Grove Press
Grove Press
Grove Press
A stunning novel from the internationally best-selling author of Night Train to Lisbon, Perlmann’s Silence is an accomplished portrayal of a man whose grief and crippling self-doubt have paralyzed him, leading him to consider the unthinkable.
A tremendous international success and a huge favorite with booksellers and critics, Pascal Mercier’s Night Train to Lisbon is one of the bestselling literary European novels in recent years. Now, in Perlmann’s Silence, the follow-up to his triumphant North American debut, Pascal Mercier delivers a deft psychological portrait of a man striving to get his life back on track in the wake of his beloved wife’s death.
Philipp Perlmann, prominent linguist and speaker at a gathering of renowned international academics in a picturesque seaside town near Genoa, is struggling to maintain his grip on reality. Derailed by grief and no longer confident of his professional standing, writing his keynote address seems like an insurmountable task and, as the deadline approaches, Perlmann realizes that he will have nothing to present to his expectant colleagues. Terrorstricken, he decides to plagiarize the work of Leskov, a Russian colleague, and breathes a sigh of short-lived relief once the text has been submitted. But when Leskov’s imminent arrival is announced and threatens to expose Perlmann as a fraud, Perlmann’s mounting desperation leads him to contemplate drastic measures.
An exquisite, captivating portrait of a mind slowly unraveling, Perlmann’s Silence is a brilliant, textured meditation on the complex interplay between language and memory, and the depths of the human psyche.
“Harrowing, heartbreaking stuff, and author Mercier expertly ratchets up the suspense with lingering details in which every ticking second could spell exposure. Mercier has a flair for vivid characterization, and has created a personality-rich tapestry of human interaction. As in his earlier novel, Night Train to Lisbon, Mercier’s fondness and compassion for his characters grows steadily through the narrative, until by the book’s end they have become multidimensional and almost mythic in impact. . . . A hearty feast for the thinking reader, and . . . an utterly satisfying emotional rollercoaster.” —Nick DiMartino, Shelf Awareness
“Mercier’s intelligence is formidable and his narrative . . . utterly compelling.” —Daniel Johnson, Standpoint (UK)
“A great premise for a psychological thriller . . . [Mercier’s] depiction of Perlmann’s mental disintegration is . . . tense and disturbing.” —Alastair Mabbott, The Glasgow Herald
“What might have been, in less talented hands, an amusing literary thriller is, in Mercier’s prose, superbly translated by Shaun Whiteside, something far more complex. . . . Mercier’s previous novel to be published here, the deservedly popular Night Train to Lisbon, showed great intelligence and story-telling power; Perlmann’s Silence is a bolder attempt, and reaches greater depths.” —Alberto Manguel, The Guardian (UK)
“Perlmann’s Silence is Mercier’s best.” —Trouw (Netherlands)
“[A] philosophical thriller . . . in the best artistic tradition.” —Friedmar Apel, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Germany)
“It is a learned, profound and yet effortless novel. . . . As exciting as a great classic tale á la Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment.” —Berlingske Tidende (Denmark)
“This novel is a tour de force. . . . After a while Perlmann creeps under your skin.” —De Volkskrant (Netherlands)
“A wise and considered novel. . . . Entertaining yet erudite.” —Süddeutsche Zeitung (Germany)
“Mercier is an excellent stylist. . . . you read the book with hands as sweaty as the protagonist’s.” —Weekendavisen (Denmark)
“A poignant read, and so hauntingly realistic. . . . A colossal literary work of art.” —Südkurier (Germany)
Perlmann looked at the clock: ten past three. He walked slowly back to the arrivals hall. These were the last minutes of his life when he could be alone with himself. In spite of the sultry air in the building he was shivering.
The monitor showed Leskov’s fl ight as having already landed. Perlmann got a stomach cramp. He positioned himself right at the back of the group of waiting people. He didn’t know what to do with his hands. At last he pressed them to his painful stomach and rubbed it. As he did so, he ran through the route once more. Not till the second ironmonger’s shop. Don’t follow the tram tracks. First right at the bakery. Before the underpass keep left. At the square with the column it was the third rather than the fourth turnoff. His hands were ice-cold in spite of the rubbing. His sweat-drenched shirt was cold and sticky, too.
He reached for the matches in his jacket pocket and found his parking ticket. And then he realized that he had only a few coins, and not a single banknote.
He looked at the coins: 600 lire. I can’t get out of here, he thought. I can’t pay the parking fee. Then he saw Leskov.
by Kirsten Giebutowski
1. How do you interpret the novel’s epigraph: “The others are really others”? How do you characterize Perlmann’s relationships with others? What do his feelings toward others—such as Brian Millar and Giorgio Silvestri—reveal about him? What qualities does he admire in others?
