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On the terrace of an elaborate hilltop apartment overlooking a Central American capital, four people sit making polite conversation. The American couple — an elderly physician and his young wife — are tourists. Their host, whom they have just met, is a young man of striking good looks and charm. The girl, his mistress, is very young and very beautiful. Sitting there, watching the sunset, the Slades seem to be enjoying the sort of fortunate chance encounter that travelers cherish. But amid the civilities and small talk, the host's casual remark to the American woman proves prophetic: "It's not exactly what you think."
Masterfully — with the poetic control that has always characterized his work — Paul Bowles leads the reader beneath the surface of hospitality and luxury into a tortuous maze of human relationships and shifting moods, until what seems at first a merely casual encounter is seen to be one rooted in viciousness and horror.
| Price | Condition | Delivery | Seller | Action |
| $99.99 | Digital |
| WonderClub |
Krish Nai
reviewed Up Above the World on February 14, 2015
Up Above the World
It was my first encounter with Paul Bowles and for sure not last. Up above the world is a disturbing novel and leaves you quivering inwardly. The whole story has an odd nightmarish atmosphere; heat and lushness of tropics clashes with coldness and some awkwardness of human relationships; descriptions of nature, colours and sounds of the jungle are picturesque and very accurate and hallucinations experienced by heroes horrifyingly palpable.
The main protagonists remain for us enigma. American couple, Dr. Slade and his much younger wife Day, seem to be not very devoted to themselves. There is some indifference and languidness in their relationship, some ennui with slight shade of lenience. The Slades are strangely supine, like string puppets letting others manipulate them. They consider life as an eternal journey or maybe escape, anyway sum of accidental events. The Slades seem to think that common sense and some amount of money is enough to make people safe in this world. Couldn't be more wrong. When they meet charming stranger, not knowing how and why, fall victim to him; though almost for the very first page we sense they are doomed. They say don't talk to strangers and these words work here fully. But the problem is much more complex.
Bowles' style is unsentimental and a bit flat when it comes to feelings and behaviors but never fails building a tension, an ominous aura, a sense of growing horror. It is really masterful. Mrs Slade thinks that true proximity between people is impossible and one can only dream of it. And maybe there is a point. Maybe Bowles wants to tell us that any human relationship is an anguish only a bit lesser than solitude itself, that we live alone and the same way we die. So, take a look into that garden of good and evil. But don't blame me if you have nightmare later.
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