Thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley for the ARC of this novel.

One of the fond memories I have of my time as a graduate English major were the days when we would sit around the conference table and go over, talk about, discuss, and even argue over a novel. Those exchanges answered questions, expanded themes you hadn’t considered, brought to light connections that were missed. The process of going over the novel with people who saw things you didn’t, whose take on the novel as a whole was different than yours, gave one a deeper appreciation of the novel, of what the novel was trying to accomplish when in the hands of the reader.

Ben Lerner’s *Transcription* is one of those novels I wish I had a room full of readers to go over the scenes with, the themes, the ideas. It is a short book with a fairly straightforward structure: A former student goes back to interview his famous mentor, things happen (I don’t like to give specifics in reviews), and the repercussions from that encounter make up the rest of the novel. Yet within the structure there are tangents, offshoots where we venture off to other times, other places. Lerner has the ability to create moments of philosophical, sometimes metaphysical, depth from the most mundane moments that pull you away from the main narrative to focus on this thought or idea, then cast you back to the story as if nothing has happened. But now you’re reading the main story with this additional little kernel of an idea floating around in your mind, and it can’t help but shift the interpretation of what you’re reading, adding a different color, a different tone. It’s masterful if sometimes maddening because that’s when I want to put the novel down and ask “Why?”

*Transcription*: Even the title is begging for interpretation. There are sections in the novel that read like transcriptions, sections of just back-and-forth dialogue, Q&A style. Does that give them more authority? More authenticity? What, exactly, is being transcribed? I’ve read Lerner’s other novels, so I know I have to come up with my own answers, my own interpretation. And this, fundamentally, is the pleasure of this novel. *Transcription* is a satisfying novel on one hand—the story feels complete, the final section complements the first section giving the novel an almost circular feel—but it does linger in the mind. Sitting here almost two days after finishing it, I am still thinking about many things in the novel: the importance of this or that scene, the brief appearances of certain characters, the meaning of the final section of text in the novel. Why the brackets [you’ll have to read the novel to understand]? The novel is short enough that I will probably reread it just to see if I can come up with answers to my own questions.

If I’ve muddled the review so you don’t know what I’m saying (which I tend to do), this is what I’m saying: *Transcription* is a very interesting, well-written novel with emotional depth that comes to a satisfying conclusion. And it is also a novel with great ideas and views that make you pause, nod your head, or shake it in disagreement, a novel that raises questions about the meaning of our existence in these recent times and the resonances from the past that continue to affect us in our present. The novel asks questions, and most great novels do.

Thank you to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for an eARC of this novel.

This is a masterclass is brevity. TRANSCRIPTION might be the first great contemporary Post-COVID novel that tackles the nature of societal isolation and fear. I have mostly felt that contemporary novels of the past couple of years have shoehorned in conversations of the pandemic without serving the greater work of art (outside of Greenwell's SMALL RAIN, whose similar use of monologues and chamber storytelling could sit alongside this novel). Into this fear, Lerner interrogates the multifaceted nature of technology: tech that unites us, tech that distracts us, tech that forces our hand. In just 144 pages, he really analyzes the contemporary malaise of the tether to our devices. Ultimately, though, this is a novel of family. In 3 sections, Lerner creates a lush diorama of family in the 21st century, specifically along the father/child dyad. It's complicated and comparative, incredibly compelling until the last sentence. I cannot recommend this (and all of Lerner's fiction) enough. This should practically be required reading as human beings (with iPhones).

Reading this book reminded me that I have wanted to read books by this author for some time and I am kicking myself that I haven't done so earlier. Transcription works well on a number of levels and the relatively simple structure opens up so many much more complex narrative enquiries. Above all though it is just very satisfying fiction; a well-written and constructed interrogation of the philosophical (maybe) and ethical considerations of representation, connection and memory. I read it very quickly and have then taken some time before considering feedback and I am struck by how much of an impression a very slight volume has left (even with twenty or so books read in the interim period). It packs a far greater punch than its page weight would suggest. Very grateful for the ARC which allowed me to read this early and to also set right the deficit of Ben Lerner books in my life. Off to buy his back catalogue.

A puzzlebox novella—delightfully spooky meta-moments about fictionality/reality, dryly funny, with Kafkaesque subplot about parenting a teenage daughter that I found fine and a covid plot that I found immensely moving. Thematically timely, but a totally refreshing take on the pandemic, "technology," etc.

Elegant, enigmatic and engaging, Lerner’s latest is a short read but a rich one. Location and character are powerfully achieved, not least Thomas, the aging intellectual with his mittel-European style and brilliant mind. The two younger men, Ben and Max, are both foils for Thomas as well as modern representatives, struggling with technology and family, engaging with Thomas in affecting ways. Lerner is a master of sensitivity and a kind of transposition whereby normality slips into something else. Here the focus is on memory, but also past and present, the layers of experience and comprehension. It’s masterful stuff, reminiscent of, to me, of someone like Sebald who can play with reality and fiction without ever entirely revealing his hand.
Fine work.

More incredible work from Lerner. At an extremely tight page count (I believe sub 130) he manages to do it again with a symmetrical structure, once again using the act of conversation, or of storytelling, as a kind of emotional fulcrum (see Atocha Station, 10:04, etc.). When I first saw the book was so short I was skeptical but I needn't have been: it works, very well.

If you have read anything from Ben Lerner before, you know that within a page his writing is singular and a voice of a generation. This book is short, but the economy of words, the story, the encapsulation of this very odd time we all went through ----so brilliantly delivered. Looking forward to reading it again as with all his works, there is plenty to ask, search for, and extract from his prose.


Thank you so much to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this.