2. Uncomfortable in his persona as esteemed academic, Perlmann dreams of shedding it: “Why, then, should it not be possible to withdraw entirely from his professional role, his public identity, into his private, authentic person, the identity that was the only thing that counted?” (p. 413). Are the private and public self so clearly divisible? Does one determine the other? Is it possible to withdraw one’s public identity?
3. What are the sources of Perlmann’s sense of identity? Does Perlmann’s view of himself affect his view of others, or is his view of others affected by how he sees himself? Does establishing and maintaining a sense of identity require a person to see their self in opposition to others?
4. When Laura Sands uses the word “ingenuous” to describe the Bach English Suite Brian Millar has played, Perlmann wonders whether his past intimacy with Hanna has been violated (p. 108). He is also discomfited by his intimacy with Leskov in St. Petersburg and by his room’s proximity and similarity to Achim Ruge’s. How does this fixation on intimacy shape him and direct his actions?
5. As Perlmann’s lecture due-date approaches and he realizes he needs to take some sort of action, he thinks: “Here in this room, under the eyes of the others, so to speak, he couldn’t reach a decision” (p. 259). How does his impulse toward solitude affect his thinking? How does his thinking change when he is forced to encounter—or in the case of Agnes and Kirsten, to consider—others? Is it possible to derive a sense of morality in isolation?
6. How does Perlmann thwart his own desire to achieve a sense of “presence”? How does his desire to find refuge (at the trattoria, in language study, and in other ways) relate to his relationship with the present moment?
7. Does this novel betray a European sensibility? How does Perlmann view Brian Millar’s Americanness? What is the role of John Smith from Carson City, Nevada?
8. Perlmann sometimes feels that he’s acting without volition, such as when he copies Giovanni Leskov’s text and experiences it as “less his own action than something that had come over him, that had simply happened to him” (p. 276), and when he feels propelled “by an invisible force” to go to the piano and play (p. 534). Could relinquishing willpower be a method of achieving presence? Or is it a form of unconscious will? Is Perlmann simply letting himself off the hook, or is the argument made that one is not ultimately responsible for his or her actions?
9. Who were Perlmann’s parents and how did his relationship with them shape him? Are his memories of them trustworthy? Does his blame seem justified? Does he understand them only in terms of his psychological wounds or can he sometimes see them separate from himself?
10. What interests Perlmann in Sandra, the daughter of the trattoria‘s proprietor? Why does he dream that her exercise book merges with his black notebook (p. 184)? She distractedly bid him goodbye and in the wake of his disappointment, he parted the trattoria‘s glass bead curtain for the last time and felt “something break as he did so, something precious and intangible” (p. 521). What hurts him in that moment?
11. In the discussion with Brian Millar and others about the death penalty, Perlmann asserts: “Killing must be based on a personal relationship. A hatred for one’s tormentor, for example. Otherwise it’s perverse” (p. 153). Do you agree or disagree with this logic?
12. Does your knowledge of Perlmann’s anxiety and other foibles make you feel sympathetic toward him? If you feel nervous that he’ll be caught, does this make you complicit in his criminal intentions? His plans to plagiarize and murder having failed, is Perlmann any less guilty than if these crimes had come to fruition? Is restoration of Leskov’s text sufficient atonement?
13. Flying back to Frankfurt, Perlmann thinks, “Finding a perspective outside oneself, to live from there in greater freedom within oneself. . . The perspective of eternity. If one did everything from that perspective, wouldn’t that mean losing the present completely—so completely that one wouldn’t even miss it?” (p. 579). If a limited perspective is imprisoning and an unlimited, eternal perspective annihilates our sense of meaning and time, are we necessarily in a bind as human beings? Would this story exist if it were told from a perspective other than Perlmann’s?
14. What sort of picture do you get of Perlmann’s relationship with Agnes? Does his bereavement have stages? Why does Agnes eschew color in her photographs? How does her project—to capture “scenes that concealed a story within themselves and forced the viewer to invent that story”—relate to themes in the book (p. 163)?
15. Can Leskov be considered Perlmann’s doppelganger? Leskov, too, speaks of loving the Italian light, of losing his sense of identity, of plagiarizing, and of experiencing the nightmare of being asked to lecture without a text. Is Leskov Perlmann’s destroyer or his savior?
16. What connection does Perlmann have with Evelyn Mistral? How does he “read” the red elephant on her suitcase? Why can’t he say no to her when she asks to come with him to the airport? How does Kirsten’s visit affect his relationship with Evelyn?
