Olga Tokarczuk's latest novel The Empusium: A Health Resort Horror Story makes fun of a lot of things, but it especially enjoys having a laugh at silly men and their silly opinions on women.

The Empusium is about a group of men at a sanatorium on the eve of World War 1 set in Poland. It's a nod to Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain, but adds a dash of mushroom horror and a big splash of feminism in the mix.

This book made me laugh a lot and I really enjoyed the tongue in cheek writing from Tokarczuk when it came to both fiction and the way these men talk about women. They think that women's bodies belong to mankind because of their ability to birth, they believe that fiction is silly and couldn't give you an example of a female writer because they don't write, but also they wouldn't read it if they do. It's very clear that Tokarczuk has OPINIONS and that's also what I really enjoyed in her novel Drive Your Plow over the Bones of the Dead. I think she does such a great job with the setting of the resort and I could easily imagine this beautiful small town in the mountains, only to have the peaceful rest destroyed by this group of silly men.

What I enjoyed less, was the branding of this book as horror. I read a lot of horror, so I'm probably too picky. The book is a little creepy at the start, but the actual horror finale was a bit of a letdown to me. It doesn't help that I'm also very skeptical of mushroom horror, but I would have liked the finale to feel a bit bigger, stranger and more memorable. I did enjoy the character arc of Wojnicz a lot, so that redeemed the end for me, but mostly I was left wanting just a bit more of that biting satire that I love in Tokarczuk so much.

Special thanks to @fitzcarraldo for the ARC. The Empusium by Olga Tokarczuk is out now.

Have you read The Empusium? Or are you planning on reading it? Let me know your thoughts!


#weirdbooks

A young Polish man arrives at a German sanatorium at the beginning of the 20th century. The man meets and gets to know his fellow patients, and starts to learn about some mysterious events that plague the sanatorium.

The book touches upon a plethora of themes - the perennial misogyny that has prevailed culture and discourse, sexual and gender identity, nationalism and associated biases, small town shenanigans, philosophy, etc. In some ways it's lovely, but this is also the main problem with this book. It tries to do way too much, in my view. I struggled to read it and following the narrative - it was rarely clear what this was about, and I couldn't bring myself to care enough about any of it. On a purely intellectual level it was a satisfying read, but from a storytelling perspective - it missed the mark entirely.

And, yes, while there is an element of mystery here, it's more metaphysical in nature. I wouldn't call this a horror story, though there is of a supernatural component to the narrative construct. It doesn't add much to the plot or character development, though. It doesn't even weigh sufficiently on how the characters came across.

What I did like were the last 15% or so, and mostly due to to the revelations about our protagonist and his journey of self discovery and self acceptance. The description of his dialogue with the doctor were particularly arresting. This was the main highlight of the book of book for me.

I recommend to more cerebral readers, and perhaps to fans of The Magic Mountain, which is a clear inspiration for this book. Those seeking the thrill of a well crafted mystery or the anxiety of a horror story will not find any of this here.

My thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an early copy of this book in return for an honest review.

My first Olga Tokarczuk and what a strange and unsettling book to start with.

From reading a few reviews I gather that this book pays a nod to The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann. However I've not read that either so I cannot comment. From what I understand though, a lot of the comments on women's psychology come from highly respected psychologists of the day. They are therefore exceptionally funny - and completely bonkers.

The story involves Mieczysław (Mieczyś) Wojnicz who has been sent to a sanatorium in Görbersdorf to recover from tuberculosis. However once he arrives he is confronted with a very strange set-up. Klara Opitz, the wife of the manager, is found hanging having committed suicide; nobody seems to get better (in fact most patients appear to get sicker) and the manager, Willi Opitz, is feeding them Schwärmerei (a strange local drink that renders the drinker insensible) to the extent that noone seems to care if they get well or not.

As Wojnicz continues his stay he finds out that there have been many strange deaths in the area and always in the autumn. Wojnicz is disturbed to find that this is true but does not leave. He becomes fascinated by Frau Opitz's old room and her things, hos friendship with the very sickly Thilo and the mystery of the Tuntschi, representations of women made of stone, sticks and moss which are found on the mountainside and are said to come to life to exact revenge on men.

There's a lot of folklore and history woven into this unnerving little tale and Wojnicz is a very odd character who seems often to have no will of his own. The psychiatrists pronouncements about women are extremely amusing until you remember that these are actually from quotes.

