Oliver VII - Softcover

Szerb belongs with the master novelists of the 20th century -- Paul Bailey Daily Telegraph Journey by Moonlight is a burning book, a major book -- George Szirtes Times Literary Supplement [T]here is more to it than fable. It actually has much in common with Journey by Moonlight the flight from identity, the alleys of Venice, the choices that must be made between duty and pleasure, or between two women. And it has its comedy, too -- Nicholas Lezard The Guardian A writer of immense subtlety and generosity, with an uncommonly light touch which masks its own artistry. His novels transform farce into poetry, comic melancholy into a kind of self-effacing grace... Antal Szerb is one of the great European writers -- Ali Smith, author of The Accidental

The restless King Oliver VII of Alturia, an obscure Central European state whose only notable exports are wine and sardines, wants nothing more than an easy life: so, plotting a coup against himself, King Oliver VII escapes to Venice in search of 'real' experience. There he falls in with a team of con-men and ends up, to his own surprise, impersonating himself. His journey through successive levels of illusion and reality teaches him much about the world, about his own nature and the paradoxes of the human condition. Szerb offered Oliver VII as a translation from a non-existent English writer, A H Redcliff - typical Szerb humor, or a reflection of the fact that as a 'rootless cosmopolitan' his own work was banned by the Nazi regime?