American Journal, Christine Montalbetti
Have you ever tried to understand the psychology of a lump of sugar which is trying to hide from the view of the coffee drinker? A glimpse into the book of the week might help you grasp the ungraspable...
The sugar sits in its bowl, keeping to itself, trying to look small to escape notice, not realizing that the ruse makes it the most obvious victim. I'm sure this has happened to you: by acting like you don't get it, in an effort to deflect attention, you end up as the focal point despite yourself. [...]
The sugar, as I was saying, sits in its bowl, keeping to itself, but Tom Lee is no fool. He walks over, grabs the sugar bowl, and extracts the recalcitrant cube, and before scalding it alive in his coffee, he holds it between his fingers and looks it over, chiding it a bit for trying to hide like that, no, that's not very nice, is it, trying to outsmart me, were you, thought you could get away with it, did you, what do you take me for, etc.
Published by Dalkey Archive Press in March 2018 in a translation by Jane Kuntz, Christine Montalbetti's novel came out in France as Journée américaine in October 2009 (Editions P.O.L).
Beginning as a road novel reuniting Donovan and Tom Lee, old friends from their college days, Christine Montalbetti’s novel quickly becomes a playfully unpredictable exploration of American culture. Re flecting on college football, small-town gossip, and the automobile, among other American institutions, the dreamlike quality of Montalbetti’s narration creates fresh, often very funny new vantages on aspects of American life usually too familiar to be noticed.
Christine Montalbetti is an award-winning French novelist, essayist, critic, and professor of literature at the University of Paris VIII.
Jane Kuntz has translated ten works of fiction for Dalkey Archive. She holds a doctorate in Francophone Literature, and spent eighteen years in Tunisia.
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