?).
Das heißt vorläufig 5 Bände a 22 Euro. Macht in Summe 110 Euro für nicht ganz 1000 Seiten, die ja rein theoretisch auch in einem kompletten Band erscheinen könnten. Man könnte das aus Marketingperspektive als ziemlich frechen Geniestreich sehen, wirtschaftlich betrachtet werden die Einnahmen fast verdreifacht, ich hoffe die Autorin hat auch was davon. Neu ist das ja nicht, es scheint sogar ein gewisser Trend zu sein und als Leser kommt es mir in gewisser Weise auch entgegen, da ich vor 1000 Seiten Büchern meist zurückschrecke.
Und so gesehen ist es auch wieder fair, denn so kann jeder für einen moderaten Preis in die Geschichte eintauchen und dann zu entscheiden ob man weitertauchen will.
Also schlucke ich den Wermutstropfen gerne, denn das muss ich nochmal betonen, man muss die Folgebände nicht lesen, um vollen Genuss an dem ersten Band zu haben. Das ist eine Parallele zu Knausgards Morgenstern, wobei bei diesem die Notwendigkeit die Folgebände zu lesen, noch viel weniger ausgeprägt ist.
August 26, 2024
Die Bücher haben mich stark an einen Film aus meiner Kindheit erinnert, und zwar an die US-amerikanische Filmkomödie „Und täglich grüßt das Murmeltier� aus dem Jahr 1993. Der zynische TV-Wetteransager Phil Connors erlebt darin täglich wiederkehrend den 2. Februar, an dem in der Kleinstadt Punxsutawney der Tag des Murmeltiers gefeiert wird. Ekelpaket Phil wird erst wieder in den 3. Februar entlassen, als aus ihm ein freundlich zugewandter Zeitgenosse geworden ist.
Der Plot von „Über die Berechnung des Rauminhalts� erinnert an den Filmklassiker, aber damit enden die Parallelen auch schon. Die Dänin Solvej Balle hat eine Romanreihe über die Unwägbarkeiten des Lebens geschrieben, die ebenso verstörend wie klug anmutet.
Die Antiquarin Tara Selter aus der (fiktiven) französischen Kleinstadt Clairon-sous-Bois ist in einer Zeitschleife gefangen und erlebt den 18. November wieder und wieder. Sie gewöhnt sich nur widerwillig an den Gedanken, dass „die ganze Vorhersagbarkeit der Welt� plötzlich aus den Angeln gehoben ist. Ihr wird die fehlende Konstanz von Zeit und Raum bewusst:
„Und hinter all dem, was wir gewöhnlich als sicher annehmen, liegen unwahrscheinliche Ausnahmen, plötzliche Risse und unvorstellbare Gesetzesbrüche.�
Würdet Ihr die Möglichkeit nutzen, einen Tag im Leben nochmal erleben zu können, wenn sie bestände? Ist es eher eine Verlockung oder Horrorvorstellung, ein wahr gewordener Albtraum? Für mich ist diese Vorstellung eine Verlockung, löst aber gleichzeitig auch Unbehagen in mir aus - letztendlich ist die Singularität der Zeit wahrscheinlich doch ein segensreiches Faktum. Es mutet doch ziemlich unheimlich an, dass der gleiche Tag immer wiederkehrt und es keinen zeitlichen Fortschritt gibt. Aber diese Vision ist eher unwahrscheinlich - oder vielleicht doch nicht?!
Tara zweifelt am Anfang der Geschichte an ihrem Verstand und sucht gemeinsam mit ihrem Mann Thomas nach Auswegen aus der Zeitschleife. Aber letztlich führt der weitere Verlauf zu einer Akzeptanz der Situation ihrerseits. Doch zahlt sie einen hohen Preis dafür - die Entfremdung von ihrem Ehemann, die mit Fortschreiten der Bücher immer stärkere Ausprägungen annimmt. Sie setzt ihre ganze Hoffnung in den Tag, an dem sich die Zeitverschiebung jährt.
Mehr möchte ich nicht über das Ende des Auftakts des Romanzyklus verraten. Mir war bis zur letzten Seite nicht klar, warum die Ich-Erzählerin Tara in dieser Zeitanomalie gefangen ist. Und auch nicht, wie sie wieder zurück in die Normalität finden könnte.
Ich habe Taras Gedankenwelt in allen Stufen ihrer Verzweiflung, die Solvej Balle hier erschaffen hat, als philosophisch und einfühlsam zugleich empfunden.
Besonders beeindruckend beschrieben von Solvej Balle fand ich die Entwicklung Taras über die drei Bücher hinweg und die pointierte Integration von Elementen des Magischen Realismus. Ein ganz großes Stück Literatur. Die Bücher werden mich so schnell nicht loslassen und ich erwarte voller Ungeduld die Erscheinung von Teil vier.
Der Plot von „Über die Berechnung des Rauminhalts� erinnert an den Filmklassiker, aber damit enden die Parallelen auch schon. Die Dänin Solvej Balle hat eine Romanreihe über die Unwägbarkeiten des Lebens geschrieben, die ebenso verstörend wie klug anmutet.
