The Romanian: Story of an Obsession
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Manufacturer: Tarcher
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 306.7662092
EAN: 9781585424788
ISBN: 1585424781
Label: Tarcher
Manufacturer: Tarcher
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 416
Publication Date: 2006-02-02
Publisher: Tarcher
Studio: Tarcher
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Editorial Reviews:
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Winner of the 2004 Prix de Flore-one of France's most distinguished literary prizes-a wildly romantic, true-life love story
History follows a trail of sputtering desire, often calling upon the delusions of lovers to generate the sparks. If it weren't for us, the world would suffer from a dismal lack of stories," writes Bruce Benderson in this brutally candid memoir.
"What astonishes and intrigues is Benderson's way of recounting, in the sweetest possible voice, things that are considered shocking," wrote Le Monde. What's so shocking? It's not just Benderson's job translating Céline Dion's saccharine autobiography, which he admits is driving him mad; but his unrequited love for an impoverished Romanian in "cheap club-kid platforms with dollar signs in his squinting eyes," whom he meets while on a journalism assignment in Eastern Europe.
Rather than retreat, Benderson absorbs everything he can about Romanian culture and discovers an uncanny similarity between his own obsession for the Romanian (named Romulus) and the disastrous love affair of King Carol II, the last king of Romania (1893-1953). Throughout, Benderson-"absolutely free of bitterness, nastiness, or any desire to protect himself," wrote Le Monde-is sustained by little white codeine pills, a poetic self-awareness, a sense of humor, and an unwavering belief in the perfect romance, even as wild dogs chase him down Romanian streets.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Obsessive Love...Is it Love or Lust?
Comment: Not only did the author give the reader a glimpse into his personal story of obsessive love; but also the added problem of his obsession - the young man that he lusts after is much younger than him, more beautiful, and lives and hustles in Romania.
There is a feeling for the reader, of impending doom throughout this book.
Bendersen's deep feelings of lust/love is is made more difficult for him knowing this beautiful man will do anything for money - including sell his own body.
So it begs the question throughout the book. Does this beautiful young man really like our older pursuer; or is he merely a means to an end.
Romulus does what he wants, even when the author visits him every few months from the states....but Romulus always makes his body available and therein is our 'catch 22'.
Benderson pulls no punches about the beautiful body of Romulus always there for him.
Angst,frustration,anger and helplessness go hand in hand with Benderson as he tries to cope with his feelings of loving someone he can't control - and who has also made it plain to Benderson that he prefers women and is not gay.
We are also given a parallel stories of obsessive love between Prince/King Carol I and his paramour a Jewess. THAT story ended badly.
Benderson's story of his obsession, is also his total renunciation of his personal life, in order to satisfy his need,his lust, his compulsion for his beautiful boy.
So we are kept wondering...will it work?....can it work?....It's worth the read to find out.
Thank you to my Romanian friend, Anton, for recommending this book to me.
Customer Rating:
Summary: An Intellectual Triumph
Comment: Benderson, Bruce, "The Romanian: Story of an Obsession", Tarcher/ Penguin, 2006.
An Intellectual Triumph
Amos Lassen and Literary Pride
If you are in the mood for a serous book that will indeed make you think, pick up a copy of Bruce Benderson's "The Romanian: Story of an Obsession" and I can promise you that you will not be disappointed. I knew nothing about it and the more I read the more surprised I became and the more I loved this book. Written as a memoir, it is really more of a mystery. It s one thing to go down the wrong road but it is something else when you knowingly do so. The book is honest (sometimes too much so) and realistic (because it really happened).
Anyone who has ever loved a person or a place with pain and obsessed, fantasized, felt not at home, or thought about the concepts of history and fate will have a pleasurable read. Benderson takes Romanian history and enmeshes it with the love story of a forbidden hustler. Benderson's obsession with a Romanian rent boy parallels the scandal of a royal family and in doing so takes us with beautiful insight into the modern perspective. Benderson has created a whole new form of travel memoir with this book. He transforms his obsessions to matters for the intellect and we get a psycho-sexual soap opera where danger and truth hide in run down hotels, dim cul-de-sacs and unknown foreign landscapes. The titillation he could have provided his readers by writing this as a soft-core porn novel is instead relates as depraved, masochistic luminous and comical story. There is no hint of redemption and no patented wisdom. The style of the author is depressing and decadent and seems to be infused with mind altering drugs but this is what makes this book so great.
Benderson is at times self-indulgent but we never lose interest. It seemed to me that the author was trying to exorcise some of his guilt feelings about exploiting a young hustler but this is not really of importance as we see when the book draws to a close. Everything is just dirty and the man brought about his own fate.
Benderson felt that his mother had suffocated him emotionally and it is through this knowledge and his relationship with a young man that he begins to realize that everyone of us carries some kind of flaw and that above all, we are human. In learning this, the book shocks us into the reality of the way we live and we start to search within ourselves. Benderson shocks us out of any preconceived notions we may have about the nature of sexuality and we learn that we are mainly responsible for our undoing.
The layers of the book are plentiful as past and present intertwine and the passion of Benderson becomes the passion of the person reading his book. The language is beautiful and the way three different themes are bound together is nothing short of amazing. The descriptions are lush and I bet that Romania has never looked so good before. Benderson uses his beautiful narrative to tell us of things that should ordinarily shock us but his way of relating what he has to say is absolutely gorgeous.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Self indulgant at times, yet kept me on board
Comment: I knew nothing about this memoire but the title before i picked it up so you can imagine my suprise as the plot became clear.
I enjoyed this book more than i expected because the characters pulled me in and the pace seemed to be more like a mystery than a memoire. Knowing that the story was not dreampt up made the characters feelings weigh a bit more heavily.
I really enjoyed the journey the author goes through...knowing he's venturing down the wrong path but going anyway, for the immediate satisfaction that lays there.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The politics of an Obsession
Comment: I loved this book. It was honest, although at times it did teeter on the pretentious. I'm not sure if there really was a valid point to his parallel tale of Romania's last king and mistress and Benderson's affair with the his Romanian hustler. Perhaps Benderson was just trying to displace some of his guilty feelings over exploiting a poor and desperate young man. By the end it really doesn't matter - his rose tinted glasses are off and it's all just grime, grit as dirty as uncut diamonds. I came to realize that everyone is an accomplice in their own undoing.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A smart director would snatch up the rights
Comment: I am straight and was wonderfully surprised how "The Romanian" depicted facets of my own love life and how Benderson's relationship with his mother was similar --the same suffocating control and tenderness. Benderson jolts us right out of our outdated heterosexual and homosexual bourgeois notions. Whether it is his mother or a shameful street hustler, Benderson is only too aware that we are all flawed; that we are only all too human. A shocker for sure but almost right from the beginning, we stop judging and start to search, along with Benderson, deep into our own souls.
"The Romanians," multi- layered intertwines the past with and present in such a brilliant way that we not only learn something about ourselves but also about several cultures. A smart director like Paul VERHOEVEN or TARANTINO would be smart to snatch up the rights.
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