And Again: A Novel - Hardcover

The premise of this strange fable by Irish short story writer/novelist O'Faolain takes some getting used to. Striking a pact with the gods of Mount Olympus, journalist Robert Younger, 65, avoids a fatal accident by agreeing to live life backwards. While his successive lovers and friends naturally grow older, he becomes younger and younger, inching back toward the womb. Over the years he exchanges his mistress Ana French for her daughter Anador, then falls for her daugher Nana, then for his great-granddaughter in New Orleans, then. . . . The reverse direction of his life's trajectory creates fun-house effects as our hero, ever-Younger, wrestles with memory, longing, desire, ultimate loss, sensuality, incest. Time does not necessarily confer wisdom: he keeps repeating his mistakes. Despite flights of philosophizing, a flowery style and a labyrinthine plot, this rueful hymn to life is funny and sad and true.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In this first American edition of O'Faolain's 1979 novel, narrator Robert Younger, a 65-year-old journalist, is given the chance to live his life again--backwards. While he enjoys the benefit of experience, Younger has no memory of his own past and is compelled to discover who he was and is. He is thus a sort of Everyman, a seeker, writing to construct himself. His "manuscript" includes occasional notes and postscripts--and a commentary by his wife, who also tells the story of his final years, his gradual "younging" toward the oblivion of birth/death. The self-conscious narrative method raises interesting questions about the interplay of language, memory, and the self. An intelligent, provocative novel. Highly readable and highly recommended.
- Michael Hennessy, Southwest Texas State Univ., San Marcos
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.