Die Antiquarin Tara Selter aus der (fiktiven) französischen Kleinstadt Clairon-sous-Bois ist in einer Zeitschleife gefangen und erlebt den 18. November wieder und wieder. Sie gewöhnt sich nur widerwillig an den Gedanken, dass „die ganze Vorhersagbarkeit der Welt� plötzlich aus den Angeln gehoben ist. Ihr wird die fehlende Konstanz von Zeit und Raum bewusst:
„Und hinter all dem, was wir gewöhnlich als sicher annehmen, liegen unwahrscheinliche Ausnahmen, plötzliche Risse und unvorstellbare Gesetzesbrüche.�
Würdet Ihr die Möglichkeit nutzen, einen Tag im Leben nochmal erleben zu können, wenn sie bestände? Ist es eher eine Verlockung oder Horrorvorstellung, ein wahr gewordener Albtraum? Für mich ist diese Vorstellung eine Verlockung, löst aber gleichzeitig auch Unbehagen in mir aus - letztendlich ist die Singularität der Zeit wahrscheinlich doch ein segensreiches Faktum. Es mutet doch ziemlich unheimlich an, dass der gleiche Tag immer wiederkehrt und es keinen zeitlichen Fortschritt gibt. Aber diese Vision ist eher unwahrscheinlich - oder vielleicht doch nicht?!
Tara zweifelt am Anfang der Geschichte an ihrem Verstand und sucht gemeinsam mit ihrem Mann Thomas nach Auswegen aus der Zeitschleife. Aber letztlich führt der weitere Verlauf zu einer Akzeptanz der Situation ihrerseits. Doch zahlt sie einen hohen Preis dafür - die Entfremdung von ihrem Ehemann, die mit Fortschreiten der Bücher immer stärkere Ausprägungen annimmt. Sie setzt ihre ganze Hoffnung in den Tag, an dem sich die Zeitverschiebung jährt.
Mehr möchte ich nicht über das Ende des Auftakts des Romanzyklus verraten. Mir war bis zur letzten Seite nicht klar, warum die Ich-Erzählerin Tara in dieser Zeitanomalie gefangen ist. Und auch nicht, wie sie wieder zurück in die Normalität finden könnte.
Ich habe Taras Gedankenwelt in allen Stufen ihrer Verzweiflung, die Solvej Balle hier erschaffen hat, als philosophisch und einfühlsam zugleich empfunden.
Besonders beeindruckend beschrieben von Solvej Balle fand ich die Entwicklung Taras über die drei Bücher hinweg und die pointierte Integration von Elementen des Magischen Realismus. Ein ganz großes Stück Literatur. Die Bücher werden mich so schnell nicht loslassen und ich erwarte voller Ungeduld die Erscheinung von Teil vier.
March 18, 2025
Tara is at a booksellers conference and auction on the 18 November, and she spends the day buying books, meeting up with an old friend and then settling down in her hotel room to call her husband whom she will travel back to see the following day. But she never gets to the following day. She wakes up again on the morning of 18 November. And again, and again, and again.
This was an absolutely stunning book that I flew through and am obsessed with. Although it seems like your typical Groundhog Day plot, it tackles sadness and loneliness head on in that Tara has to explain her loop in time to her husband every morning and watch his memories vanish each time the day resets. We watch her experiment with the fracture in time as she wonders why some objects ‘stick� and other objects are magically whisked back to their original place once the day starts over again. It has a very slight speculative feel to the plot but the musings on philosophy and isolation are absolutely beautiful.
I can’t wait to read the second volume and I am just astounded at how excited I am to read about one woman living the same day over and over again. It is wonderfully constructed and characterised and I feel it is going to leave me heartbroken by the end of the saga. Cannot recommend this enough and hope it gets its deserved recognition on the International Booker Prize 2025.
This was an absolutely stunning book that I flew through and am obsessed with. Although it seems like your typical Groundhog Day plot, it tackles sadness and loneliness head on in that Tara has to explain her loop in time to her husband every morning and watch his memories vanish each time the day resets. We watch her experiment with the fracture in time as she wonders why some objects ‘stick� and other objects are magically whisked back to their original place once the day starts over again. It has a very slight speculative feel to the plot but the musings on philosophy and isolation are absolutely beautiful.
I can’t wait to read the second volume and I am just astounded at how excited I am to read about one woman living the same day over and over again. It is wonderfully constructed and characterised and I feel it is going to leave me heartbroken by the end of the saga. Cannot recommend this enough and hope it gets its deserved recognition on the International Booker Prize 2025.
January 6, 2025
Obras que brincam com a volatilidade do tempo usualmente são curiosas, seja as clássicas como de Mann, seja aquelas no terreno do sci-fi como de Mandel. No caso da escritora dinamarquesa, Solvej Balle, o mistério do tempo e de sua estagnação está precisamente no loop de um dia específico e no seu impacto na vida da protagonista.
Sem compreender como o dia 18 de novembro segue se repetindo diariamente, após cansativas tentativas de desvendar o mistério daquele dia com o marido, a protagonista parte sozinha para o mesmo lugar, a um ano de distância para tentar encontrar alguma alteração ou possibilidade de fuga do dia interminável, notando padrões e rupturas em diferentes dias 18, em uma jornada que parece estar longe de acabar.
Embora dê ao leitor poucos sinais do que está ocorrendo, a leitura é misteriosa do início ao fim, sendo completamente instigante, em especial o final e o mistério do tempo, de maneira que quem gosta de mistério e seja paciente, possa vir a gostar da obra. Quanto a mim, adorei a leitura, que foi mais uma excelente indicação de um amigo querido do ŷ.
Sem compreender como o dia 18 de novembro segue se repetindo diariamente, após cansativas tentativas de desvendar o mistério daquele dia com o marido, a protagonista parte sozinha para o mesmo lugar, a um ano de distância para tentar encontrar alguma alteração ou possibilidade de fuga do dia interminável, notando padrões e rupturas em diferentes dias 18, em uma jornada que parece estar longe de acabar.
Embora dê ao leitor poucos sinais do que está ocorrendo, a leitura é misteriosa do início ao fim, sendo completamente instigante, em especial o final e o mistério do tempo, de maneira que quem gosta de mistério e seja paciente, possa vir a gostar da obra. Quanto a mim, adorei a leitura, que foi mais uma excelente indicação de um amigo querido do ŷ.
