Kenneth Trachtenberg, has left his native Paris to be near his beloved uncle Benn Crader, who lives from affair to affair and from "bliss to breakdown". As Kenneth grapples with his own problems, the two men try to figure out why gifted and intelligent pe
Dean Corde is a man of position and authority at a Chicago university. He accompanies his wife to Bucharest where her mother lies dying in a state hospital. As he tries to help her grapple with an unfeeling bureaucracy, Corde is troubled: at home the cent
Mr Artur Sammler, intellectual and occasional lecturer at Columbia University in 1960s New York City, is a registrar of madness, a refined and civilized being caught among people crazy with the promises of the future. His Cyclopean gaze reflects on the de
When his induction into the army is delayed, Joseph finds himself facing a year of idleness. This journal presents an account of his restless wanderings through Chicago's streets, his musings on the past, his psychological reaction to his inactivity while