Auster's Dream

Paul Auster's new book has been called a "multi-layered, spare puzzle of existence and creation, conveyed in lovely, minimalist prose". Others have just said "Huh?" In Travels In The Scriptorium, he's back to his intriguing metaphysical puzzles, leaving aside -- some would say unfortunately -- the warmth that was evident in The Brooklyn Follies. Here he is in an interview with Jill Owens: "I think this is the way dreams work...There's a kind of repetition of objects, or just putting one thing next to another, and something happens in between. In the way, for example, that collages work. I think my novels have tended to, more and more, be very multi-layered, and have several stories going on at once; I find that when you have story one, story two, and story three all on the same canvas, the energy between them is very interesting."