Shelved as 'sampled'
December 11, 2024Compare/contrast with the entertaining, funny, surprisingly philosophical and sometimes dark/outrageous Andy Samberg/Cristin Milioti rom-com "Palm Springs" (2020, on Netflix). This is pretty much the opposite. Read about 75 pages and couldn't stop an impulse to skim. Interesting at first but then quickly less so. A good concept for a literary novel, repetition of the day to day, but too hung up on its own logistics? Didn't feel free -- feels trapped by its conceit (which is maybe the point, to induce a similar trapped feeling in the reader, but still). Love ND but this one's not for me.
March 28, 2025
On the Calculation of Volume I - Solvej Balle
اقتباس من الرواية:
"في كل ليلة عندما أستلقي للنوم على السرير في غرفة الضيوف يكون اليوم هو الثامن عشر من نوفمبر وفي كل صباح عندما أستيقظ يكون الثامن عشر من نوفمبر. لم أعد أتوقع الاستيقاظ في التاسع عشر من نوفمبر ولم أعد أتذكر السابع عشر من نوفمبر."
~
تعلق تارا، في اليوم الثامن عشر من نوفمبر بلا نهاية...
تبدو وكأنها خرجت من قطار الزمن، وتعلق هناك وحيدة ولا تشهد تغير الأيام والأسابيع والشهور والفصول، لا يتذكرها أحد ولكنها تتذكر كل شيء، تغدو وتروح وتخطط وتقول لزوجها ولكن لا يتغير شيء...
نعيش مع تارا خوفها وارتباكها ولحظات الملل والأمل واليأس، وتأثيرها الصغير في العالم وما حولها.
الفكرة جذابة لكن الرواية ككل كانت مملة بعد تجاوز الثلث الأول...
الرواية من الروايات المرشحة لبوكر العالمية؛ وهي الجزء الأول من سلسلة، لذا ربما تتحسن مع الوقت وخاصة وأني كنت أتطلع للفصل التالي حين انتهت الرواية ... غالبًا سأقرأ الجزء الثاني قريبًا فقط لأعرف ماذا ستفعل تارا لاحقًا وماذا سيحدث.
اقتباس من الرواية:
"في كل ليلة عندما أستلقي للنوم على السرير في غرفة الضيوف يكون اليوم هو الثامن عشر من نوفمبر وفي كل صباح عندما أستيقظ يكون الثامن عشر من نوفمبر. لم أعد أتوقع الاستيقاظ في التاسع عشر من نوفمبر ولم أعد أتذكر السابع عشر من نوفمبر."
~
تعلق تارا، في اليوم الثامن عشر من نوفمبر بلا نهاية...
تبدو وكأنها خرجت من قطار الزمن، وتعلق هناك وحيدة ولا تشهد تغير الأيام والأسابيع والشهور والفصول، لا يتذكرها أحد ولكنها تتذكر كل شيء، تغدو وتروح وتخطط وتقول لزوجها ولكن لا يتغير شيء...
نعيش مع تارا خوفها وارتباكها ولحظات الملل والأمل واليأس، وتأثيرها الصغير في العالم وما حولها.
الفكرة جذابة لكن الرواية ككل كانت مملة بعد تجاوز الثلث الأول...
الرواية من الروايات المرشحة لبوكر العالمية؛ وهي الجزء الأول من سلسلة، لذا ربما تتحسن مع الوقت وخاصة وأني كنت أتطلع للفصل التالي حين انتهت الرواية ... غالبًا سأقرأ الجزء الثاني قريبًا فقط لأعرف ماذا ستفعل تارا لاحقًا وماذا سيحدث.
December 20, 2024
It is such an accomplishment to make a novel about a woman living through the exact same day, 365 days in a row, feel this intensely gripping and enthralling. Read this in one sitting—the language is so simple and clear and lovely, simultaneously unelaborated and very beautiful.
There are also some very touching depictions of love and companionship, years into a marriage, which feels rare! So much out there about young love, and much less about the love that develops and sediments itself into the soul.
There are also some very touching depictions of love and companionship, years into a marriage, which feels rare! So much out there about young love, and much less about the love that develops and sediments itself into the soul.
December 5, 2024
Tara Selter tik išvyko į aukcioną įsigyti senų knygų, kurias su vyru Tomu vėliau perparduos. Dar išrinko jam dovanų Antonino Pijaus sesterciją draugų antikvariate. Bet pernakvojus viešbutyje Tarai laikas ėmė ir užlūžo, sustojo ties lapkričio 18 diena. Pas Tomą grįžti jai pavyksta ir tą laiko išsinėrimą paaiškinti lyg ir išeina, bet vienintelė Tara supranta, kad diena kartojasi, o kiti iš ryto prabunda viską pamiršę. Tai dabar jai belieka žymėtis brūkšnelius � skaičiuoti pasikartojančias dienas ir galvoti, kaip iš tos laiko kilpos ištrūkti.
Knyga gana meditatyvi � Tara turi sočiai laiko įsigilinti į besikartojančias dienos smulkmenas, pavyzdžiui, išgirsti, kaip sieną perbraukia laiptais besileidžiančio mylimo žmogaus ranka. Bet kai ta aplinkos stebėsena ir pasvarstymai, rodos, jau pabos, autorė sugeba laiku susivaldyti, įterpti pokyčių ir išlaikyti intrigą. Knygoje kalbama ne tik apie užstrigusį laiką, bet ir apie tai, ką vis atidėliojam daryti: pavyzdžiui, pagyventi kitokiuose namuose arba nusipirkti teleskopą.
