On the Nature of Human Romantic Interaction

By Karl Iagnemma

Book Overview

Winner of theParis Review Discovery Prizefor best first fiction and anthologized inThe Best American Short Stories 2002, Karl Iagnemma has been recognized as a writer of rare talent. His literary... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0385335946
• ISBN13: 9780385335942
• Release Date: June 2004
• Publisher: Dial Press
• Length: 212 Pages
• Weight: 0.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.5" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

LOST IN NUMBERS, LOST AT LOVE

I've been rereading Iagnemma's magical collection of short stories --I loved it the first time I read it. The stories are about scientists, mostly academics, and one pseudo-scientist, a nineteenth-century phrenologist ("The Phrenologist's Dream"). They try to come to grips with love, but their passion proves resistant to categorization or manipulation by numbers. The title story of this fine collection is simply stunning: a failed doctoral student at a technical institute in the cold northern reaches seeks to pin down the love of his free-thinking lover and to write down a universal formula for the complex, unpredictable maneuverings of erotic love. Iagnemma's prose is lucid and at once coldly logical and fierily passionate. His empathic love for his doomed creatures is apparent; it redeems the book from any touch of coldness. Who would have imagined a scientist, a researcher on robots, would write such human, living stories?

Artist and Scientist in One

When I first read the title story of this collection, "On the Nature of Human Romantic Interaction" in Paris Review a couple of years ago, I was immediately hit by the opening: "When students here can't stand another minute, they get drunk and hurl themselves off the top floor of the Gehring building, the shortest building on campus." A writer myself, I know very well how difficult it is to find a great opening. Nowadays, many writers-- including some high-profile ones-- seem to seek a shocking effect for its own sake, so it's often forced and unnatural. Karl Iagnemma does not have this problem. His stories are as real as they are impressive. The aforementioned opening passage resonates with my years in MIT where students are as crazy and talented as Karl's characters, yet it sends a strong signal to the reader of a non-boring campus story. Oddly, this opening also reminds me of Ha Jin's award-wining novel, Waiting, which opens with: "Every summer Lin Kong returned to Goose Village to divorce his wife, Shuyu." Here, two talented writers "sing different tunes with equal skill," as a Chinese proverb says. These openings simply make you want to read on.And here's more: none of the stories in this collection disappointed me. I'm a picky reader. At first, I thought Karl's stories attracted me because he and I have something in common: we both are scientists trained at MIT (though I didn't know him), and we both are writers. Soon I realized it's the in-depth portrayal of human nature that resonates the most. In his story "Zilkowski's Theorem", a mathematician writes his girlfriend's Ph.D dissertation. He does it for love. But after his girlfriend is converted to a new religion and becomes another man's finance, she wants to be "honest" and publicize the fact that the dissertation wasn't hers. This "honest" act would put the mathematician's career in jeopardy, in favor of his rival - the girl's husband-to-be. Every character in this story did what seemed reasonable, yet a moral dilemma remained. Different readers may have different takes on the story; "the benevolent see benevolence and the wise see wisdom." That is the beauty of this story.It's worth noting that, two stories in this collection, "Zilkowski's Theorem" and "the Confessional Approach" were translated into Chinese and published in the prestigious Writers literary magazine in China. Unlike most short stories by unknown foreign writers that went largely unnoticed by Chinese media and readers, China's most popular weekly newspaper Southern Weekend devoted an entire page to reviewing Karl's stories and had high praise. As unusual as this is, it shows, more importantly, good stories go a long way, across oceans and cultures.Another thing worth mentioning: Karl has a unique way with language and story structure. It's so brilliantly different from other writes I have read. I like to think it's because he is both an artist and scientist. Sometimes, our profession impacts our personality and style

Wonderful talent and raw genius

Karl Iagnemma is an amazing writer as this debut book reflects. His natural talent and ability to create characters that appear to be so real allow the reader to connect with each of them. His knowledge of science combines with his genuine portrayal of love to create stories that hook you in immediately. I was introduced to Karl's writing initially when he won playboy's college fiction contest in 1998. His story entitled "A little advance", was a reflection of what was yet to come. I am so impressed with this book and look forward to more stories written by him. I strongly recommend this book to everyone out there!!

A Terrific Debut from a Talented New Writer

Karl Iagnemma is a research scientist in the mechanical engineering department at MIT, but in his spare time he writes incredibly enjoyable stories about Ph.D. students who describe their love using Venn diagrams, love triangles and sabotage between mathematicians, and a phrenologist and his mysterious traveling companion. There's a rare fictional combination of scientific logic and romantic empathy that makes these stories some of the best I've read in years. Highly recommended.