David Treuer

reviews

With quiver & quill

Love of language and literature suffuses David Treuer's novel of two parallel love stories - one set in a modern-day book bunker, the other in turn-of-the-last-century Indian villages.

By Emily Carter Roiphe

Special to the Star Tribune

The hero of David Treuer's smart, sweet new novel, "The Translation of Dr Apelles: A Love Story," is not "one of those professional Indians who were willing to dispense platitudes disguised as cultural treasure." Neither, thankfully, is his creator. People looking for digestible nuggets of ancient wisdom in New Age window dressing might visit one of the many gift shops dotting the Minnesota landscape that offer sage-scented bath beads or dream-catcher earrings.

In fact, this well-crafted, clever and somewhat complex book draws as much on European and Greek classics as on anything closer to home. It tells two parallel love stories: One is a lush, turn-of-the-last-century pastoral of two Indian foundlings who find each other; the other is a modern romance between a lonely Indian translator and a book lover who must learn to read each other.

Treuer juggles multiple elements with skill and confidence: literary satire, metafictional gamesmanship and cultural tr! uth-telling. Each on its own would be of interest to different kinds of readers, but the love story alone would appeal to anyone, even the most cynical. Oddly, it is the love story (the simplest part of the narrative) that is hardest to do well - the line between sentiment and schmaltz being razor thin.

The story of Eta and Bimaadiz, the Indian foundlings, is an especially spectacular feat. Their tale dates to at least ancient Greece, and every culture seems to have its own version: The prettiest girl and the handsomest boy grow up together, the finest flowers of their families and community. Their pure friendship turns into love, and, after many obstacles and harrowing adventures, they are either united at the nuptial altar or tragically separated through death and falsehood. To breathe life into this old standard takes only one thing: a unique descriptive voice. A rare quality indeed. In fact, a story is only as new as the way it's told.

When Bimaadiz, the you! ng hunter, and Eta, the trapper maiden, look at each other, their thou ghts are not new. But the way Treuer describes them makes their love as singular to the reader as it is to the characters: "How was such beauty possible ... that it could be made out of bone and blood? [W]hen she moved he saw the long, lean triangle of muscle that began in her armpit spring tight and then relax. He had never seen anything like it."

This individual, specific touch transforms what could be breathless sentiment into something real and affecting. In writing class, this is called "voice," and it can take years to achieve. When Treuer describes something - skinning a deer, boat maintenance, vegetables "gossiping" and "grumbling" in a village garden - you are seeing the results of hard work and observation.

Work itself is the unspoken subject that runs through this book. In one unforgettable scene, a group of lumberjacks erupts into a spontaneous dance contest to take the virginity of the captive Eta. It is their work they dance: sawing, loading, log-ro! lling, greasing griddles and stoking ovens. They "danced beautifully," writes Treuer, "each according to his occupation." It quite literally brings down the house.

Dr Apelles does a more modern kind of job, much of it mind-numbing (sorting library overstock in a huge book warehouse) and some of it head-turning (translating ancient texts in a library). It is while translating that he realizes he has never loved another person. And his love for this work, which comes from his love of language, makes it possible for him to adore Campaspe, his comely young colleague.

Likewise, love of language and literature suffuses Treuer's book. Students will find a lot of engaging and engaged shop talk: Treuer kidnaps Ernest Hemingway and Jane Austen, among others, and he's not afraid to give minor characters Dickensian surnames: a bitter spinster is called Ms Manger (as in dog-in-the ... ) and a book warehouse functionary is called Mrs Millefeuille ("thousand pages" in French).!

He also playfully engages in some metafictional hijinks, placin g books within books, sometimes literally. It's the same impulse that makes young boys take things apart to look at their pieces and see how the whole works. It can be juvenile and annoying only when used as a distancing technique. "You felt something for the character," the metafictionist seems to say, "so the joke's on you - it's only words on paper, it doesn't really exist."

Treuer's book within a book, however, makes perfect sense. The last few pages let you know that what you have read is a story, and the satisfied sigh you utter when you read the last sentence is neither silly nor a delusion of sentiment.

Emily Carter Roiphe of Minneapolis wrote the short-story collection, "Glory Goes and Gets Some."

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