Tekstas išverstas ir suredaguotas sklandžiai ir natūraliai, manau, kad gerai girdėjau pasakotojos balsą. Knygos puslapiai švelnūs, patiko viršelio kremiškumas. Formatas nedidelis, perskaitoma greitai, bet čia tik pirmoji septologijos dalis. Tai dabar jau ir aš galiu laukti užstrigęs, kol FB vėl pamatysiu vertėjos nuotrauką fotely, kur ji sėdės prieblandoj ir rankose laikys knygą. Bet ten gali būti ir ta pati dalis.
Knyga gana meditatyvi � Tara turi sočiai laiko įsigilinti į besikartojančias dienos smulkmenas, pavyzdžiui, išgirsti, kaip sieną perbraukia laiptais besileidžiančio mylimo žmogaus ranka. Bet kai ta aplinkos stebėsena ir pasvarstymai, rodos, jau pabos, autorė sugeba laiku susivaldyti, įterpti pokyčių ir išlaikyti intrigą. Knygoje kalbama ne tik apie užstrigusį laiką, bet ir apie tai, ką vis atidėliojam daryti: pavyzdžiui, pagyventi kitokiuose namuose arba nusipirkti teleskopą.
Tekstas išverstas ir suredaguotas sklandžiai ir natūraliai, manau, kad gerai girdėjau pasakotojos balsą. Knygos puslapiai švelnūs, patiko viršelio kremiškumas. Formatas nedidelis, perskaitoma greitai, bet čia tik pirmoji septologijos dalis. Tai dabar jau ir aš galiu laukti užstrigęs, kol FB vėl pamatysiu vertėjos nuotrauką fotely, kur ji sėdės prieblandoj ir rankose laikys knygą. Bet ten gali būti ir ta pati dalis.
June 20, 2023
Alsof een kok tot in de kleinste details aan je uitlegt hoe hij een gerecht maakt zonder dat je het uiteindelijk op je bord krijgt en mag proeven. Alsof je een voorwoord op een roman leest waarin de worldbuilding uit de doeken wordt gedaan en men de eigenlijke roman is vergeten toevoegen.
Cruciaal bij dit soort groundhog day- verhaal is beklemming, betovering, magnetiserend enigma, beklijving. Ik lees overal dat het boek claustrofobisch is maar dat zegt men omdat de schrijfster 220 blz lang alles uit de kast haalt om te bewijzen dat het verhaal nu eenmaal claustrofobisch is. 99% tell, 1% show. In die zin is dit de tegenhanger van De muur van Marlen Haushofer, waarin de schrijfster er de godganse tijd -zonder (dat het lijkt) al te veel moeite te doen- in slaagt om onder je huid te pulken.
Ik heb niet ontdekt waarom dit boek moest geschreven worden of wat ik eruit kan halen. 220 blz van uitzoeken waarom de dag zich steeds herhaalt, is all meta no narrative. En is saai. Ze doet op psychologisch en filosofische niveau bitterweinig met dit fascinerende principe.
Het ergste: ik geloofde het niet.
(Ik lees ooit nog wel deel 7 om het einde te vernemen ;-))
Cruciaal bij dit soort groundhog day- verhaal is beklemming, betovering, magnetiserend enigma, beklijving. Ik lees overal dat het boek claustrofobisch is maar dat zegt men omdat de schrijfster 220 blz lang alles uit de kast haalt om te bewijzen dat het verhaal nu eenmaal claustrofobisch is. 99% tell, 1% show. In die zin is dit de tegenhanger van De muur van Marlen Haushofer, waarin de schrijfster er de godganse tijd -zonder (dat het lijkt) al te veel moeite te doen- in slaagt om onder je huid te pulken.
Ik heb niet ontdekt waarom dit boek moest geschreven worden of wat ik eruit kan halen. 220 blz van uitzoeken waarom de dag zich steeds herhaalt, is all meta no narrative. En is saai. Ze doet op psychologisch en filosofische niveau bitterweinig met dit fascinerende principe.
Het ergste: ik geloofde het niet.
(Ik lees ooit nog wel deel 7 om het einde te vernemen ;-))
November 4, 2024
This is the first instalment of a seven-part series of novels about a woman, Tara Selter, who wakes up every day on 18 November. Somewhere during the night, things are reset and return to how they were at dawn on the 18th. And so the day endlessly repeats itself, in a loop, with only Tara noticing and growing older and trying to escape, but also somehow enjoying the monotony of everyday life and the intimate knowledge of each and every sound.
As you read, the hope of an escape - or at least some development towards solving the mystery - is always in the back of your mind, as she enlists the help of her partner or returns to place where it all started...but deep down you know the pleasure of a solution is probably not going to be granted.
Solvej Balle is a Danish novelist that I had not heard of before, but apparently enjoyed some success in the nineties with works inspired by Kafka and Borges. This 'Calculation of Volume' series is said to be her big comeback.
I enjoyed it a lot and am quite eager to get to Part 2, but I wonder if I will have the patience to sit it out until Part 7...
As you read, the hope of an escape - or at least some development towards solving the mystery - is always in the back of your mind, as she enlists the help of her partner or returns to place where it all started...but deep down you know the pleasure of a solution is probably not going to be granted.
Solvej Balle is a Danish novelist that I had not heard of before, but apparently enjoyed some success in the nineties with works inspired by Kafka and Borges. This 'Calculation of Volume' series is said to be her big comeback.
I enjoyed it a lot and am quite eager to get to Part 2, but I wonder if I will have the patience to sit it out until Part 7...
