cover image Hedyphagetica

Hedyphagetica

Austryn Wainhouse, . . Dalkey Archive, $12.95 (227pp) ISBN 978-1-56478-467-4

In a 1960 essay on American ex-pats in Paris, Gay Talese mentions Austryn Wainhouse and his “strong, esoteric novel, Hedyphagetica ,” in which a one-eyed schlemiel named Dr. Samuel Johnson (not the Dictionary Johnson) becomes the most famous prisoner in the mythical country of Grön. The first and last sections of the novel are parts of a letter written by the unnamed “official historian” of Grön to his lover, Aimée, who stands high in the court of the “Accuser,” Claude-Maxime, a crazed tyrant. The Accuser has kept the state in perpetual war since his coup d'état 39 years before and subjects the homeland to any number of repressions. Dr. Samuel Johnson, for one, was born to a wealthy, liberal family, was drafted into the army, served six years, and was then arrested for obscure reasons and sentenced to 14 years in a prison factory. Released, he was rearrested. Johnson's misery reflects the state's brutality, which may now have the populace at a boiling point. Structurally, Wainhouse's novel is a verbal gallimaufry that contains a prescient satire. His best writing is in the conversation of the characters, of which there is too little, but his targets are still legitimate. (Aug.)