Dreams of the Abandoned Seducer takes place in the new “free market” era of personal choices and relations: a chaotic, sometimes hopeful, often comic world that has supplanted the old order of political terror and clearly demarcated ideological divides. The novel’s vaudeville qualities, with characters shuffling on and off the page in rapid succession, are complemented by its exhilarating air of parody. Dreams draws ingeniously upon the sentimentality and ephemera of popular culture—quoting radio and TV shows, song lyrics, newspaper items, and bits of gossip— while also offering a sterner, more nuanced view of public and private relations. It is in large measure this mix of elements—“popular” and “high” culture, sentimentality and political understanding, vaudeville and arch satire—that makes Dreams an exemplary postmodern novel.

Translated by: Alicia Borinsky, Cola Franzen