Doppelgänger

Two elderly people, Artur and Isabella, meet and have a passionate sexual encounter on New Year's Eve. Details of the lives of Artur, a retired Yugoslav army captain, and Isabella, a Holocaust survivor, are revealed through police dossiers. As they fight loneliness and aging, they take comfort in small things: for Artur, a collection of 274 hats; for Isabella, a family of garden gnomes who live in her apartment. Later, we meet the ill-fated Pupi, who dreamed of becoming a sculptor but instead became a chemist and then a spy. As Eileen Battersby wrote, "As he stands, in the zoo, gazing at a pair of rhinos, in a city most likely present-day Belgrade, this battered Everyman feels very alone: 'I would like to tell someone, anyone, I'd like to tell someone: I buried Mother today.'" Pupi sets out to correct his family's crimes by returning silverware to its original Jewish owners through the help of an unlikely friend, a pawnbroker.

Described by Dasa Drndic as "my ugly little book," Doppelg nger was her personal favorite.

Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: New Directions Publishing Corporation
Published: 09/24/2019
ISBN: 9780811228916
Pages: 160
Weight: 0.45lbs
Size: 7.90h x 5.30w x 0.60d

Review Citations: Publishers Weekly 07/08/2019
Kirkus Reviews 07/15/2019