Esther's Inheritance

I think some of the nuances and character traits were lost on me because of the cultural difference between the author and an American audience. Maybe it's just me, I don't know. I didn't think the author was trying to make a point of how foolish one can be when in love and a woman, but that is really the only point I gathered from this book.

Marai is newly translated to English from Hungarian, and not a moment too soon. His writing has that particular somnambulistical lyricism of which only early twentieth-century Europeans are capable. I felt as if Anais Nin was going to sleepwalk out of one of the houses on Esther's street. I love the fatalism, the irony, and the restraint of this late great writer.

a quick read - didn't fully satisfy. It is Sandor Marai, but this small story only whet's one's appetite to go deeper...

Quick and easy read, well written but the story-line is disappointing in it's absurdity.

It was OK, but after experience with Marai's other writings I expected more.

Good fiction! Read it in three quick sittings.

Reading Sandor Marai is like discovering lost treasure since he has already created a body of work and has passed and only now are all his books being translated. He is such an imminently gifted writer of incisive and an insightful prose. With the amount of skill he possesses narrative nearly becomes secondary to just reading his words and meeting his characters. I do love how intimate this tale...more

Reading Sandor Marai is like discovering lost treasure since he has already created a body of work and has passed and only now are all his books being translated. He is such an imminently gifted writer of incisive and an insightful prose. With the amount of skill he possesses narrative nearly becomes secondary to just reading his words and meeting his characters. I do love how intimate this tale is, how psychological, how much it depends on one person who just holds sway over all he interacts with and how hard those ties are to sever. It almost seems absurd but we've all met people like Lajos. It's certainly not Marai's greatest "to date" but at 148 pages definitely worth a read. Once you've read "Embers" you'll be hooked on Marai for good so now every time I get my hands on one of his books I drop everything. Even Proust.   hide