The Evenings: A Winter's Tale

by Gerard Reve, Sam Garrett (Translator)

Overview

THE FIRST ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF A POSTWAR MASTERPIECE

'I work in an office. I take cards out of a file. Once I have taken them out, I put them back in again. That is it.'

Twenty-three-year-old Frits - office worker, daydreamer, teller of inappropriate jokes - finds life absurd and inexplicable. He lives with his parents, who drive him mad. He has terrible, disturbing dreams of death and destruction. Sometimes he talks to a toy rabbit.

This is the story of ten evenings in Frits's life at the end of December, as he drinks, smokes, sees friends, aimlessly wanders the gloomy city street and tries to make sense of the minutes, hours and days that stretch before him.

Darkly funny and mesmerising, The Evenings takes the tiny, quotidian triumphs and heartbreaks of our everyday lives and turns them into a work of brilliant wit and profound beauty.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781782273011
Publisher:	Steerforth Press
Publication date:	01/09/2018
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	4.90(w) x 7.40(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Gerard Reve (1923-2006) is considered one of the greatest post-war Dutch authors, and was also the first openly gay writer in the country's history. A complicated and controversial character, Reve is also hugely popular and critically acclaimed- his 1947 debut The Evenings was chosen as one of the nation's 10 favourite books by the readers of a leading Dutch newspaper while the Society of Dutch Literature ranked it as the Netherlands' best novel of all time.

Read an Excerpt

I
It was still dark , in the early morning hours of the twenty-second of December 1946, on the second floor of the house at Schilderskade 66 in our town, when the hero of this story, Frits van Egters, awoke. He looked at the luminous dial of his watch, hanging on its nail. “A quarter to six,” he mumbled, “it’s still night.” He rubbed his face. “What a horrible dream,” he thought. “What was it again?” Gradually it came back to him. He had dreamt that the living room was full of visitors. “It’s going to be a glorious weekend,” someone said.
At that same moment a man in a bowler hat walked in. No one paid him any heed and no one greeted him, but Frits eyed him closely. Suddenly the visitor fell to the floor with a thud.
“Was that it?” he thought. “What happened after that?
Nothing, I believe.” He fell asleep again. The dream went on where it had stopped. His bowler pressed down over his face,
the man was now lying in a black coffin that had been placed on a low table in one corner of the room. “I don’t recognize that table,” Frits thought. “Did we borrow it from someone?” Then,
peering into the coffin, he said loudly: “We’ll be stuck with this till Monday, in any event.” “I wouldn’t be so sure about that,”
said a bald, red-faced man with spectacles. “Would you care to wager that I can arrange the funeral for this afternoon at two?”
Frits awoke once more. It was twenty minutes past six. “I’ve had enough sleep,” he said to himself, “that’s why I woke up so early. I still have more than an hour to go.”
He dozed off eventually, and entered the living room for the third time. There was no one there. He walked over to the coffin, looked into it and thought: “He’s dead, and starting to rot.” Suddenly the cadaver was covered in all kinds of carpenter’s tools, piled to the coffin’s rim: hammers, drills, saws, spirit levels, planes, pliers and little bags of nails. All that stuck out was the dead man’s right hand.
“There’s no one here,” he thought, “not a soul in the house;
what am I going to do? Music, that always helps.” He leaned across the coffin to turn on the radio, but at that same moment saw the hand, bluish now and with long white nails, begin to stir.
He recoiled in fear. “I mustn’t move,” he thought, “otherwise it will happen.” The hand sank back down.
Later he awoke, feeling anxious. “Ten to seven,” he mumbled,
peering at the watch. “I always have such horrible dreams.” He rolled over and fell asleep again.
Parting a pair of thick green curtains, he entered the living room. The visitors had returned. The man with the red face came up to him, smiled and said: “It didn’t work out. It will have to be Monday morning, at ten. We can put the box in the study till then.” “Study?” Frits thought. “What study? Do we have a study? He means the side room, of course.” Six men lifted the coffin to their shoulders. He himself walked out in front, to open the door for them. “The key’s still in the lock,”
he thought, “good thing, too.”
The coffin was extremely heavy; the bearers moved slowly,
with measured strides. Suddenly he saw that the bottom of the box was beginning to sag and swell. “It’s going to burst,” he thought, “that’s hideous. The corpse is still intact on the outside,
but inside it’s a thin, yellow mush. It will splatter all over the floor.”
By the time they were halfway down the hall, the bottom was sagging so badly that it had begun to crack. Slowly, out of that crack, appeared the same hand from which he had recoiled.
Gradually the whole arm followed. The fingers groped about,
then crept towards the throat of one of the bearers. “If I scream,
the whole thing will fall to the floor,” Frits thought. He watched as the bottom sagged further and further and the hand drew closer and closer to the bearer’s throat. “There’s nothing I can do,” he thought. “I can’t do a thing.”
He awakened for the fourth time, and sat up in bed. It was seven thirty-five. The bedroom was cold. He sat there for five minutes, then stood up and, turning on the light, saw the windowpanes covered in flowers of frost. He shivered as he made his way to the toilet.
“I should start going out for a little walk in the evening, before bed,” he thought while washing himself at the kitchen sink. “It would make me sleep more soundly.” The soap slipped through his fingers, and he spent quite some time feeling around for it in the shadowy space beneath the counter. “We’re off to a roaring start,” he mumbled.
“But today’s Sunday,” he realized suddenly, “what a piece of luck.” Then he added to himself: “I’m up far too early, how stupid of me. But no, for once my day won’t be ruined by lying around till eleven.” While drying his face he started to hum,
then went into his room, dressed, and combed his hair in the little mirror that hung beside the door, above one corner of the bed. “It’s ridiculously early,” he thought. “I can’t go in yet. The sliding doors are still open.”
He sat down at his little desk, picked up a white marble rabbit about the size of a matchbox and tapped it softly against the arm of the chair. Then he put it on top of the pile of papers from whence it came. Standing up with a shiver, he returned to the kitchen, opened the bread bin and took out two soft white rolls, the first of which he stuffed into his mouth in a few bites.
The second he held clenched in his teeth as he went into the hallway for his coat.
“A brisk, invigorating walk in the morning air,” he murmured.
As he crossed the landing and passed the downstairs neighbours’
door, a dog yapped. He pulled the street door closed behind him quietly and followed the frozen canal to the river, which was covered along both banks with a dark layer of ice. There was not much wind. The sun had barely risen, but the street lights were already out. The gutters of the houses were lined with rows of gulls. After kneading the last of his roll into a little ball, he tossed it onto the ice and scores of birds descended. The first gull that picked at it missed. The piece of bread slid, fell into a little hole in the ice and sank before another bird could peck at it.
Church bells rang once. “An early start, this will be a day well spent,” he thought, turning right along the riverbank. “It’s cold and early and no one’s out yet, but I am.”

