Eunoia

From Publishers Weekly
"Writing is inhibiting. Sighing, I sit, scribbling in ink this pidgin script. I sing with nihilistic witticism, disciplining signs with trifling gimmicks impish hijinks which highlight stick sigils. Isn't it glib? Isn't it chic?" Besides being glib and chic, Bok's new book strikes one with the force of being the most incredible literary curio: each of its chapters is allowed to use only one vowel outgunning even Georges Perec's famed La Disparition, which simply omits the letter "e." Apparently seven years in the making, Eunoia, the shortest word in the English language to employ all the vowels (it means "beautiful thinking"), also employs other, more mundane constraints on paragraph length (all are 12 lines long) and what must be mentioned (the act of writing, nautical travel, energetic eating). This hyper-mechanization of the writer's craft sets the stage for a welter of eccentric, yet universally appealing, tours-de-force, such as Chapter E's retelling of the Illiad from the viewpoint of Helen: "Whenever Helen seeks these perverse excesses, her regretted deeds depress her; hence, Helen beseeches Ceres (the blessed Demeter): `let sweet Lethe bless me, lest these recent events be rememberd' then the empress feeds herself fermented hempseed, her preferred nepenthe." In the "u" chapter, "Dutch smut churns up blushful succubus lusts," and Ubu and Lulu burp, hump and bump for five delirious pages, exhausting, in the meantime, the entire range of English words that only contain the vowel. Eunoia's reductorial neurosis as euphonically zestful contrivance turns formidable stunts to imp's play. That is, this terrific book makes sense on its own terms. (Nov.)Forecast: Bok's debut Crystallography was well reviewed in Canada (Bok lives and works in Toronto, whence Coach House publishes), and he has invented languages for two Gene Roddenberry TV series, Earth: Final Conflict and Amazon. This book will have to be sought out, but it is beautifully produced, and browsers will be hooked. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Samuel R. Delany
"Eunoia is a novel that will drive everybody sane"

Harry Mathews
"A marvellous, musical texture of rhymes and echoes."

Devin Crawley, Quill and Quire, October, 2001
"The writing is musical, bawdy, and ingenious...Bök has crafted storylines [that are] a delight to read."

Book Description
'Eunoia' which means 'beautiful thinking' is the shortest English word to contain all five vowels. This book also contains them all, except that each one appears by itself in its own chapter. A unique personality for each vowel soon emerges: the courtly A, the elegiac E, the lyrical I, the jocular O, and the obscene U. A triumphant feat, seven years in the making, this uncanny work of avant-garde literature promises to be one of the most important books of the decade.

About the Author
Christian Bök is the author of Chrystallography (Coach House Press, 1994), a 'pataphysical encyclopedia nominated for the Gerald Lampert Award for Best Poetic Debut. 'Pataphysics: The Poetics of an Imaginary Science is forthcoming from Northwestern University Press, 2001. Bök has created artificial languages for Gene Rodenbery's Earth: Final Conflict and Peter Benchley's Amazon. His conceptual artwork has appeared at the Marianne Boesky Gallery in New York City as part of the exhibit Poetry Plastique.

Excerpted from Eunoia by Christian Bok, Christian Bök. Copyright © 2001. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter A For Hans Arp Awkward grammar appals a craftsman. A Dada bard as daft as Tzara damns stagnant art and scrawls an alpha (a slapdash arc and a backward zag) that mars all stanzas and jams all ballads (what a scandal). A madcap vandal crafts a small black ankh - a handstamp that can stamp a wax pad and at last plant a mark that sparks an ars magna (an abstract art that charts a phrasal anagram). A pagan skald chants a dark saga (a Mahabharata), as a papal cabal blackballs all annals and tracts, all dramas and psalms: Kant and Kafka, Marx and Marat. A law as harsh as a fatwa bans all paragraphs that lack an A as a standard hallmark.


Buy from Amazon     Compare Prices

"Writing is inhibiting. Sighing, I sit, scribbling in ink this pidgin script. I sing with nihilistic witticism, disciplining signs with trifling gimmicks impish hijinks which highlight stick sigils. Isn't it glib? Isn't it chic?" Besides being glib and chic, Bok's new book strikes one with the force of being the most incredible literary curio: each of its chapters is allowed to use only one vowel outgunning even Georges Perec's famed La Disparition, which simply omits the letter "e." Apparently seven years in the making, Eunoia, the shortest word in the English language to employ all the vowels (it means "beautiful thinking"), also employs other, more mundane constraints on paragraph length (all are 12 lines long) and what must be mentioned (the act of writing, nautical travel, energetic eating). This hyper-mechanization of the writer's craft sets the stage for a welter of eccentric, yet universally appealing, tours-de-force, such as Chapter E's retelling of the Illiad from the viewpoint of Helen: "Whenever Helen seeks these perverse excesses, her regretted deeds depress her; hence, Helen beseeches Ceres (the blessed Demeter): `let sweet Lethe bless me, lest these recent events be rememberd' then the empress feeds herself fermented hempseed, her preferred nepenthe." In the "u" chapter, "Dutch smut churns up blushful succubus lusts," and Ubu and Lulu burp, hump and bump for five delirious pages, exhausting, in the meantime, the entire range of English words that only contain the vowel. Eunoia's reductorial neurosis as euphonically zestful contrivance turns formidable stunts to imp's play. That is, this terrific book makes sense on its own terms. (Nov.) Forecast: Bok's debut Crystallographywas well reviewed in Canada (Bok lives and works in Toronto, whence Coach House publishes), and he has invented languages for two Gene Roddenberry TV series, Earth: Final Conflict and Amazon. This book will have to be sought out, but it is beautifully produced, and browsers will be hooked. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.


Buy from Barnes & Noble     Compare Prices