Pigeon

Author: Patrick Suskind
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-01-01
Features: The name Patrick Suskind is very familiar to readers in China. His book Perfume brought him international fame, and it has been translated into over twenty languages, including English, French, Italian, Japanese, and Chinese. This book collects one of Suskind's middle-length stories, three short stories, and one essay. Among them, The Pigeon is the author's powerful work published in 1978. It tells the following story: Jonathan is a doorman at a bank in Paris. After enduring the terror of Nazi rule, the hardships of war, and his wife's elopement, he becomes extremely timid. When he is living a quiet life, a pigeon suddenly disrupts his inner peace, causing him to feel inexplicable tension, confusion, and fear. Pigeons are symbols of peace and safety, but in the author's hands, they become the source of panic, with their metaphor being quite clear. It reflects the anxiety of modern Western society about the loss of security and the fear of human survival. The novel uses traditional techniques, skillful craftsmanship, and outstanding psychological to portray the bewildered and trance-like state of the protagonist, making it an excellent psychological novel. The other three short stories are also rare masterpieces. With sharp writing, Suskind depicts the personalities and psychology of different characters, offering his unique and insightful perspectives to reveal various aspects of society. When the pigeon incident occurs, Jonathan Noel is already over fifty years old, and this event suddenly changes his life. Looking back on nearly two decades of quiet life, he probably never imagined that besides the day he might pass away, he would encounter anything else of great significance.