![]() ![]() Only an older reader is likely to appreciate the subtleties of “The Lost Soul” (Seven Stories, 46 pages, $22.95), a picture book by Olga Tokarczuk, winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature. “Devotees like to say that a person is never too old to enjoy picture books. It’s a soothing balm for tense, jagged times.” This sincere collaboration invites readers to reflect upon existential themes on their own terms. As they do, the monochromatic pencils gradually incorporate rich hues of green and orange, representing life again in balance. Tokarczuk’s poetic sensibility matches perfectly with Concejo’s hushed, evocative drawings, which comment abstractedly on the story, depicting humans in Hopper-esque isolation from each other and the natural world, until they eventually interact and integrate. and their lost souls always left behind.” John decides to cease his frantic lifestyle in the hope that he and his soul can reunite. The minimal text opens with “Once upon a time” and describes John, a workaholic businessman in existential crisis who feels “as if the world around him were flat, as if he were moving across a smooth page in a math exercise book, entirely covered in evenly spaced squares.” As he loses all sense of identity, a wise doctor diagnoses his spiritual malaise: “The world is full of people running about in a hurry. ![]() “Nobel Prize–winning Polish novelist Tokarczuk (Flights) teams up with artist Concejo for an elegant, meditative parable about isolation and redemption. Winner of the Bologna Ragazzi Award, Special Mention 2018, Prix de l'Union Internationale pour les Livres de Jeunesse (IBBY), The White Raven (IJB Munich), and the Łódź Design Festival Award. "You must find a place of your own, sit there quietly and wait for your soul." The Lost Soul is a sublime album, a rare delicacy that will delight readers young and old. He moves to a house away from all that is familiar to him to wait for his soul to return. Here a man has forgotten what makes his heart feel full. It is a story that beautifully weaves together the voice of the Nobel Prize-winning Polish novelist Olga Tokarczuk and the finely detailed pen-and-ink drawings of illustrator Joanna Concejo, who together create a parallel narrative universe full of secrets, evocative of another time. The Lost Soul is a deeply moving reflection on our capacity to live in peace with ourselves, to remain patient, attentive to the world. But sometimes he felt as if the world around him were flat, as if he were moving across a smooth page in a math book that was covered in evenly spaced squares." In fact his life was all right without his soul-he slept, ate, worked, drove a car and even played tennis. "Once upon a time there was a man who worked very hard and very quickly, and who had left his soul far behind him long ago. The only book in English for readers of all ages by Nobel Prize-winning novelist Olga Tokarczuk is a beautifully illustrated meditation on the fullness of life. Translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones Illustrated by Joanna Concejo ![]()
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