January 5, 2023
Præmisset for denne helt specielle roman(serie) er, at hovedpersonen sidder fast i tiden � den 18. november kommer igen og igen og igen. For hende. Ikke for resten af verden. Efterhånden som Balle udruller konsekvenserne af sådan en tidsforskydning, bliver man som læser helt svimmel! Oven i købet er hullet i tiden så faktisk ikke helt konsistent, hvilket gør både hovedpersonen og læseren endnu mere forvirret.
Når jeg giver fire og ikke fem stjerner, skyldes det, at bogen rører mere ved mit intellekt end ved mit hjerte. Det kan nok nå at ændre sig � jeg bestiller i hvert fald næste bind på biblioteket.
Når jeg giver fire og ikke fem stjerner, skyldes det, at bogen rører mere ved mit intellekt end ved mit hjerte. Det kan nok nå at ændre sig � jeg bestiller i hvert fald næste bind på biblioteket.
April 13, 2025
“𝘌𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯� 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘢𝘮𝘦, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘧𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘳 𝘥𝘦𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘭𝘴…� 𝘥𝘪𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘧𝘭𝘰𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩 𝘢 𝘳𝘦𝘱𝘭𝘦𝘵𝘦 𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘦, 𝘐 𝘥𝘪𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘴𝘸𝘪𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩 𝘢𝘯 𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘢𝘯 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘶𝘵𝘦 𝘥𝘦𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘭 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘐 𝘩𝘢𝘥 𝘯𝘰 𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘢 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘐 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘨𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘨.�
Disappointing in its trite approach through backwashed circling of themes in the horrors and beauty of the mundane. Done in poor Vigdis Hjorth imitation, Balle writes in circular motions, repeating images and themes with such fainted laquer that precision loses its grip on major interest or focus in trying to towards anything worthy of interest.
At its core, it’s mere mirror image of boredom in the time of Corona. The stakes aren’t high enough. The lack of characterization plagues the book. If you strip the book back of its only redeeming factor—the elevator pitch—all you’re left with is a spineless journal of 2020 to 2022 that is supposed to go on for 6 more volumes??? I can tell you now you’re better off watching Murray’s rendition of this. All attempts in trying to resolve the issue of repeating a day over and over again is accomplished in an hour and 41 minutes.
p/s: I would be more than pissed off if this ever converted itself into an Apple TV slowburn miniseries because it’s really quite dull, even in its short form factor.
Disappointing in its trite approach through backwashed circling of themes in the horrors and beauty of the mundane. Done in poor Vigdis Hjorth imitation, Balle writes in circular motions, repeating images and themes with such fainted laquer that precision loses its grip on major interest or focus in trying to towards anything worthy of interest.
At its core, it’s mere mirror image of boredom in the time of Corona. The stakes aren’t high enough. The lack of characterization plagues the book. If you strip the book back of its only redeeming factor—the elevator pitch—all you’re left with is a spineless journal of 2020 to 2022 that is supposed to go on for 6 more volumes??? I can tell you now you’re better off watching Murray’s rendition of this. All attempts in trying to resolve the issue of repeating a day over and over again is accomplished in an hour and 41 minutes.
p/s: I would be more than pissed off if this ever converted itself into an Apple TV slowburn miniseries because it’s really quite dull, even in its short form factor.
March 6, 2025
A partir de uma premissa de da ficção científica, a escritora dinamarquesa Solvej Balle desenvolve uma obra reflexiva, experimental, filosófica e que me envolveu de uma forma que não esperava.
No último dia de sua estadia em Paris para visitar alguns alfarrabistas após ter participado em Bordéus de um leilão de livros raros e de ilustração do século XVIII, os quais comercializa com seu marido a partir de uma pequena cidade no norte da França, ao descer para o café da manhã no hotel em que se encontra hospedada, Tara Selter observa uma cena banal, mas que lhe dá uma sensação de déjà vu: um hospede na mesa ao lado deixa cair uma fatia de pão no chão. Durante o dia, outras situações a levam a ter a mesma sensação até que descobre que o dia em que está é o dia 18 de novembro. Que foi o dia de ontem.
Num primeiro momento, é fácil lembrarmos do filme Groundhog Day (Feitiço do Tempo), em que o meteorologista Phil Connors, interpretado por Bill Murray, se vê preso num loop temporal. No entanto, enquanto o filme é uma comédia romântica com uma mensagem moral, o livro de Balle não se prende a isso e nos leva a refletir sobre questões que na pressa do dia a dia raramente temos tempo de dar atenção, como o isolamento, a solidão, a alteridade, a forma como interagimos com o mundo e dele nos apoderamos, muitas vezes devorando-o sem nos darmos conta que somos apenas um entre bilhões.
O primeiro livro da septologia Sobre o cálculo do volume começou a ser publicada em 2020 quando praticamente o mundo todo se viu às voltas com a necessidade de realizar lockdown. Embora saiba que se trata apenas de uma contingência, visto que em entrevista a autora já disse que a ideia inicial surgiu ainda na década de 1990 e levou anos para que pudesse desenvolver e escrever suas ideias, não pude evitar pensar nos efeitos do confinamento assim que terminei a leitura. Tara tem de aprender a encarar o dia a dia nesse mundo que aparentemente parou de avançar e enfrentar situações similares ao que um confinamento pode representar, não só físico, mas também mental, espiritual, tais como a busca por respostas, a luta para não perder a razão, a procura em equilibrar os seus sentimentos em relação ao que lhe é caro para não se perder e não perder o seu mundo etc.
Essas situações também podem ser vistas no decorrer do livro, tanto na necessidade de Tara estar com o seu marido, como de se esconder, mas também ainda de abandonar para trás a vida que tinha na tentativa de encontrar um caminho de volta ao ciclo do tempo, embora carregue consigo alguns itens, quase talismãs. Como descobrir se algo nos amarra numa determinada situação se não procuramos avançar? Devemos evitar a mudança quando tudo ao nosso redor insiste em permanecer o mesmo? E mesmo quando a mudança é necessária, como proceder? Ou devemos nos adequar à essa névoa que aos poucos vai nos sufocando?
