A hasty slow

This is a real choice of Laurent Gaudé writer has done in just describing the end of Alexander. Far from telling us his military exploits that made swell the Macedonian Empire to the banks of the Indus, Laurent Gaudé depicts the last minutes of the life of Alexander the Great: his death, between poisoning and fever; the war of succession that starts; and the glory of Alexander beyond death. This is a real choice of writer because Laurent Gaudé decides not to an agreed and predictable story of the life of Alexander in 500 pages recounting his exploits (everyone has seen in history class or At the movie theater); no, Laurent Gaudé chosen to slow and magic, music language for us to tell the dying Alexander, Alexander's death and the last glory of Alexander.

While slow procession, the novel advance by his style, his epic taste, ancient supernatural. Laurent Gaude written polyphony to punctuate a narrative whose slowness is that of the sun, the stifling heat, mourning, walking the funeral procession, humidity of Indian forests. The magic is that dances, that of the spirit of the dead, the silent priests who throw saffron powder handles to call for clemency terrible gods. And the word is given to the dead; they are the ones that offer last glory to Alexander, while the succession war is raging.

A wonderful book which is super slow his hurried pace and constant threat in alternating voices: the voice of the dead who are for the living; the narrative voice which sometimes attaches to Dryptéis, sometimes to Alexander or Tarkilias.

Laurent Gaudé brilliantly meets the challenge he embarked without falling into the traps a very familiar story.