1968 novel by Jerzy Kosi?ski
Steps
is a book by a
Polish-American
writer
Jerzy Kosi?ski
, released in 1968 by
Random House
. The work comprises scores of loosely connected vignettes or
short stories
, which explore themes of social control and alienation by depicting scenes rich in erotic and violent motives. It was Kosi?ski's second novel, a follow-up to his successful
The Painted Bird
released in 1965.
Steps
won the U.S.
National Book Award for Fiction
in 1969.
Content
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]
Steps
consists of a series of short stories, reminiscences, anecdotes and dialogues, loosely linked to each other or having no connection at all, written in the first person. The book does not name any characters or places where described situations take place.
[1]
The book has been interpreted as being about "a Polish man's difficulties under the harsh
Soviet regime
at home played against his experiences as a new immigrant to the United States and its bizarre codes of capitalism."
[2]
The stories reflect upon control, power, domination and alienation, depicting scenes full of brutality or sexually explicit.
Steps
contains remarkable autobiographical elements
[3]
and numerous references to
World War II
.
Reception
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Despite its commercial failure, especially when compared to
The Painted Bird
,
Steps
met with generally positive critics' reviews
[4]
and eventually won the U.S.
National Book Award for Fiction
in 1969.
[5]
Canadian critic
Hugh Kenner
in his review of
Steps
in
The New York Times
compared it to the works by
Louis-Ferdinand Celine
and
Franz Kafka
.
[6]
In 1975, a freelance writer Chuck Ross, in order to prove his theory that unknown authors always find their books rejected, sent out excerpts from
Steps
to four different publishers, using the pseudonym Erik Demos. All four did not accept the sample. In 1977, Ross sent out the entire book to ten publishers, including
Random House
, which had originally published the book,
[7]
and thirteen literary agents. Again, the book was rejected, also by Random House, having not been recognized, despite being an award-winning work.
[8]
American novelist
David Foster Wallace
in 1999 named
Steps
one of "five direly underappreciated U.S. novels", describing it as a "collection of unbelievably creepy little allegorical tableaux done in a terse elegant voice that's like nothing else anywhere ever." He further praised that "only Kafka's fragments get anywhere close to where Kosinski goes in this book, which is better than everything else he ever did combined."
[9]
Release history
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Year
|
Region
|
Title
|
Publisher
|
1968
|
United States
|
Steps
|
Random House
|
1968
|
Netherlands
|
Stappen
|
De Bezige Bij
|
1969
|
United Kingdom
|
Steps
|
The Bodley Head
|
1969
|
France
|
Les Pas
|
Groupe Flammarion
|
1970
|
Germany
|
Aus den Feuern
|
Droemer Knaur
|
1971
|
Italy
|
Passi
|
Mondadori
|
1971
|
Turkey
|
Adımlar
|
E Yayınları
|
1981
|
Spain
|
Pasos
|
Argos Vergara
|
1981
|
Croatia
|
Koraci
|
CIP
|
1985
|
Sweden
|
Steg
|
Tiden
|
1989
|
Poland
|
Kroki
|
PIW
|
1996
|
Czech Republic
|
Kroky
|
Argo
|
2009
|
Thailand
|
??????
|
???????
|
References
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]