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A novella of ludic menace, a puzzle without pieces, SJ Fowler’s MUEUM pictures the amassing and dismantling of a public edifice, brick by brick, in prose that refracts and breaks the light emitted by history’s ornaments and history’s omissions. Suspended in unknowable time there is a city; in the city, an event, a conflict. Amid the ash, fog and cloud, there is the manufacturing of a space-a many-winged museum on the make. On the plinths, exquisite remnants of life present and past-adorning the walls, portraits of gentle torture sit hand in hand with brutal and statuesque portrayals of camaraderie-and the gift-shop is littered with plastic curios and gilt revulsion. Goya, as atmosphere rather than artwork, hovers amid iron age ghosts, bronzed ideas, and antiqued anxiety. Pacing the hall, atrium and corridor, there are those who keep the museum-the various midwives to the building’s demands-and those, like the reader, who merely visit; those who pass through the vacant galleries adrift with questions. What can I touch? What is next to Egypt? What is hidden in Mesopotamia? Where do we eat? Drink? Where is the entrance? The exit? Following the tradition of the Nestbeschmutzer authors ( one who dirties their own nest, vis-a-vis Bernhard and Gombrowicz, et al), in Fowler’s curt, spiralling, and acute work, the museum’s keepers will answer.
