Beatrice and Virgil, by Yann Martel, Text Publishing, $32.95
Beatrice is a donkey, Virgil a howler monkey. They are loyal friends with a taste for philosophy – or at least they were. Now, after an epic journey, they’re no more than stuffed specimens in a taxidermist’s window, where they attract the interest of a successful Canadian writer, Henry, struggling for a fresh way to write about the Holocaust (to the horror of his editor, who regards this as publishing poison).
He pieces together their dark story – in which man turns out to be the cruellest animal. Nine years after the sensational success of [itals]Life of Pi[enditals], Yann Martel here proves, again, that he’s a gifted story-teller who can write in the simplest style of the most profound subjects. [itals]Pi[enditals], you’ll remember, told of a young Indian boy who crossed the ocean in the company of a ferocious Bengal tiger called Richard Parker and emerged unscathed. As unlikely a tale as a talking howler monkey. Which takes nothing from the power of the parable and each reader’s right to interpret it as they like.
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