I'd recommend this book if you like strange and unnerving novels. It certainly fits with the time of year.

Thankyou to Netgalley and Fitzcarraldo for the advance review copy.

Olga Tokarczuk’s ambitious, thought-provoking novel’s loosely based on Thomas Mann’s bildungsroman The Magic Mountain which she frequently rereads. Through the experiences of protagonist Hans Castorp, Mann’s novel examines pre-WW1 European society: competing strands of political thought; the search for meaning in a world in which Nietzsche’s declared God dead. Tokarczuk borrows from Mann’s framework but changes the setting from Swiss TB sanitorium to a version of Hermann Brehmer’s famous sanitorium in an isolated, mountainous valley in Görbersdorf, compressing the action so her story unfolds over several months in 1913.

Tokarczuk’s book features Mieczysław Wojnicz, Polish, in his twenties, like Castorp he’s diffident and sensitive, slightly adrift. Wojnicz travels to Brehmer’s sanitorium for its wellness cure, renting a room in a gentlemen’s guesthouse close to the main complex. His fellow residents seem desperate to command Wojnicz’s attention. These men have an abundance of spare time, caught between hoping to survive and waiting for death. Each night they swig Schwarmerei, a local concoction with hallucinogenic qualities, and engage in heated debates about the nature of things. Each striving to convert Wojnicz to their particular viewpoints. The men vary in their affiliations ranging from conservative Catholic to theosophist yet are united in fear and loathing of women. Theirs is a heteropatriarchal society in microcosm, women are relegated to the margins: useful for domestic labour and/or sex but little else.

Wojnicz listens to the men but rarely reciprocates possibly because he has a secret to keep. He quickly realises he’s not alone in that, the boarding-house and its surrounds are shrouded in mystery: the manager’s wife dies in suspicious circumstances; at night Wojnicz hears strange whisperings in the attics overhead; and there are rumours of macabre occurrences in the woods above the town. These sinister elements build on Mann but give Tokarczuk’s narrative a more pronounced gothic flavour mixed with flashes of folk horror, laced with unsettling undercurrents. The novel’s narration intensifies the atmosphere of unease, borrowing from Aristophanes Tokarczuk shifts between an enigmatic choral perspective and one more aligned to Wojnicz’s. Allusions to classical Greek and Roman texts pervade her story, from the play on Plato’s Symposium in her title, to the mythical Empusa, a terrifying, shape-shifting woman– whose name also conjures Polish tales of witchcraft and malevolent, blood-sucking beings.

As usual, Tokarczuk’s piece is highly referential weaving in aspects of history, myth and folklore: from Jean Renoir’s La règle du jeu to the Alpine fable of the Sennentuntschi, a variation on a rape-revenge fantasy involving sex dolls crudely-fashioned by mountain workers – although a more recent find suggests such dolls may not be purely fictional. Tokarczuk picks up on a number of Mann’s themes, his ideas on myth and recurring patterns overlap with her own interest in Jung. But this is recognisably Tokarczuk’s territory from the oblique commentary on speciesism to the condemnation of racism and antisemitism. Like Mann’s, Tokarczuk’s novel traces a line from certain forms of belief to the advent of war. But she also hints at connections between some characters’ worldviews and the later rise of National Socialism, the twisted morality that justified the Holocaust – underlined by making Lviv Wojnicz’s home and placing him in a sanitorium in Silesia. But Tokarczuk’s flagging concerns too over events in contemporary Europe: climate change; the resurgence of far-right nationalism; the war in Ukraine.

However, Tokarczuk’s overriding preoccupation here’s with toxic masculinity, body fascism, destructive gender binaries/species divides, the misogynistic, phallocentric belief systems that have dominated European thought. She deftly exposes these prejudices by having numerous characters spout appalling ideas about women drawn directly from the work of prominent male thinkers and writers from Darwin and Freud to Yeats and Sartre. Tokarczuk then challenges these gendered attitudes through Wojnicz’s personal journey to an unexpected, radical awakening. She constructs scenarios promoting alternative ways of seeing, emphasizing the organic, interspecies networks, fluidity over rigidity – possibly drawn from queer mycology. But she blends concepts centred on the potential for transcendence and the queering of gender with a plea for equal status for so-called ‘women’s’ work within human society – aiming for a world in which the feminine-coded domestic sphere carries as much weight as the male-coded public.