É a partir dessa premissa de um universo que se encontra preso a um dia 18 de novembro, no qual Tara se vê como uma prisioneira consciente e no qual precisa perceber essa nova realidade e como transitar nesse mundo diário, o qual consegue prever quase todos os acontecimentos diários por conhecê-lo tanto e, por isso, tão estranho, que por vezes a obra pode parecer repetitiva e, no entanto, não o é. São reflexões necessárias, saem do lugar comum, por vezes passam ao filosófico, até porque para ela, é necessário entender o mundo como ele se tornou. Não é a toa que a Física é conhecida como Filosofia da Natureza. Para entendermos as razões, precisamos entender os fundamentos. Mesmo que para a Física Quântica a causa tenha pouca importância, sabemos bem que na Física Clássica, a relação de causa e efeito é essencial para entendermos os fenômenos. O que é o tempo, afinal?
Para mim, Sobre o cálculo do volume é um desses livros que parecem não ter mais pretensões a não ser contar uma boa história, mas acabam por ir além. No meu caso, apenas posso dizer que me enfeitiçou! Li-o há meses e ainda permanece vibrando na minha mente.
No último dia de sua estadia em Paris para visitar alguns alfarrabistas após ter participado em Bordéus de um leilão de livros raros e de ilustração do século XVIII, os quais comercializa com seu marido a partir de uma pequena cidade no norte da França, ao descer para o café da manhã no hotel em que se encontra hospedada, Tara Selter observa uma cena banal, mas que lhe dá uma sensação de déjà vu: um hospede na mesa ao lado deixa cair uma fatia de pão no chão. Durante o dia, outras situações a levam a ter a mesma sensação até que descobre que o dia em que está é o dia 18 de novembro. Que foi o dia de ontem.
Num primeiro momento, é fácil lembrarmos do filme Groundhog Day (Feitiço do Tempo), em que o meteorologista Phil Connors, interpretado por Bill Murray, se vê preso num loop temporal. No entanto, enquanto o filme é uma comédia romântica com uma mensagem moral, o livro de Balle não se prende a isso e nos leva a refletir sobre questões que na pressa do dia a dia raramente temos tempo de dar atenção, como o isolamento, a solidão, a alteridade, a forma como interagimos com o mundo e dele nos apoderamos, muitas vezes devorando-o sem nos darmos conta que somos apenas um entre bilhões.
O primeiro livro da septologia Sobre o cálculo do volume começou a ser publicada em 2020 quando praticamente o mundo todo se viu às voltas com a necessidade de realizar lockdown. Embora saiba que se trata apenas de uma contingência, visto que em entrevista a autora já disse que a ideia inicial surgiu ainda na década de 1990 e levou anos para que pudesse desenvolver e escrever suas ideias, não pude evitar pensar nos efeitos do confinamento assim que terminei a leitura. Tara tem de aprender a encarar o dia a dia nesse mundo que aparentemente parou de avançar e enfrentar situações similares ao que um confinamento pode representar, não só físico, mas também mental, espiritual, tais como a busca por respostas, a luta para não perder a razão, a procura em equilibrar os seus sentimentos em relação ao que lhe é caro para não se perder e não perder o seu mundo etc.
Essas situações também podem ser vistas no decorrer do livro, tanto na necessidade de Tara estar com o seu marido, como de se esconder, mas também ainda de abandonar para trás a vida que tinha na tentativa de encontrar um caminho de volta ao ciclo do tempo, embora carregue consigo alguns itens, quase talismãs. Como descobrir se algo nos amarra numa determinada situação se não procuramos avançar? Devemos evitar a mudança quando tudo ao nosso redor insiste em permanecer o mesmo? E mesmo quando a mudança é necessária, como proceder? Ou devemos nos adequar à essa névoa que aos poucos vai nos sufocando?
É a partir dessa premissa de um universo que se encontra preso a um dia 18 de novembro, no qual Tara se vê como uma prisioneira consciente e no qual precisa perceber essa nova realidade e como transitar nesse mundo diário, o qual consegue prever quase todos os acontecimentos diários por conhecê-lo tanto e, por isso, tão estranho, que por vezes a obra pode parecer repetitiva e, no entanto, não o é. São reflexões necessárias, saem do lugar comum, por vezes passam ao filosófico, até porque para ela, é necessário entender o mundo como ele se tornou. Não é a toa que a Física é conhecida como Filosofia da Natureza. Para entendermos as razões, precisamos entender os fundamentos. Mesmo que para a Física Quântica a causa tenha pouca importância, sabemos bem que na Física Clássica, a relação de causa e efeito é essencial para entendermos os fenômenos. O que é o tempo, afinal?
Para mim, Sobre o cálculo do volume é um desses livros que parecem não ter mais pretensões a não ser contar uma boa história, mas acabam por ir além. No meu caso, apenas posso dizer que me enfeitiçou! Li-o há meses e ainda permanece vibrando na minha mente.
