The Luneburg Variation - Hardcover

Maurensig, Paolo; Rothschild, Jon

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0374194351 ISBN 13: 9780374194352

Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux, 1997

Synopsis

Tells the story of a chess duel between to completely opposite individuals--a persecuted Jew and a persecuting German--as it takes place in big international tournaments and in a Nazi death camp

About this title

Review:

A man is found shot in his garden, in a village not far from Vienna. Unable to be defined as either a suicide or a homicide, the death is called one of "mysterious circumstances." The garden--unlike the prominent citizen's life--is highly unusual, a "concentric maze of ten-foot-high hedges leading to a chessboard-shaped clearing paved with squares of white and black marble." Frisch, the murdered man, was obsessed with chess, and the novel's chilling first sentence--"They say that chess was born in bloodshed"--bears this out.

In this first novel, Paolo Maurensig coolly executes the ultimate drama of manipulation--life as a game of chess. On this armature, he hangs a tale of vengeance set against a backdrop of historic villainy, Nazi against Jew. The two chess players are as black and white as can be--a persecuted Jew and a ruthless, persecuting German who first "duel" over a chessboard in an international tournament, and then in a concentration camp. The narrative is a meticulous reconstruction of the moments and background events that led to Frisch's death. Ingeniously referring everything back to the machinations and executions of movements in a chess game, life itself is at stake as the inescapable sins of the past catch up with the chess-obsessed characters.

About the Author:

Paolo Maurensig was born in Italy in 1943. He has held a variety of occupations, most recently a restorer of antique musical instruments.

About this edition

• Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0374194351
• ISBN 13: 9780374194352
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 139