Naked Thoughts
Heralded by Joshua Cohen as "The Aphorism Master," Róbert Gál revives the forgotten art of the philo-poetic line with vicious wit and tremendous dexterity. Naked Thoughts—his fourth book to be translated into English—is at once incendiary and revelatory, surprising and instinctual, defiant and delicate, and dares to pursue and give expression to those fugitive inspirations of the mind whose very beauty relies on their performance of contention with the structures of meaning by which they are snared and signified. Weighing the balance between the intensity of emotion and patient contemplation, Naked Thoughts is a book that will satisfy voyeurs and arsonists.
"Róbert Gál continues to keep navigating the narrows of the Aphoristic Straits bound by the peaks Montaigne, Cioran, and @NeinQuarterly. These turbulent waters are not easy to maneuver, but Gál is a master oarsman of the barque of melancholy."
—Andrei Codrescu, author of The Art of Forgetting
"Whether he's inverting the closing line of Wittgenstein's Tractatus, upending some cliché, or crafting stark truisms that exude a hard-won simplicity, Róbert Gál's amusing and pessimistic micro-philosophies are always a rare joy."
—Gary J. Shipley, author of Warewolff!
"Here is something really new. Róbert Gál's archipelago of fragmentary narratives, ruminations, and aphorisms gives us a new kind of reading experience—one marked by disjunction and divergence rather than by linear narrative or structured argument. I'd like to think of Naked Thoughts as a harbinger of a writing to come, unconfined by any of the familiar categories we use to classify our books."
—Lars Iyer, author of Nietzsche and the Burbs