March 13, 2025
The contrast between the unsettling premise and the clear, measured writing was so powerful for me and much to my surprise made this a compulsive reading experience. The book makes the familiar unfamiliar and then familiar again, and then....... Living through November 18th 365 times, Tara Selter goes through multiple stages of loss (not grief, that is different) and acceptance and her reflections throughout were like little philosophical fireworks for me. Here's one extended example:
It seems so odd to me now, how one can be so unsettled by the improbable. When we know that our entire existence is founded on freak occurrences and improbable coincidences. That we wouldn't be here at all if it weren't for these curious twists of fate. That there are human beings on what we call our planet, that we can move around on a rotating sphere in a vast universe full of inconceivably large bodies comprised of elements so small that the mind simply cannot comprehend how small and how many there are. That in this unfathomable vastness, these infinitesimal elements are still able to hold themselves together. That we manage to stay afloat. That we exist at all. That each of us has come into being as only one of untold possibilities. The unthinkable is something we carry with us always. It has already happened: we are improbable, we have emerged from a cloud of unbelievable coincidences. Anyone would think that this knowledge would equip us in some small way to face the improbable. But the opposite appears to be the case. We have grown accustomed to living with that knowledge without feeling dizzy every morning, and instead of moving around warily and tentatively, in constant amazement, we behave as if nothing has happened, take the strangeness of it all for granted and get dizzy if life shows itself as it truly is: improbable, unpredictable, remarkable.
November 21, 2024
Nejaukiai slipstrymiška (čia ne tas žanras, tik tas jausmas) knyga. Plaukianti proza, jaučiusi pati kažkur įstrigusi be išeities, dėl pasikartojimų, nesibaigiančių aplinkos detalių aprašymų, įsuka į tokią mažą šizofreniją. Dėl tos pačios priežasties pagaudavau save vietom ir nuobodžiaujant, tai nežinau, ar septynios dalys šito bus mano jėgoms, bet antrą tikrai skaitysiu.
Mačiau GR vieną atsiliepimą, kur sakė, kad šita knyga yra kaip 60s prancūziškas filmas - jauti už visko užmanytus filosofinius klodus, bet paviršiuje tiesiog nuobodu :D ką galiu suprast, nors man tie filmai tada patikdavo.
Žodžiu, labai tiko sezoniniam liūdesiui pagilinti, kai kyla (santykių) prasmės klausimų.
Mačiau GR vieną atsiliepimą, kur sakė, kad šita knyga yra kaip 60s prancūziškas filmas - jauti už visko užmanytus filosofinius klodus, bet paviršiuje tiesiog nuobodu :D ką galiu suprast, nors man tie filmai tada patikdavo.
Žodžiu, labai tiko sezoniniam liūdesiui pagilinti, kai kyla (santykių) prasmės klausimų.
March 13, 2025
Este libro es, sin duda, una de esas experiencias literarias que no se olvidan fácilmente. “On the Calculation of Volume�, primera entrega de un proyecto más amplio de la autora danesa Solvej Balle, no se parece a nada que haya leído antes. Es una obra extraña, hipnótica y profundamente existencialista, que invita a la reflexión más que a la acción, y que juega con el concepto de tiempo de una forma tan singular que se queda resonando mucho después de haber cerrado el libro.
La historia sigue a Tara Selter, una mujer aparentemente ordinaria que, tras un evento menor pero significativo (una estancia en un hotel mientras viaja por trabajo), descubre que el tiempo, para ella, ha dejado de avanzar. Está atrapada en el mismo día: el 18 de noviembre. Sin embargo, a diferencia de otros relatos de bucles temporales, aquí no hay reinicio total. Tara conserva la memoria de cada repetición. Cada día se acumula dentro de ella, creando una experiencia profundamente íntima y desconcertante de la eternidad. Nadie más parece notar este fenómeno. El mundo sigue, para todos los demás, exactamente igual.
Tara es el eje central absoluto del relato. Aislada en su percepción temporal, la acompañamos mientras intenta racionalizar, aceptar y finalmente encontrarle sentido a lo que le está ocurriendo. Su carácter es introspectivo, inteligente, incluso filosófico. Al principio busca respuestas de forma práctica: consulta expertos, médicos, científicos. Pero cuando se da cuenta de que nadie puede ayudarla, la narrativa se vuelve más íntima, casi meditativa.
Lo más fascinante de Tara es cómo cambia su forma de pensar a medida que los días se acumulan sin cambiar. Comienza siendo una mujer con una vida estructurada, lógica, incluso metódica, y poco a poco va convirtiéndose en alguien que observa el mundo con una mezcla de extrañeza, resignación y asombro.
Su motivación es, en un primer momento, comprender qué está sucediendo. Más adelante, simplemente sobrellevarlo. Y con el tiempo, descubrir qué significa existir cuando el tiempo no se mueve. Esa evolución lenta, casi imperceptible, es uno de los mayores logros del libro.
Los personajes secundarios son escasos y están deliberadamente poco desarrollados. El marido de Tara, por ejemplo, aparece como una figura en la que ella confía, pero también como un recordatorio cruel de que todo lo que ella vive es irreal para los demás. La distancia entre ellos crece sin que él lo sepa. Ese tipo de microdrama emocional, que normalmente pasaría desapercibido, aquí se vuelve central.
Otros personajes con los que interactúa, como recepcionistas, colegas o transeúntes, actúan como espejos que subrayan su aislamiento. Su papel no es tanto avanzar la trama como reforzar la sensación de desconexión progresiva que vive la protagonista.
El tiempo es, sin lugar a dudas, el tema medular. ¿Qué es el tiempo? ¿Cómo lo experimentamos? ¿Existe el tiempo sin cambio? Balle no responde estas preguntas, pero las plantea con profundidad. La repetición del mismo día (sin una causa aparente, sin una solución en el horizonte) funciona como un experimento literario para explorar los límites de la experiencia humana.
En un mundo donde todo es estático salvo ella, Tara se convierte en un sujeto de observación. ¿Quién es cuando ya no puede definirse a través de sus relaciones, sus proyectos, su trabajo o su historia? El libro es un viaje hacia adentro, hacia una identidad que se reconfigura fuera del flujo convencional del tiempo.
