Psychophant's Reviews > Manuscrit trouvé à Saragosse

This was a hard read. The XIXth century French was easier than I expected, but the continuous repetition, the nested stories, the fact that most narrators are unreliable, together with the jumps between events and periods, make it difficult to track.

The book has a structure vaguely similar to The Thousand and One nights, with many narrators telling stories but more often telling stories about others. The stories range from Gothic horror (in the beginning) to picaresque, to some libertine tales, to the philosophical. Some are good, most are predictable, a few are awful. The first half is better than the second, rushed to finish the book.

Many stories sound familiar because they were reused by other authors in the XIXth century, up to Washington Irving himself.

The main strength of the book lies in its power to evoke XVIIIth century Spain, and some parts of Italy as well. It is a clear Romantic piece, but with so many different tales, many use older tropes or subjects. The author loved the country and its people, even while being aware of the many defects of Spanish society at the time. It manages to be both an illustrated book, and obscurantist at times.

The rating given is for its value as entertainment, or how likely I am to reread it. As a guide to its century and as historical reference, from clothes to manners to travels, it is precious.