Prochain Episode (New Canadian Library)
Next Episode
by Hubert Aquin
from BTC Audiobooks
"First published in 1965 as Prochain Épisode, Hubert Aquin's Next Episode is a novel of its time, informed by the author's active participation in Quebec nationalist politics. In the novel, a young separatist writes an espionage story in the psychiatric ward of the Montreal prison where he has been detained. The book provides a searing first-person account of terrorism about to be perpetrated by the novel's narrator." -- CBC Radio, Canada Reads. A member of the FLQ idles away his time in a Montreal psychiatric hospital by writing a quasi-autobiographical spy thriller set in 1960s Switzerland. The volatile hero of this flamboyant novel within a novel reunites with his long-lost lover and fellow revolutionary "K" only to embark on a mission (on K’s request) to assassinate a wealthy RCMP informer known as H. de Heutz. Twice, he is handed a perfect opportunity to complete his mission and twice, Hamlet-like, he falters and fails. Like Joseph Conrad’s The Secret Agent, Next Episode captures the mood of muddling desperation and hysteria experienced at the ground level of a terrorist operation.
Antiphonary
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