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

The funniest, most exhilarating novel about boredom ever written. If "The Evenings" had appeared in English in the 1950s, it would have become every bit as much a classic as "On the Road" and "The Catcher in the Rye". —Herman Koch, author of The Dinner                           
Unlike John Williams, Gerard Reve's work was critically acclaimed and sold exceptionally well during his lifetime. But, just like "Stoner","The Evenings" is brilliantly written, and has a maximum impact on the reader's soul.', Oscar van Gelderen, the Dutch publisher who rediscovered John Williams’ Stoner

'This book, an important classic in the Netherlands and long, long overdue in English, is as funny as it is peculiar. Reve really deserves more attention in the Anglophone world. — Lydia Davis, winner of the Man Booker International Prize

Editorial Reviews

IPPY Literary Fiction Award Bronze Medalist
An Observer, Financial Times, and Irish Times Book of the Year

"Exceptional... a crisp and readable translation by Sam Garrett." — The Wall Street Journal

"Fascinating, hilarious, and page-turning. The publication of this novel marks the exciting introduction of a wonderful writer to an Anglophone audience." — Publishers Weekly

"Reviewers have compared it favorably to J .D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, Albert Camus’s The Stranger and Karl Ove Knausgaard’s My Struggle. In The Irish Times, Eileen Battersby called it 'one of the finest studies of youthful malaise ever written,' and in The Guardian, Tim Parks described it as 'not only a masterpiece but a cornerstone manqué of modern European literature.'  The Society of Dutch Literature ranked it as the country’s best 20th-century novel and its third-best of all time." — The New York Times

