Donald Antrim - The Verificationist

It was good to know that Jane was taking her time, driving safely in the foul weather. I always remind her to buckle her seat belt. To be honest, I sometimes yell at her about this. I’d have to leave it to Manuel or somebody else on earth to tell her, after she arrives at the Pancake House & Bar, where to find me.

In the meantime, and until I felt, for want of a better way of putting it, like a man — until such time, up I went, up, up, into the ICU, with its shiny new beds draped in spotless white sheets. And it occurred to me to wonder whether, had I been able, in my panicked flight from Bernhardt’s arms and my own body — had I been able to travel, as I had wanted to travel into the unknown, infinite universe, out past the moon to the farthest stars and beyond — well, I asked myself, then, if the things I might have seen and felt there, out at the edges of space and time — would these things, whatever they might have been (whatever they might be ), the things that I might have seen (that I might see ) — might they, I wondered, possibly look or feel to me anything like this ascension into light?

And would Jane, finding me naked on a metal bed on a cold ward, would she crawl into the bed and hold me for a minute, and stroke my head, and whisper sweetly in my ear, over and over again, telling me that, after all, we are married, and she doesn’t mind?

“Edgy, fantastical, absurdist, Dionysian, visionary … not to mention hilarious … Antrim’s virtuosic technical skills are everywhere apparent. Rarely has such a serious-minded book provoked so much laughter.”

— Newsday

“[Antrim] weds highbrow rumination and goofy humor, cinematic extravagance, and magical realism.”

— The Denver Post

“Witty … [and] hilarious.”

— The Boston Globe

“Wild, silly, funny, confusing, fantastic, challenging … Donald Antrim is a clever and polished writer, and he brings his readers along his strange trajectories with ease and élan.”

— The Raleigh News & Observer

“[Antrim] writes wonderfully in a funny, poignant, supple prose style … [with] full-bodied characters, each abuzz with anxiety, self-doubt, and lust … The Verificationist is terrific.”

— The Providence Journal

“Remarkable … a great treat … this novel is satisfying beyond almost all expectations.”

— Rocky Mountain News

DONALD ANTRIMis a regular contributor to The New Yorker, and he has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library, and the American Academy in Berlin. He lives in New York City.