That in Aleppo Once by Vladamir Nabokov

Morpheus as Othello.

That in Aleppo Once by Vladimir Nabokov completely scrambled my brain. I finished it feeling like I had just walked out of an abstract art exhibit where everyone else was nodding thoughtfully, while I was standing there dumbfounded, wondering if I had even been looking at the same thing. Nabokov’s prose is, as always, stunningly intricate. His sentences are overflowing with poetic force, creating a sophisticated metafiction where meaning is obfuscated by literary smoke and mirrors. 

The story consists of a whirlwind of unreliable narration, obsession, fragmented memories (real or imagined?), and the power of art to transform reality. More specifically, poetry as a way to make sense of an uncanny and chaotic world. Or, at least those are my main takeways but I could be completely out to lunch here. The title is derived from Othello (at least I know that much) and the theme of betrayal, like in the play, could be worth exporing. Yet, that would only be one approach out of countless interpretations. For me, reading this story was like trying to hold onto a dream after waking up. The fragments remain, but they never quite settle into something solid. Is it about the disintegration of a marriage? The psychological unraveling of the narrator mind? A meditation on exile and loss? Probably all of the above or maybe none of it is accurate. It's like 10000 piece puzzle and missing a bunch of pieces. Regardless, I need several re-reads to even begin piecing it all together. Sure, I can appreciate Nabokov's skills as a writer but I don't have the patience or fortitude to perform a deep dive here, which this story demands from the reader. It’s both frustrating and mesmerizing, and I respect the hell out of it, even if most of it went completely over my head.