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In the beginning, everything was alive. The smallest objects were endowed with beating hearts...
Having recalled his life through the story of his physical self in Winter Journal, internationally acclaimed novelist Paul Auster now remembers the experience of his development from within through the encounters of his interior self with the outer world in Report from the Interior.
From his baby's-eye view of the man in the moon, to his childhood worship of the movie cowboy Buster Crabbe, to the composition of his first poem at the age of nine, to his dawning awareness of the injustices of American life, Report from the Interior charts Auster's moral, political, and intellectual journey as he inches his way toward adulthood through the postwar 1950s and into the turbulent 1960s.
Auster evokes the sounds, smells, and tactile sensations that marked his early life - and the many images that came at him, including moving images (he adored cartoons, he was in love with films), until, at its unique climax, the book breaks away from prose into pure imagery: The final section of Report from the Interior recapitulates the first three parts, told in an album of pictures. At once a story of the times - which makes it everyone's story - and the story of the emerging consciousness of a renowned literary artist, this four-part work answers the challenge of autobiography in ways rarely, if ever, seen before.
"This erratically episodic, somewhat puzzling compendium rounds out the edges to Auster's oeuvre." - Publishers Weekly
"Auster has long rendered life as something of a puzzle; here are some significant, illuminating pieces." - Kirkus
"A high-wire explication of his inner life… Auster's phenomenal literary powers are generated by his equal fluency in matters emotional and cerebral. Here the origins of that sustaining duality are revealed." - Booklist
This information about Report from the Interior was first featured
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Paul Auster was the bestselling author of 4 3 2 1, Sunset Park, The Book of Illusions, Moon Palace, and The New York Trilogy, among many other works. In 2006, he was awarded the Prince of Asturias Award for Literature. His other honors include the Prix Médicis étranger for Leviathan, the Independent Spirit Award for the screenplay of Smoke, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Burning Boy, and the Carlos Fuentes Prize for his body of work. His most recent novel, 4 3 2 1, was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and is a Commandeur de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. His work has been translated into more than forty languages. He died at age 77 in his home in Brooklyn in ...
... Full Biography
Author Interview
Name Pronunciation
Paul Auster: or-ster
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