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Both aesthetically and historically, “Ergo” is a piece of disillusioned postwar literature. The entire novel is as arbitrary, surrealistic, and tenebrous as the episode of Aslan’s death. Its violent content and spastic structure incarnate the fury of war and the gloom of post-war Europe...
...chaos of the novel serves as a background for Lind’s omnipresent existentialism. Because in the world of “Ergo” everything is permitted, Lind takes the liberty of mentioning the concept everywhere. From the most quotidian of conversations to the Leo’s deitific chants, the characters communicate via existential tropes from modern literature whose clearest source is Samuel Beckett...
...however, “Ergo” is obnoxiously one-dimensional. Of course there are many abstract ideas presented in the book, but they all serve a single purpose: existential terror. The novel explores no other sentiment. Even the intercourse of Wacholder and Trude Böckling, a minor character from the government, is described in a disturbing fashion. Böckling goes, “Kill a Trude Böckling with a little fellow like that? Don’t be silly.” “Aren’t you a whore...
...vulgar, again without variation. Toward the end of the book, Leo says, “We pull on God’s cock therefore, we are. Penem Dei tractamus ergo sumus.” This declaration is presumably an important sentence, considering the fact that the title of the novel “Ergo,” which means “therefore” in Latin, is derived from the quote. However, the redundant use of crude language and even the purpose behind its use, which is always the same, become an annoyance. The structural chaos...
...Ergo” deserves a certain degree of credit if only for its ability to genuinely terrify. It would be difficult to find a postwar book that leaves an impression as petrifying as “Ergo.” But a novel, due to its inherent features as a genre, tends to reach its height when it delivers multi-layered thoughts and sensations that expand themselves throughout the breadth of reading. Instead of delivering on this front, Jakov Lind limited the artistic potential of the novel by consciously designating a purpose to it. “Ergo...