I browsed through just about every page of the labyrinthian HoL forum and I think you’ve given the best analysis on tying the layers of the book together. There are still some loose threads however. Like Zampano’s frequent allusions to the french legionnaire and the battle of Dien Bien Phu.
The passage that I keep coming back to is footnote 301 & 302 (narrated here in track 12). Truant is a torture chamber. Zampano is the tourtured. Who is the torturer? Pelafina?
Another thing. Danielewsky likens HoL to a three character play: “A blind old man (Z), a young man (T), and a very special, extraordinarily gifted woman §.” What are her gifts?
It’s funny because my analysis came after basically doing nothing but reading this on a miserable rainy day. I finished it not really seeing how it came together, as it seems most do. When I woke up the next day I randomly came up with that. Guess my mind must’ve been subconsciously working it out!
I haven’t visited their forums, you think it’s worth posting over there? I’m sure there’s more connections or ways or refuting it, but I don’t plan on rereading it anytime soon, it’s just what I could remember.
Posting? Nooooo. I haven’t posted but I can tell the (few) regulars seem quite hostile directing people to old threads on any topic brought up. Never mind that the search is borked and most of the links are dead. Like the house itself, any attempt at navigating through or even charting the forum is a futile endeavor which leads to frustrating dead ends and endless loops.
Unfortunately there is a lot of information hidden in HoL that isn’t all clearly defined in one central wiki or something. The secrets and codes that are cool but ultimately don’t seem to lead anywhere, but a worthwhile discussion would be interesting to read. Like Pelafina’s hidden message (“My dear Zampano who have you lost?”), the meaning of fonts (Jonny is Courier, Z is Times, Editor is Bookman, etc). The official forum doesn’t satisfy. This is a good starter guide but there’s a lot more little codes throughout HoL that could drive anyone crazy.
What I find strange/disappointing is that for all its faults, there really aren’t many books anything like it. You can rightly criticize the prose of the book, but the overall complexity can’t be matched, AFAIK. Sure, it may be pretentious, but I’m a sucker for these types of things.
Maybe I should start another thread, but I’m interested in what other forms of experimental fiction are out there, and their varying degrees of quality. Of course I know about Only Revolutions, haven’t heard too many good things there though. After a cursory search I don’t see too much like it, which I really find surprising.
I should add others that pop into mind are on the level of Infinite Jest/Gravity’s Rainbow/Ulysses. None of which I’ve read, though they will be read soon(own the first two). They don’t really seem in the same vein though, I might be wrong.
Depends on what you’re looking for. From what I’ve been told, James Joyce is a good start for modernist literature. Then there’s post modern work like Vonnegut. For similar horror there is H. P. Lovecraft, or Shirley Jackson (“Haunting of Hill House”).
When I was reading HoL it made me think that it was one of the first works of interactive fiction. It demands an active reader to look for clues within the text. A precursor to ARG games like Year Zero, The Beast, and I Love Bees. Sean Stuart has written most of the content of these and I think he’s great. His latest works are more aimed for teens however with Cathy’s Book and its sequels.
Heh, yeah I was involved in The Beast, I got a letter from Spielberg…I think I was in the credits for the movie too if I’m not mistaken. Stewart is great.
I’m sure you’re right. I’m coming from a very limited literary background. Nabokov & Joyce are both authors I’d like to read. My only fear is that triksy books like these are hard enough without the generational and cultural differences being added to the mix.
I think HoL is closer to “Pale Fire” than to almost anything else mentioned so far (“Ulysses”, “Infinite Jest”, etc) in that it’s presented almost explicitly as a puzzle piece – who are the authors, what is their relationship, is it possible that they’re the same person?
“Ulysses”, for example, contains a lot of puzzles, but they feel more organic to me, somehow. That is, a lot of the puzzles are things where a character thinks a little bit about something (maybe just a phrase) on p. 45, then a little more on p. 150, and something else about it on p. 300. And so there’s a puzzle to put those together, but you can also just say that it’s part of getting swept up in the stream-of-consciousness, and choose not to try to correlate these little phrases.
And “Infinite Jest” is, I think, much more on-the-surface that “Ulysses” (disclaimer: I’m only partway through IJ).
Yeah, Pale Fire is one I plan to pick up soon(though like I said, I already have GR/IJ to read! And still 2/3’s the way through Foucault’s Pendulum).
“If on a winter’s night a traveler…” is another one I want to get. It apparently breaks the fourth wall early on, making you the protagonist, and you proceed through the book as it jumps through different genres and writing styles, constantly perplexed at the defective book you have apparently purchased. I think at some point you attempt to return it, only it find that all copies are defective, etc. It seems very cool to me.
I also recently got a book titled “The City of Saints and Madmen” by Jeff Vandermeer. This seems really up my alley. If you haven’t heard of it, it’s a encyclopedia of short stories/letters/bibliographies/etc all about the fictional city of Ambergris and it’s culture. There’s a whole chapter in code, for instance. Printed on the cover is actually the first short story, in which a man nearly drowns after being attacked by a giant squid, and loses his copy of the book you’re reading. Looks really interesting and eclectic.
I was actually going to mention this one, by Italo Calvino. It’s not quite the same as the sorts of shenanigans that Pale Fire and (it seems) House of Leaves have, in which a supposed work of art is supposedly criticized by a supposed scholar. But it is kinda as you describe. Basically, it’s about you buying the new book by Italo Calvino, called “If on a winter’s night a traveler…”…and then something going not quite right with the narrative.
Quoting myself to say that this book was a fantastic slice of horror/fantasy/scifi.
Basically at first glance it is a selection of short stories about the city of Ambergris. Starts off with a nice fiction piece to introduce you to the city. Next there’s a historical discussion of the city and its founders and its original inhabitants, a mysterious race of mushroom dwellers. Then an unsettling biographical account of how one artist found his muse. You may start to question just what exactly you are reading when you begin the fourth part, a transcript from an interrogation in a mental hospital. Then the appendix…which is actually half of the book, and ends up being extremely important. The deeper you dig, the more questions are raised about what you have already read, the more connections begin to appear, and suddenly everything begins to come into focus. (This is not even mentioning the extensive, hilarious, and ultimately -vital- section all about squid, or the encrypted story which I am still working on)
Definitely a book where you need to read between the lines. In the interest of avoiding spoilers, I haven’t really touched on WHY it’s considered horror…because I think it’s alot more fun to be completely creeped out by this book.
I can’t recommend this highly enough for fans of Lovecraft, Borges, or highly original fantasy in general.
