The Review of Contemporary Fiction

Shadow without a Name, by Ignacio Padilla, translated by Peter Bush and Anne McLean
reviewed by Chad W. Post

Untitled document

Ignacio Padilla. Shadow without a Name. Trans. Peter Bush and Anne McLean. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2003. 192 pp. $22.00.

Padilla’s first novel to be translated into English starts off simply enough: pointsman Viktor Kretzschmar is being charged with causing a terrible train crash. His motives for this crime open the door into the mystery fueling the plot of this book, for as his son discovers, Kretzschmar was actually born as Thadeus Dreyer but won the name—and safety—in a chess game on a train that was to take him to the front, fighting for the German army in World War I. As it turns out, the stand-in Dreyer doesn’t die in the war, instead becoming a major figure in Hitler’s regime, responsible for creating a dangerous game of doubles involving the highest officers of the Party. In a twist straight out of a thriller, this Dreyer isn’t the same person from the train, a fact that is somewhat irrelevant, as the name of Dreyer continues on through history, assuming a certain inevitable force along the way. Putting aside the intrigues of the plot, the most interesting aspect of this novel is its structural form. A member of the Crack group, Padilla tells his story through four stand-alone yet interwoven sections, each narrated by a different character at a different time and place. These monologues are restricted by the character’s point of view, presenting the reader with all the clues to the puzzle but no omniscient narrator to put it all together. So only the reader can figure out that Kretzschmar’s son is trying to exact his revenge against a different Dreyer, and by paying attention to the seemingly extraneous dates and places where each section was written the reader can uncover the final clues to the novel’s game. Aptly translated by Peter Bush and Anne McLean, this is an ambitious book executed with such style and ease to establish Padilla as a writer to watch for years to come.


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The Review of Contemporary Fiction Shadow without a Name, by Ignacio Padilla, translated by Peter Bush and Anne McLean reviewed by Chad W. Post Untitled document Ignacio Padilla. Shadow without a Name. Trans. Peter Bush and Anne McLean. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2003. 192 pp. $22.00. Padilla’s first novel to be translated into English starts off simply enough: pointsman Viktor Kretzschmar is being charged with causing a terrible train crash. His motives for this crime open the door into the mystery fueling the plot of this book, for as his son discovers, Kretzschmar was actually born as Thadeus Dreyer but won the name—and safety—in a chess game on a train that was to take him to the front, fighting for the German army in World War I. As it turns out, the stand-in Dreyer doesn’t die in the war, instead becoming a major figure in Hitler’s regime, responsible for creating a dangerous game of doubles involving the highest officers of the Party. In a twist straight out of a thriller, this Dreyer isn’t the same person from the train, a fact that is somewhat irrelevant, as the name of Dreyer continues on through history, assuming a certain inevitable force along the way. Putting aside the intrigues of the plot, the most interesting aspect of this novel is its structural form. A member of the Crack group, Padilla tells his story through four stand-alone yet interwoven sections, each narrated by a different character at a different time and place. These monologues are restricted by the character’s point of view, presenting the reader with all the clues to the puzzle but no omniscient narrator to put it all together. So only the reader can figure out that Kretzschmar’s son is trying to exact his revenge against a different Dreyer, and by paying attention to the seemingly extraneous dates and places where each section was written the reader can uncover the final clues to the novel’s game. Aptly translated by Peter Bush and Anne McLean, this is an ambitious book executed with such style and ease to establish Padilla as a writer to watch for years to come.

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