Word: pre-columbian
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...CONNOISSEUR by Evan S. Council Jr. A businessman descends into the joys of collecting pre-Columbian art and gradually loses himself to his possessions...
...nobleman. His soft, Prufrockian sensibility struggles briefly to understand the figurine's power. "Does he remind me of myself?" Muhlbach wonders incongruously. No matter. He pays $30 for it and takes the piece to an expert in Albuquerque. The verdict is quick: authentic Mayan, a dark survivor from pre-Columbian burial rites. By the time his plane touches down in New York, Muhlbach is possessed by his possession...
With declarative simplicity, The Connoisseur traces Muhlbach's plunge into a world where everyone is "into" some sort of object: wicker baskets, pre-Columbian bowls, Oriental sculptures, early American leg irons. His new acquaintances are sharks, nuzzling through dealers' galleries, circling fiercely at auctions. With cold passion, they study the artifacts of vanquished people; blankly, they watch for signs of ignorance or weakness in competitors, especially newcomers like Muhlbach. Having acquired a little knowledge, he quickly obliges them. He successfully bids on what he takes to be an Olmec jade mask, realizing only as the hammer falls that...
Pangs of Greed. This small novel leaves Muhlbach dangling between pleasure and despair. Packed with pre-Columbian arcana (Connell himself is a collector), it conveys the joyous release that absorption in a stern hobby can bring. Something alien has penetrated Muhlbach's life and opened vistas he can never exhaust. Not certain whether his response is to beauty or authenticity, Muhlbach nonetheless responds. Yet he is aware of some disquieting side effects: increasing pangs of greed for what he can appreciate but not afford, a habit of judging people by their acquisitions -and of being judged and found wanting...
Exquisite Profession. This dissolution of the art and artifacts of a whole culture to the crude denominator of bullion was especially ironic in view of the sheer multiplicity of use and image in pre-Columbian goldwork. No two figures are ever the same, and the range of imagery is as profuse as Colombian nature itself: alligators, jaguars, condors, deer, owls, lizards, macaws, and even hallucinogenic mushrooms. To the gaping Spaniards it seemed that anything, among these singular people, could be made of gold, from cooking pots to ceremonial masks and lime holders for coca chewing...