I'm having difficulties with comprehension whilst reading The Lighthouse at the End of the World. The problem doesn't lie in what the text says, rather what it omits, like, say, what is real and what is a figment of Poe's imagination. I know that's a good portion of the draw to this book, but I haven't the patience to try and ascertain dreams from reality. I've got roughly 80 pages to finish, and while it's an easy read, it stopped being compelling once I figured out it's not a traditional mystery story (not even a mystery in the same manner as Paul Auster's excellent The New York Trilogy, which isn't truly a mystery). I think once I've finished this book, I'll begin Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco, since I hear that his work is rather difficult to understand, and I'm up to the challenge (though it's a slightly long book at 553 pages, it certainly doesn't compare to the mammoth Neal Stephenson 'Cryptonomicon' book I finished last summer).
In reading The Lighthouse at the End of the World, it would help if I knew of the characters from his fiction and the real-world events and characters I've encountered in the book. Though there are footnotes with explanations, they are few and far-between, and are intended to be incidental.
Posted by stephend at February 23, 2003 08:37 PM