A banquet for the mind

In the interests of transparency, I should declare that when it comes to David Mitchell, I am less of a critic than a fan. Okay, devotee. Having been blown away by Ghostwritten — a book that is practically the definition of the phrase “masterful debut” — spellbound by the Murukami-like trippyness of number9dream, still reeling from his breathtaking Cloud Atlas, and tickled to death by bizarre suburban Englishness of Black Swan Green, I approached The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet with trepidation. Pedestals are designed for people to fall off, and I feared that Mitchell would go the way of Don DeLillo (Cosmopolis) and Rushdie (Ground Beneath her Feet — a book that truly deserved to be).

Within the first few pages, it is clear that the blurb-writers on the back are not exaggerating: here is yet another book by a “storyteller of genius”, possibly “the greatest British writer of his age” who is “dizzyingly, dazzlingly good”.

 (For those who have not yet encountered this extraordinary writer, a note on what wikipedia calls “disambiguation”: there are two David Mitchells, both British, more or less the same age, one brought up in Wiltshire, the other in Worcestershire. One is primarily an actor and comedian, the other primarily a novelist who is, frequently, very funny. The latter — let’s call him, for simplicity’s sake, “our David” — is a rather handsome chap; the other looks like a haddock.)

Full review here Business Standard