The Lost Books of
the Odyssey
The Lost Books of the Odyssey
Winner of the 2006 Starcherone Fiction Prize, chosen by judge Carole Maso
Finalist, 2009 Young Lions Award, for best work of fiction by a writer under the age of 35
(NOTE: as of March 11, 2009, this title is no longer available through Starcherone Books)
Following the structure of the ancient Greek classic, The Lost Books of the Odyssey features alternative episodes, fragments, and revisions of Homer's original Odyssey and, equipped as well with a faux-authoritative scholarly introduction, richly carries off the illusion of being the lost ur-text of Homer's masterpiece. Justifying comparison with the great postmodern fictive hoaxes of Jorge Luis Borges, Vladimir Nabokov, and Robert Coover, this is a one-of-a-kind book destined to become a classic in its own right.
"Mason's book is incredibly impressive. Beautifully written, intelligent, war-inflected in all the most ancient and contemporary ways, filled with all kinds of pleasures. An ambitious feast!" Carole Maso, author of Ava and The Art Lover
"A stirring revelation: Zachary Mason's astounding glosses of The Odyssey plunge us into an unforeseeable and hypnotic dimension of fiction. Of the three possible interpretations of the work that he proposes -- Homeric stories anciently reproduced by recombining their components, a Theosophist dream of abstract mathematics, and pure illusion (that is, it was all made up by him) -- the result is one and the same. This enthralling book is his doing, whether as translator, conjuror, or author. I vote for number three." Harry Mathews, author of My Life in CIA
"That each story is all stories, that the tale foretells the teller's life, that the poem kills its hero, that one word will suffice, that all times are today, that everything changes, that nothing changes - from these riddles Zachary Mason crafts his book. It encodes the astonishments others promised to decipher, the secret of secrets, the last meaning. We feel its mysteries within our grasp, just a page away. Even this is prefigured. This is the book I always meant to write." R. M. Berry, author of Frank and Leonardo's Horse
ISBN 0-9788811-5-X. ISBN-13 978-0-9788811-5-3.
[Note: This edition is no longer available through Starcherone Books]
Zachary Mason