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Review by Katherine Harrison
Like the mythological Charon, Francine Prose ferries her characters through various underworlds where they are forced to navigate the dim recesses of their own psyches. Going along for the journey, you laugh hysterically as Prose's stories reach the very height of hilarity, but pause uneasily when confronted with the self-realizations that await you on the opposite bank. She is the kind of writer who can make you burst into laughter one moment and shift in your seat with discomfort the next, glancing up from the page self-consciously to see if anyone is watching, as though you've stumbled but caught yourself before a fall.
In the title novella, "Guided Tours of Hell," we meet Landau, a struggling, mediocre playwright visiting Prague for a Kafka conference. Jealousies and sexual tensions exist from the start, but events begin to spin out of control as the group takes an organized tour of a former concentration camp.
Jiri, a Holocaust survivor and successful writer who escaped from the same camp they are visiting, leads the party on what becomes not so much a tour as a war of wills and egos, a schoolyard competition in which nothing is won but much is lost. When the characters enter this hell, it is not only the ghosts of the past that they must contend with, but the darker shades of the self. As the crowd fawns over Jiri -- or is it deserved adulation? -- Landau becomes consumed by jealousy for the attention lavished upon his colleague, for Jiri's success in the literary world, and for the suffering that authenticates his work. But as you begin to deride Landau for his pettiness and self-centeredness, you pause at the awful realization of something all too familiar in our "hero's" behavior.
In "Three Pigs in Five Days," Nina, the story's protagonist, is sent on an assignment to France to write an article for Allo! -- a newsletter for American tourists founded by Nina's lover and employer, Leo. Devastated and perplexed by Leo's decision not to join her on the trip, she spends the first several days undergoing a surreal, and existential, crisis. Unable to leave the hotel room and tormented by images emitted from the snowy French TV, Nina calls into question every aspect of her life. Her relationship with Leo becomes much like a funhouse mirror at a carnival, reflecting a reality that is warped, only part truth. When Leo finally does join her, Nina feels her sense of reality, and her self, restored. That is, until a pilgrimage to the grave of Simone de Beauvoir, a descent into the catacombs of Paris, and a tour of the site of Marie Antoinette's imprisonment force Nina once again to examine her own identity and the very nature of love.
Is historical or emotional objectivity possible? What is the "proper" response to the tragic events of the past? Is our perception of reality forever altered by love, jealousy, lust, and fear? Francine Prose leaves you pondering weighty questions like these as you make a descent to the catacombs of your own soul.
Prose's greatest gift lies in her ability to look into the very heart and mind of her characters, expose them, and then, remarkably, evoke a deep compassion for them despite their faults, their darkness. And she does all of this with a searing, incisive wit. What more could you ever ask of a writer?
Katherine Harrison is Assistant Editor of this publication.
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