Trieste

Haya Tedeschi sits alone in Gorizia, in northeastern Italy, surrounded by a basket of photographs and newspaper clippings. Now an old woman, she waits to be reunited after sixty-two years with her son, fathered by an SS officer and stolen from her by the German authorities as part of Himmler’s clandestine Lebensborn project.

Haya reflects on her Catholicized Jewish family’s experiences, dealing unsparingly with the massacre of Italian Jews in the concentration camps of Trieste. Her obsessive search for her son leads her to photographs, maps, and fragments of verse, to testimonies from the Nuremberg trials and interviews with second-generation Jews, and to eyewitness accounts of atrocities that took place on her doorstep. From this broad collage of material and memory arises the staggering chronicle of Nazi occupation in northern Italy.

Written in immensely powerful language and employing a range of astonishing conceptual devices, Trieste is a novel like no other. Daša Drndić has produced a shattering contribution to the literature of twentieth-century history.

"A masterpiece." —Financial Times   "In this documentary fiction, the private and public happen at once, large and small scale, imagined with just the same biographical precision...The picture Trieste offers is cumulative—so is its effect...The multifarious elements that comprise Haya's story and its grand context are an incredibly dense and potent mixture, too." —The Independent 

"Trieste achieves a factographical poetry, superbly rendered by Ellen Elias-Bursać, implying that no one in Axis-occupied Europe stood more than two degrees from atrocity"- Times Literary Supplement    "Trieste is more than just a novel, it's a document that should be compulsory reading in secondary schools ... Books like this are necessary whilst there's still a glimmer of hope that eloquently reminding us of the past may prevent its repetition." —Bookbag 

"Trieste is a massive undertaking. It swings from stomach-churning but compelling testimonials from former concentration camp workers to fluid fictional prose'" —Irish Independent   "Gripping...Highly recommended, this story’s gripping historical approach calls to mind the work of Norman Mailer and Don DeLillo." —Library Journal (starred review)

 

"Moving...Drndić's themes, use of history, and narrative technique invite favorable comparisons to W.G. Sebald." – Publishers Weekly

"A masterpiece." —Financial Times   "In this documentary fiction, the private and public happen at once, large and small scale, imagined with just the same biographical precision...The picture Trieste offers is cumulative—so is its effect...The multifarious elements that comprise Haya's story and its grand context are an incredibly dense and potent mixture, too." —The Independent 

"Trieste achieves a factographical poetry, superbly rendered by Ellen Elias-Bursać, implying that no one in Axis-occupied Europe stood more than two degrees from atrocity"- Times Literary Supplement    "Trieste is more than just a novel, it's a document that should be compulsory reading in secondary schools ... Books like this are necessary whilst there's still a glimmer of hope that eloquently reminding us of the past may prevent its repetition." —Bookbag 

"Trieste is a massive undertaking. It swings from stomach-churning but compelling testimonials from former concentration camp workers to fluid fictional prose'" —Irish Independent   "Gripping...Highly recommended, this story’s gripping historical approach calls to mind the work of Norman Mailer and Don DeLillo." —Library Journal (starred review)

 

"Moving...Drndić's themes, use of history, and narrative technique invite favorable comparisons to W.G. Sebald." – Publishers Weekly  "Trieste’s originality lies not just in its structure and forceful, unflinching imagery—translator Elias-Bursa deserves acclaim as well—but also in how it brings the lingering effects of the Nazis’ merciless racial policies forward into the present."  – Booklist

"A masterpiece." —Financial Times (UK) "In this documentary fiction, the private and public happen at once, large and small scale, imagined with just the same biographical precision...The picture Trieste offers is cumulative—so is its effect...The multifarious elements that comprise Haya's story and its grand context are an incredibly dense and potent mixture, too." —The Independent (UK) "Trieste achieves a factographical poetry, superbly rendered by Ellen Elias-Bursać, implying that no one in Axis-occupied Europe stood more than two degrees from atrocity" —Times Literary Supplement (UK) "Gripping...Highly recommended, this story’s gripping historical approach calls to mind the work of Norman Mailer and Don DeLillo." —Library Journal (starred review)"Moving...Drndić's themes, use of history, and narrative technique invite favorable comparisons to W.G. Sebald." —Publishers Weekly "Trieste’s originality lies not just in its structure and forceful, unflinching imagery—translator Elias-Bursa deserves acclaim as well—but also in how it brings the lingering effects of the Nazis’ merciless racial policies forward into the present."  —Booklist

PRAISE FOR TRIESTE "Although this is fiction, it is also a deeply researched historical documentary. Haya's life story is woven artfully into a broader tale of the twentieth century's atrocities. The book begins gently, introducing us to the archiepiscopal see of Gorizia in a manner reminiscent of WG Sebald . . . It is a masterpiece."-A.N. Wilson, Financial Times "Trieste achieves a factographical poetry, superbly rendered by Ellen Elias-Bursać, implying that no one in Axis-occupied Europe stood more than two degrees from atrocity."- Times Literary Supplement  "Trieste is more than just a novel, it's a document that should be compulsory reading in secondary schools ... Books like this are necessary whilst there's still a glimmer of hope that eloquently reminding us of the past may prevent its repetition."-Bookbag "Trieste is a massive undertaking. It swings from stomach-churning but compelling testimonials from former concentration camp workers to fluid fictional prose'"-Irish Independent on Sunday

"Undeniably raw and mythical...Trieste evolves as a novel in the documentary style of the German writer W.G. Sebald, but also as a memorial of names, and as a novel about one woman's attempt to find order in her life. And as a book of events that have made the last century infamous for the ages, a book that, if it moves you as it moved me, you will have to set down now and then, to breathe, to blink and blink and say to yourself and whatever gods you might believe in, please, oh, please please please, never again." —Alan Cheuse, NPR's All Things Considered "Ingenious...Trieste is an exceptional reading experience and an early contender for book of the year." —Minneapolis Star Tribune "A masterpiece." —Financial Times (UK) "In this documentary fiction, the private and public happen at once, large and small scale, imagined with just the same biographical precision...The picture Trieste offers is cumulative—so is its effect...The multifarious elements that comprise Haya's story and its grand context are an incredibly dense and potent mixture, too." —The Independent (UK) "Trieste achieves a factographical poetry, superbly rendered by Ellen Elias-Bursać, implying that no one in Axis-occupied Europe stood more than two degrees from atrocity" —Times Literary Supplement (UK) "Gripping...Highly recommended, this story’s gripping historical approach calls to mind the work of Norman Mailer and Don DeLillo." —Library Journal (starred review) "An epic, heart-rending saga...A brilliant artistic and moral achievement worth reading." —Kirkus (starred review) "Moving...Drndić's themes, use of history, and narrative technique invite favorable comparisons to W.G. Sebald." —Publishers Weekly  "Trieste’s originality lies not just in its structure and forceful, unflinching imagery—translator Elias-Bursa deserves acclaim as well—but also in how it brings the lingering effects of the Nazis’ merciless racial policies forward into the present."  —Booklist