Only Joking

Alphonse, an accordion-playing ex-clown, is hired by the Baron to spy on his wife, for whom, unknown to the Baron, he is already working. The intricate shadow-play that ensues moves at a pace that quickly blurs the distinctions between jokes and lies, art and evidence, until with a final tug at the strings the characters barons, clowns, art students, art collectors, film-makers, restaurateurs are brought into unexpected alignment with their several objects of desire. -- "I do not think there is any writer working in English at present who is more subtly inventive or more original than Gabriel Josipovici." (Tales from the Reading Room)


Genre: Literary Fiction