"Sam Garrett’s precise and convincing translations ... capture the consistently anxious, suggestive, and haunting tone that runs through The Evenings like a live wire—one that, after seventy years, is still electrifying. The narrators of The Fall of the Boslowits Family and Werther Nieland, too, are persuasively rendered in the matter-of-fact and dreamlike tones of the originals." — Philip Huff, New York Review of Books

"Diabolically funny... From the deep midnight of shattered Europe, Reve crafted not only an existential masterwork worthy to stand with Beckett or Albert Camus but an oblique historical testament." — The Economist

"A novel as funny as it is painful . . . A little masterpiece — a provocative reminder that life goes on even in the bleakest of circumstances." — Los Angeles Review of Books

"Captivating." — The Atlantic

"In this first English translation of a Dutch classic . . . The author’s dry wit and ability to find humor and beauty in the banality of daily life are impressive."— Booklist

“Not only a masterpiece but a cornerstone manque of modern European literature… what can I say, in a world of hype, that will put this book where it belongs, in readers’ hands and minds?... Reve’s sparkling collage of acute observation, droll internal monologue and pitch-perfect dialogue keeps the reader breathless right through to the grand finale...huge respect to Pushkin Press.” — Tim Parks, The Guardian

"One of the greatest post-war Dutch novels... [a] brilliant modern classic." — Tom Chalmers, Publishers Weekly

"Consistently simple, straightforward, pitch-perfect prose (translated splendidly by Sam Garrett)." — Weekly Standard

"Darkly funny and mesmerizing, The Evenings takes the tiny quotidian triumphs and heartbreaks of our everyday lives and turns them into a work of brilliant wit and profound beauty… an extraordinary and highly recommended addition to both community and academic library collections’." — Midwest Book Review

"a neurotic, darkly humorous and cynical treatise on youth in the Netherlands after World War II. . . the book is innovative in its use of language. Reve successfully evokes a strong sense of psychological unrest in the mind of reader." — Out and About Nashville

"drily amusing, suffused with angst and post-war malaise and — at first blush — very impressive." — BookFilter

"It’s a testament to Reve’s writing and imagination that the question of Frits will haunt the reader long after they’re finished." — Pop Matters

"A classic of dry, dark humour… it captures a very specific flavour of ennui." — Herald

"I warmly recommend Gerard Reve’s hilariously gloomy The Evenings… I see it as a Dutch version of Kafka’s Metamorphosis." — Observer 

"A Meursault-in-waiting, a blank Holden Caulfield, a precursor to the kid in Iain Bank’s The Wasp Factory. Very good." — Evening Standard

"As a study of aimlessness in postwar Europe it is difficult, perhaps impossible to surpass." — Irish Times

"This much lauded book, finally available in English, [is] the perfect January read." — The Spectator

"The novel is dark, funny, unsettling and lingers vividly in the mind. Hats off to Pushkin Press and the outstanding translator, Sam Garrett, for making this odd, orphaned masterpiece available at last to an English-speaking readership." — Times Literary Supplement

"The Evenings is packed with the minutiae of life: luckily, the minutiae are fascinating…Reve isn't the kind of novelist to give you a straightforward answer but the journey is quite a ride." — The Times

“Reve’s keen eye for absurdity manages to cast the mundane in a new, albeit macabre, light.” — Financial Times

"This 1947 Dutch novel, considered the Netherlands' greatest in the twentieth century and now published in English for the first time...is a savage novel, full of strange, cold laughter." — The Daily Mail

"[A] dark masterpiece... a powerful story." — The Observer

"I was also pleased to see Gerard Reve’s funny, poignant debut novel, The Evenings, available in English … It’s like BS Johnson and Kafka wandering the crepuscular streets of of 1940s Amsterdam together – in a good way." — Alex Preston, The Observer Best Fiction of 2016 round up

"Batavophile bookworms can rejoice now that possibly the greatest Amsterdam novel is now available in English… for a testament to ennui, it’s strangely gripping." —A-Mag (Amsterdam)

