The Vanity Routines


Short prose
Original title: Vanitasrutinerna
Stockholm: Norstedts, 1998, 101 pages
Cover: Bigert & Bergström
ISBN: 91-1-300328-3



“This is an exquisite little book about the art of disappearance. . . . His style is singular, at times so precise in its use of metaphors that cold chills are sent down my Swedish spine. It goes straight to the central nerve system!” — Märit Aronsson, Upsala Nya Tidning

“Fioretos’ texts recall Samuel Beckett’s monological dramas, but are considerably more lighthearted and elegant . . . The language has luster and seems newly polished; words and sentences are in good balance, the spirits high . . . There is song inside my head.” — Lars-Olof Franzén, Dagens Nyheter

“Here is pragmatism, beauty, and clandestine sensitivity, even a sort of black humor as a consequence of the elegantly teasing tone and the absurd situations that are gradually being uncovered.” — Thomas Götselius, Göteborgstidningen

“Fioretos is an extremely conscious writer, whose control over his means of expression is precisely so dictatorial and solemn as is necessary for great comedy to arise. Like Buster Keaton among collapsing houses, Fioretos strolls around in that apocalyptic pandemonium we call the moment of death while carrying a neutral expression on his face, which of course becomes all the more comic the higher the drama of the physical situation.” — Ragnar Strömberg, Bonniers Litterära Magasin

 

 






Literary

The Truth about
Sascha Knisch


The Gray Book

Scholarly
Re: the Rainbow
The Solid Letter
Word Traces

In Other Languages

Berlin Above and
Below Ground


The Skulls
Stockholm noir
The Vanity Routines
A Book about Phantoms
The Critical Moment
The Book of Imparting