Home
/
Fiction
/
Venice, An Interior
Venice, An Interior
Jan 11, 2026 8:33 PM

Author:Javier Marías,Margaret Jull Costa

Venice, An Interior

An essential companion for every traveller to Venice, this is the hidden city revealed in a gorgeous non-fiction account by one of Europe's greatest living writers, Javier Marías

Century after century, the essence of Venice is unchanging. It is a place of contradictions, equal parts glamour and chaos. As a young man, Javier Marías made the city his home; since then he has left and returned many times, drawn back to its labyrinth of blind alleys, its pearly green canals, its imagined spaces.

His love affair with the city has lasted over thirty years - he has traced every inch of its endless interior, has lived among the Venetians and lived apart from them. In Venice, An Interior, Marías sets out to uncover the heart of this strange and enchanting place.

Reviews

Publisher's description. A spell-binding literary journey through the ancient and timeless maze of Venice. With characteristic thoughtfulness and elegance, Marías captures this city of contradictions, where glamour and squalor are layered one atop the other, and the truly native Venetians are a rare and elusive tribe.

—— Penguin

In Indignation, his power and intensity seem undiminished

—— New York Times

He is a writer of quite extraordinary skill and courage

—— London Review of Books

I relished Indignation. Roth writes with his trademark drive and fluency, on the knife blade between rage and laughter

—— Guardian

Roth reasserts his fictional mastery with a fine taut narrative about the frustrations of youth...every part of it is dovetailed into a story of compelling economy...a mid-20th-century tale of nemesis with all the intellectual and imaginative force of a great novelist writing at the height of his powers

—— Sunday Times

A gratifying novel... Indignation is, unquestionably, seriously "good" Roth

—— The Times

Roth's novels abound in comic moments, and so does Indignation...His powerful new novel seethes with outrage...a deft, gripping, and deeply moving narrative

—— New York Review of Books

Indignation ought to be required reading for presidential candidates

—— Evening Standard

Indignation is, among its many pleasures, a controlled expression of wrath

—— Daily Telegraph

If I had to choose one word to sum up Indignation I'd go for classy. If were allowed two: very classy

—— Sunday Telegraph

Consummately elegant

—— Sunday Times

He writes perceptively about the shift from self-absorbed teenager to adult.

—— The Times

If all works of fiction were as thoughtful, as subtle, as well constructed and as funny as Metroland there would be no more talk of the death of the novel

—— New Statesman

It's one of the best accounts of clever English schoolboyhood I've read

—— Times Educational Supplement

Irony and imagery are deployed with a finesse even Flaubert wouldn't wince at...consummately elegant

—— Sunday Times
Comments
Welcome to zzdbook comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
Copyright 2023-2026 - www.zzdbook.com All Rights Reserved