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W.F. Hermans A Guardian Angel Recalls: The Cloud of Unknowing ‘Hermans does a wonderful job tracking Bert’s ethical, moral, and spiritual roller coaster, which fascinatingly mirrors the Dutch Nazi sympathizers and fifth columnists who enabled fascism. This should establish Hermans as a modern Dostoyevsky.’ – Publishers’ Weekly On the eve of World War II, a public prosecutor, upset because his Jewish lover has fled and left him, runs over a young girl by car. She was residing clandestinely in the Netherlands. He is torn between his sorrow at the loss of his girlfriend and the guilt about the accident, which is surrounded by mysteries that he tries to unravel as the world around him collapses. Meanwhile, he is watched over by his guardian angel, who whispers warnings to him, and the Devil, who makes use of the same exhortations. In this highly acclaimed, gripping war-time novel, personally dubbed ‘one of the most beautiful novels that I’ve written’, Willem Frederik Hermans shows that human actions are not purposeful, but amount to a string of randomness and error.
World rights: De Bezige Bij – Rights sold: Archipelago (USA/Canada), Pushkin Press (UK /ANZ), Helicon Plus (Russia) – Classic – 416 pages – First publication: 1971 – Full English translation available 44
