Cadenza

First published in Ireland in 1958, this fantastic excursion of the mind, which moves between Dublin and Dundalk on a train headed for the scrap heap after fifty years, also reminds the reader of Tristram Shandy, Finnegans Wake, Ulysses, and At Swim-Two-Birds. But while Leopold Bloom is peripatetic in his Dublin Odyssey, Cusack's Desmond locks himself in train carriage 304D and orders out sandwiches, whiskey, and beer. A brilliant tour de force melding time, place, and memory.

Ralph Cusack (1912-1965) was born in Dublin. Though trained as a painter, he settled in the south of France to grow flowers for the manufacture of perfume. He wrote one novel, Cadenza, originally published in 1958.

In addition to his books of poetry and criticism, Gilbert Sorrentino is the author of fourteen novels, including Imaginative Qualities of Actual Things, The Sky Changes, and Mulligan Stew. He has received numerous grants and awards throughout his career, including the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature, two Guggenheim Fellowships, two NEA Fellowships and a Lannan Literary Award.