17. How does Kirsten’s presence in Perlmann’s life affect his actions? Why does her visit to Italy make everything there seem unreal? How is she similar to her father and how are they dissimilar?
18. What about the southern light of Italy gives Perlmann intimations of life in the present? He thinks: “The crucial thing would be this: to allow the appearance of this light to be everything, the whole of reality, and seek nothing behind it. To experience the light not as a promise, but as the redemption of a promise. As something at which one had arrived, not something that constantly aroused new expectations” (p. 7). Would this kind of fulfillment be antithetical to the experience of life? How would you describe the experience of being in the present? When do you feel most present?
19. Once he has made the decision to plagiarize Leskov, why does Perlmann feel as though “the future was no longer a space of possibilities, but just a cramped, undeviating stretch of time on which he would have to live through the unalterable consequences of his deception” (p. 277)? What is the relationship between time and uncertainty and other mental states? How does the novel explore the subjective experience of time?
20. Perlmann thinks that as a translator “one could think without having to believe anything, and one could speak without having to assert anything. One could deal with language without having to be concerned about the truth. For a man with no opinions, like myself, translator or interpreter would have been the ideal profession” (p. 148-149). Why does Perlmann shy away from forming opinions? Is it possible to think without believing or to speak without asserting? As Perlmann translates Leskov’s text and searches for the right words, does he make decisions that are, in a sense, opinionated?
21. What do you make of Perlmann’s idea of “Language as an enemy of imagination” and of thinking in sentences as necessarily bringing about “a diminution of possibilities” (p. 176)? Do you feel trapped by language into certain ways of thinking? Studies show that gendered language affects perception so that, for instance, in languages where “bridge” is a feminine word, people attribute feminine qualities to bridges (like beauty and elegance) and in languages where “bridge” is masculine, people describe bridges in traditionally masculine terms and speak of their strength and durability. How far-reaching are the ramifications of this gendered vocabulary? Is an argument made for learning a second language?
22. During his presentation, Leskov elaborates his theory that “the narrating self is none other than the narrated stories. Apart from the stories there is nothing. Or rather, no one” (p. 485). For him, remembering involves creation and invention, and so “there is no such thing as a true story about the experienced past” (p. 486). Do you find these beliefs unsettling or comforting? If one can never attain the truth about his or her past, what should be one’s goal? Have your stories about your past changed as you’ve grown older?
23. Perlmann reads from his notebook: “It cannot be stressed often enough: one grows into the world by repeating words parrot-fashion. These words don’t come by themselves; we hear them as parts of judgments, mottos, sentences” (p. 172). Can language exist apart from usage that is personal and also cultural? Were you told something when growing up that lodged inside you and bothered you so much you had to find a way to dispute it, as Perlmann does with his father’s statement, “mestre is ugly”?
24. Why does Perlmann make a project of reading the chronicle of the twentieth century? What does he learn from it and what makes him relinquish the project? When you look back on historical events you’ve lived through, do the events trigger forgotten memories from your personal life?
25. Offended by Laura Sands’ poetic images of suffering on the Steppe, Brian Millar says “Truthful pictures of hunger and death . . . should, I think, be as dry as agency reports. Sober” (p. 223). Achim Ruge disagrees: “Taking suffering seriously and allowing oneself to be morally touched by it can’t mean denying beauty” (pp. 223-224). Have you felt uncomfortable about images of suffering that are beautiful? What is the source of such discomfort? Do you think certain rules should govern depiction of atrocities?
26. Why does Perlmann abandon his study of the piano and how does it affect his life? What does he experience when he finally sits down to play in Chapter 53? How does Perlmann’s life in academia mirror the life he might have had in music?
27. At the end of the novel, has Perlmann’s relationship with himself and with others changed? Why does he refuse the job offer from Olivetti and apply to teach German in Managua? Why will he never again read Jakob von Gunten? How do you interpret the last line of the book—”Nothing had happened”—and how does it relate to Gorky’s story of the drowned boy in Klim Samgin (p. 559)?
28. As Perlmann considers what to wear on his dark errand, he thinks to himself: “Dress more comfortably for the murder” (p. 343). When Brian Millar admires his rental car, it occurs to Perlmann that his murder weapon has turned him into a man of style. Are other elements of the absurd present in the novel? Places where a disjuncture between action and thought seems ridiculous? Does the novel suggest that life is absurd or that meaning can be found somewhere?
Suggestions for further reading
The Loser and Correction by Thomas Bernhard; The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes; Jakob von Gunten by Robert Walser; Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoyevsky; Vertigo by W. G. Sebald; Wittgenstein’s Mistress by David Markson; Metaphors We Live By by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson
An Independent Literary Publisher Since 1917
