Savage Theories (2017)by Pola Oloixarac

Book Review

Savage Theories (2017)

by Pola Oloixarac

  I thought I read Savage Theories because it was nominated for a Booker International Prize but I was wrong- it was not nominated for a Booker International Prize.  I loved Mona- the new novel by Oloixarac, but I listened to the Audiobook of Savage Theories, I think, simply because it was readily available from the library, another advantage of reading translated fiction- no one checks it out from the library because library patrons are vulgarians.   I am a fan of Oloixarac, she reminds me of Ottessa Moshfegh, or vice versa,  a woman who writes with wit and style about something other than motherhood, coming-of-age or the immigrant experience. Why should male writers have all the fun?  Why can't literature be fun. Again, Savage Theories, like Mona, reminded my of Laurent Binet, who is probably the most playful of all the contemporary writers of literary fiction

  Savage Theories is wild- it's got drugs, sex and heaps of Marxism, philosophy and Marxist philosophy.