"With the first English translation of 1947 Dutch masterpiece The Evenings, by the out-of-time, out-of-step gay Catholic convert Gerard Reve, [Pushin Press] makes perhaps its most crucial contribution yet to bringing quietened, radical non-English voices into the open. Reve’s debut doesn’t have the mainstream-baiting sensationalism of his later, sex and religion-focused, work. But it’s debatable whether he ever wrote anything better. 
Trying to sum up the rare quality of this novel in a few hundred words is akin to tossing off a pithy one-liner on Karl Ove Knausgård’s six-volume opus My Struggle. Comparisons to that chronicle of domestic minutiae are actually rather neat; much of The Evenings’ enticing devilment is in its mesmerising detail." — The Big Issue

"A masterwork of comic pathos...It should be acknowledged as one of the finest studies of youthful malaise ever written...In all fairness to Salinger, The Evenings is so much better...For a narrative so funny, it is also profoundly moving.'" — Eileen Battersby, The Irish Times

"An undisputed classic...it's a fantastic novel." — Andre van Loon, Sunday Telegraph

"This deft translation by Sam Garrett offers English readers the exploits of the cynical and awkward 23-year-old Frits van Egters as he wends his way through the last 10 days of 1946 in Amsterdam. . .  In a strangely compelling way the gloom (and eventual hope) of this nearly plotless novel is its strongest quality. How does one find meaning in life when death permeates every dream? Seventy years later, the English-speaking world is gifted with a glimpse into that time. And we sigh. It is nearly as relevant now." — Winnipeg Free Press

"An edgy, atmospheric and sardonically funny book which was way ahead of its time. Still possessing the power to shock but also to beguile, the novel’s bold stylistic tricks and its hero’s original thoughts and deeds mark it out as a classic in any language... it is now time for a wider audience to discover its weird textures and dark delights." — The National (UAE)

"Gerard Reve's sardonic classic The Evenings is finally translated into English." — Culturetrip

"An understated novel that’s funny, bizarre and yet emotionally renewing." — Attitude

“If The Evenings had appeared in English in the 1950s, it would have become every bit as much a classic as On the Road and The Catcher in the Rye.” — Herman Koch, the Dutch bestselling author of The Dinner

"Hilarious, disturbing and humane." - Joe Dunthorne, author of Submarine


“This book, an important classic in the Netherlands and long, long overdue in English, is as funny as it is peculiar. Reve really deserves more attention in the Anglophone world.”  - Lydia Davis
 
“Unlike John Williams, Gerard Reve’s work was critically acclaimed and sold exceptionally well during his lifetime. But, just like Stoner, The Evenings is brilliantly written, and has a maximum impact on the reader’s soul.” - Oscar van Gelderen, the Dutch publisher who rediscovered John Williams’ Stoner

From the Publisher

2016-12-06
Published for the first time in English, this is the 1947 debut novel by controversial Dutch writer Reve (1923-2006), who went on to a rich career offending Dutch sensibilities. He's a mean man. He's a sick man. No, he's just a bored man, although he does spend time pondering what to do with the solid contents of his nose, deciding that the best place for them is the underside of a chair: "wherever you go, if you feel around under the chair the pieces of dried snot fall to the floor." It is Christmastime, a year and a half after the end of World War II, and Frits van Egters is thoroughly disaffected. The young man works in a meaningless office job, pushing paper from one stack to another. He's a Dostoyevski-an character in his malaise and spitefulness, but Frits is more or less than that; he still lives at home, tormenting his mother on the details of how to properly smoke a cigarette, giving his pimply brother a hard time; if the war were still going on, Frits might well be working for the bad guys, but now he'll spend the days between Christmas and the New Year wandering around Amsterdam loudly voicing his barely post-juvenile opinions about things to whomever will listen, including a stuffed rabbit when no human is available: "Rabbit, I am alive. I breathe, and I move, so I live. Is that clear? Whatever ordeals are yet to come, I am alive." Alive, yes, but an irredeemably unpleasant twerp all the same, given to killing insects and thinking about edema. Not much happens because not much is meant to happen, as if to say that apart from the occasional invasion by a malevolent neighbor life is pretty dull. If listless existentialism is your bag, then this is your book, which, though written well enough, hasn't aged particularly well. Unpretty but true to life—at least life of a sort, however uninteresting.

Kirkus Reviews