Lenoir

Ken Greenhall


Rated: 3.00 of 5 stars
3.00 · 1 ratings · 256 pages · Published: 01 Sep 1998

Lenoir by Ken Greenhall
An African stolen from his homeland and sold into bond-servitude in Amsterdam in 1640 is renamed Lenoir. His exotic appearance makes him popular as a model for Rembrandt and Peter Paul Rubens. With great intelligence and dignity he observes and comments on the art, sex and profiteering that are the chief preoccupations of the city, a world he finds baffling, disgusting, and haunted by strange pale spirits. Part picaresque, part serious exploration of white European society seen through the eyes of a slave, Lenoir beautifully achieves the goal of the greatest historical fiction: to make the exotic familiar, and the familiar utterly new.
Ken Greenhall, a former reference book editor, is the author of four previous works of fiction. His novel Baxter, made into a film, was chosen as one of the New York Times' best movies of 1990. He lives in New York City.
"A sweeping historical triumph."-Edwidge Danticat
"A rare tale that's able both to entertain and enlighten."-"Kirkus Reviews"
"Wry, bemused and honest, Lenoir's voice adroitly registers both 17th-century Holland and the soul of a proud outsider who struggles to maintain his beliefs, dignity and self-possession even as he is pulled into the perplexing lives and misadventures of those around him..."Lenoir" speaks from the margins of his society in a voice of supreme sanity and deep wit."-"Publishers Weekly" (starred review)
"The protagonist of "Lenoir" is wryly perceptive, simultaneously innocent and jaded, and always compelling."-Jim Shepard
"When we study great paintings, we rarely consider their inspiration. Through "Lenoir" we discover what the life of one model for the great masters of painting must surely havebeen like. Engaging, unwavering, ingenious, and courageous, this fresh approach to storytelling is to be applauded."-Jo Ann Mapson
Chapter 1
They are deranged. They are pale, their country is flat and wet, and they have no soul. I believe they are being punished for having only one god.
Their lives are busy and complicated, yet they do not understand the simplest of facts about human existence. For example, it is not clear to them that when one makes

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