Lo cotidiano adquiere un valor casi ritual. Las acciones simples como tomar un café, caminar, mirar por la ventana, se convierten en los únicos puntos de referencia. Este minimalismo narrativo es, en sí mismo, una declaración sobre lo que significa estar vivo.
Solvej Balle escribe con una precisión quirúrgica. Su estilo es elegante, sobrio, incluso matemático. No hay florituras innecesarias ni emociones desbordadas; todo está contenido, medido. Esto podría resultar árido para algunos lectores, especialmente en una historia donde “no pasa nada� en el sentido convencional. Sin embargo, para quienes disfrutan de la literatura introspectiva y cerebral, esta sobriedad es profundamente atractiva.
El ritmo es pausado, deliberadamente repetitivo, lo cual es completamente coherente con el tema del libro. Aun así, esto también puede hacer que algunos tramos se sientan densos o lentos. La lectura requiere paciencia y atención.
“On the Calculation of Volume� es una apuesta arriesgada, profundamente cerebral y emocionalmente contenida. Puede parecer frío al principio, pero si se le da el tiempo y la atención que merece, se convierte en una experiencia absorbente. Es una meditación sobre el tiempo, la identidad y la naturaleza de la experiencia humana que, lejos de dar respuestas, nos lanza preguntas que resuenan mucho después de cerrar el libro.
La historia sigue a Tara Selter, una mujer aparentemente ordinaria que, tras un evento menor pero significativo (una estancia en un hotel mientras viaja por trabajo), descubre que el tiempo, para ella, ha dejado de avanzar. Está atrapada en el mismo día: el 18 de noviembre. Sin embargo, a diferencia de otros relatos de bucles temporales, aquí no hay reinicio total. Tara conserva la memoria de cada repetición. Cada día se acumula dentro de ella, creando una experiencia profundamente íntima y desconcertante de la eternidad. Nadie más parece notar este fenómeno. El mundo sigue, para todos los demás, exactamente igual.
Tara es el eje central absoluto del relato. Aislada en su percepción temporal, la acompañamos mientras intenta racionalizar, aceptar y finalmente encontrarle sentido a lo que le está ocurriendo. Su carácter es introspectivo, inteligente, incluso filosófico. Al principio busca respuestas de forma práctica: consulta expertos, médicos, científicos. Pero cuando se da cuenta de que nadie puede ayudarla, la narrativa se vuelve más íntima, casi meditativa.
Lo más fascinante de Tara es cómo cambia su forma de pensar a medida que los días se acumulan sin cambiar. Comienza siendo una mujer con una vida estructurada, lógica, incluso metódica, y poco a poco va convirtiéndose en alguien que observa el mundo con una mezcla de extrañeza, resignación y asombro.
Su motivación es, en un primer momento, comprender qué está sucediendo. Más adelante, simplemente sobrellevarlo. Y con el tiempo, descubrir qué significa existir cuando el tiempo no se mueve. Esa evolución lenta, casi imperceptible, es uno de los mayores logros del libro.
Los personajes secundarios son escasos y están deliberadamente poco desarrollados. El marido de Tara, por ejemplo, aparece como una figura en la que ella confía, pero también como un recordatorio cruel de que todo lo que ella vive es irreal para los demás. La distancia entre ellos crece sin que él lo sepa. Ese tipo de microdrama emocional, que normalmente pasaría desapercibido, aquí se vuelve central.
Otros personajes con los que interactúa, como recepcionistas, colegas o transeúntes, actúan como espejos que subrayan su aislamiento. Su papel no es tanto avanzar la trama como reforzar la sensación de desconexión progresiva que vive la protagonista.
El tiempo es, sin lugar a dudas, el tema medular. ¿Qué es el tiempo? ¿Cómo lo experimentamos? ¿Existe el tiempo sin cambio? Balle no responde estas preguntas, pero las plantea con profundidad. La repetición del mismo día (sin una causa aparente, sin una solución en el horizonte) funciona como un experimento literario para explorar los límites de la experiencia humana.
En un mundo donde todo es estático salvo ella, Tara se convierte en un sujeto de observación. ¿Quién es cuando ya no puede definirse a través de sus relaciones, sus proyectos, su trabajo o su historia? El libro es un viaje hacia adentro, hacia una identidad que se reconfigura fuera del flujo convencional del tiempo.
Lo cotidiano adquiere un valor casi ritual. Las acciones simples como tomar un café, caminar, mirar por la ventana, se convierten en los únicos puntos de referencia. Este minimalismo narrativo es, en sí mismo, una declaración sobre lo que significa estar vivo.
Solvej Balle escribe con una precisión quirúrgica. Su estilo es elegante, sobrio, incluso matemático. No hay florituras innecesarias ni emociones desbordadas; todo está contenido, medido. Esto podría resultar árido para algunos lectores, especialmente en una historia donde “no pasa nada� en el sentido convencional. Sin embargo, para quienes disfrutan de la literatura introspectiva y cerebral, esta sobriedad es profundamente atractiva.
El ritmo es pausado, deliberadamente repetitivo, lo cual es completamente coherente con el tema del libro. Aun así, esto también puede hacer que algunos tramos se sientan densos o lentos. La lectura requiere paciencia y atención.
“On the Calculation of Volume� es una apuesta arriesgada, profundamente cerebral y emocionalmente contenida. Puede parecer frío al principio, pero si se le da el tiempo y la atención que merece, se convierte en una experiencia absorbente. Es una meditación sobre el tiempo, la identidad y la naturaleza de la experiencia humana que, lejos de dar respuestas, nos lanza preguntas que resuenan mucho después de cerrar el libro.
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