Montano's Malady

Shortlisted for the inaugural Warwick Prize for WritingA dazzlingly original exploration of literature's limitsand its necessityMontano's Malady is Enrique Vila-Matas at his most mischievous, self-referential, and intellectually provocative.Both the narrator of Montano's Malady, Jos, and his son, Montano, suffer from literary illnesses: Montano has writer's block and Jos can only experience the world as literature. The search for a cure leads Jos around a world that is constantly mediated by his thoughts about writers and literaturefrom Cervantes to Sternea and Kafka to Sebald, among countless other literary touchstonesas he blends fiction and essay, memoir and criticism, with dizzying brilliance.A sequel of sorts to Bartleby & Co., Montano's Malady is both a love letter to literature and a lament for its diminished place in the modern world.