But I found this combination slightly vexing, Tokarczuk’s organic network’s one in which gender should theoretically be dissolved, merging into a greater, interspecies collective. Yet Tokarczuk’s version retains sufficient ‘feminine’ rage to fight against male oppression suggesting conventional gender binaries still retain some force; similarly, Tokarczuk’s specific set of arguments in favour of elevating the status of domestic labour – which I’m obviously all for – sometimes seemed to skirt dangerously close to reinforcing essentialist feminine archetypes. It’s possible that part of the problem, at least for me, was that Tokarczuk's trying to pack too much in, making her narrative overly dense, difficult to negotiate at times, muddling her arguments. But, doubts aside, there’s a lot here I fully support. Overall, a stimulating, engrossing read. Translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones

The main character arrives at a sanatorium in Switzerland in the early 1900s to take the treatment. He is surrounded by a guesthouse of men who pontificate on the superiority of men, among other philosophical points. He is always a bit removed, unsettled and immediately aware of unnerving elements in and around the house. While horror does appear - in what is said and what is done - it is not the driving force of the book. It is the main character's understanding of self. Olga always challenges me. I'm looking up references and reflecting on moments long after I've read them. It's not casual reading. But it is fun and startling.

Olga Tokarczuk’s THE EMPUSIUM (translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones) takes place in September 1913, and is a subversive take on Thomas Mann’s classic, featuring a spectrum of sickly men cloistered at a Silesian healthcare resort. Of varying age and possessing various identities and ideologies, the unfortunate thread that holds them together in this storied borderlands appears to be constant refrains of a misogynist nature, as well as perhaps a shared economic reality. All are convalescing in the poor man’s version of the neighbouring healthcare facility, that yet retains an uncanny feeling of being out of place and out of time, it’s atmosphere charged with the thrill of transformative potential, a no-man’s land where transcending imposed boundaries, personal or national, might be possible.

Upon this magic mountain, the men spend their days at leisure, engaged in regular verbal jousting to do with clarifying how best to be in this world, in their eyes. But it seems as if other pairs of eyes might be watching, a presence lurking and listening in on their merry debates that nevertheless return to misogynist takes on women who recede into invisibility. In this natural landscape that thrums with life and abundance, the only women that become known to the reader are either dead or live in the margins. The narrator, too, feels like an outsider, a constant companion being someone of a similar age closest to death’s door. Neither can shake the sense that *something* is out to get them all.

Though it wasn’t always pleasant to read through the more misogynistic discussions in the book, the more universal concepts discussed around art and identity and various belief systems rang true. Here voiced by a sickly micro-society of men, the author’s note at the end noted that these were actual documented words once said by a number of well-known, real-life male figures. Everything is a matter of perspective, but it seems that not every perspective matters. I loved how fluidly everything unravelled in the end, flipping the entire narrative on its head on multiple levels, as if reaching across time and space to assert its voice, the voice of the many that have gone unheard in times past and present, ensuring it reverberates well into the future.

A humorous, multi-faceted read that left me reflecting on different aspects of the story afterwards, and that will likely reveal further perspectives again on further re-reads!

Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for this complimentary copy!

This was my first Olga Tokarczuk and it won't be my last - loved the premise and the writing was so atmospheric, the translation was beautiful. This book reads a bit like a classic gothic novel but it's very readable and I think I'd get even more from it from a reread now knowing the reveal/denouement at the end. The book is set just before the first World War but the themes within it (misogyny, gender) are clearly still incredibly relevant today and Tokarczuk seamlessly blends gothic horror into social commentary, Iconic authors note too.

The novel blends history, folklore and feminist parable with literary in-jokes and more than a nod to Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain.
There were lots of elements that attracted me to this book: eve of WW1 setting; exploration of misogyny; creeping horror; use of German vocabulary (including plays on words); and allusions to classic German literature. However, with its levels of complexity, this is a novel I would prefer studying and writing essays about rather than as a bedtime read. Without doubt, it's a quality text and possibly a future classic.

Taken from the blurb: In September 1913, Mieczysław Wojnicz, a student suffering from tuberculosis, arrives at Wilhelm Opitz’s Guesthouse for Gentlemen. Every day, its residents gather to drink the hallucinogenic local liqueur and to discuss the great issues of the day: Will there be war? Do devils exist? Are women inherently inferior? As stories of shocking events in the nearby highlands reach the men, a sense of dread builds. Someone – or something – seems to be watching them and attempting to infiltrate their world. Little does Mieczysław realize, as he attempts to unravel both the truths within himself and the mystery of the sinister forces beyond, that they have already chosen their next target.

With thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an early copy in exchange for an independent review.

On publication, I will post this review on my blog.

The Empusium follows a Polish engineering student, who is sent to a sanatorium/health spa in the German mountains in 1913 to cure his tuberculosis.
He spends the next few months surrounded by a cast of oddball misogynist patients who discuss philosophy, art, politics, their troubling views on women and the mysterious local folklore, all while drinking a strange local liquer and ignoring the strange sounds in the room above.

This story was very different to what I was expecting going in, for the first 60% of the book I wasn't entirely sure I was enjoying it but the whole vibe of the book is very unsettling and I was so curious to find out more, so I persevered. The final quarter of this book is incredible and caught me completely off guard. I recommend going in as blind as possible and trusting the process.

A very unique and thought provoking book, exploring illness/historic medicine, masculinity/gender and perception. I really loved it.

An easy win for my favourite publisher: this had ingredients of such quality it could hardly fail to delight. I loved the pastiche 19C style, the evocative descriptions of clothes and food and furnishings, the 'gentle' satire of the misogynist attitudes of intellectuals, and even the element of fantastical horror (not usually my thing). Oddly it made me think a little of The Solitaire Mystery, one of my favourites when I was a kid. Something about the mix of philosophy and a mysteriously powerful liquor ..

Anyway I doubt I'll bother to read The Magic Mountain but I'm glad I've read this.

Thank you Netgalley for this arc. I was excited to read this after reading Drive Your Plow and I wasn't disappointed. I do think however that a reading of Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain might have enhanced this as I think there are hidden Easter eggs, but nevertheless I enjoyed everything about this. We are in 1913 and young Wojnicz has been sent to a sanatorium in Silesia to cure his tuberculosis. Unable to stay at the centre, he resides in a guesthouse for gentlemen and goes daily for treatments. Live at the guesthouse is one of eating with the fellow residents, taking walk in the countryside and long discussions about politics, world affairs and the inferiority of women. This might sound very dull (check out the author note at the end - every misogynistic idea put forward by her characters is taken from famous thinkers and literary figures) but through these conversations you get to know the other characters, other residents. Wojnicz is someone you just want to mother. However. throughout there is a sense of something not quite right. The wife of the owner of the guesthouse commits suicide, Wojnicz hears noises at night and the men drink a mushroom based liquer every night that 'eases' their mind. Add to this the occasional voice that appears in the novel - the 'we' who is watching and the graveyard full of gravestones of those who all died in differents years but at the same time in November and the stories of how their bodies were found in the woods ripped apart and the sense of unease and creeping horror grows. The female seems to be largely absent but there is the sense that the female is always present in some sense - even the misshapen figures created by the charcoal burners in the woods. The final 10/15% is just wonderful and as the horror element emerges. Super. Rounded up to a 5*

“The Empusium” – Olga Tokarczuk (translated from Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jones)

Here we are, slightly changed, but just the same as before, warm but also cold, both seeing and blind. Here we are, here are our hands formed from decaying branches, our bellies, our nipples that are puffballs, our womb that blends into a fox's den, into the depths of the earth, and is now nursing a fox's litter. Can you see us at last, Mieczyslaw Wojnicz, you brave engineer from the flat woodless steppes?

My final #witmonth post will be about a book that isn’t actually out yet… but should you get it when it’s published.

Tokarczuk’s take on Thomas Mann’s “The Magic Mountain”, “The Empusium” takes place in a sanatorium in Lower Silesia, one that specialises in the treatment of tuberculosis. The male patients sit around conversing and ruminating on the big ideas of the world – reason, emotion, art and women. Especially women, and in heavily misogynistic tones that, as revealed at the end of the book, mirror the views of several prominent and real men of the time. So in part, we get a feminist retelling of Mann, or so I assume, having not read his magnum opus.

There’s more to this, however. Mieczyslaw Wojnicz, our protagonist, always feels that something is never quite right in the mountains, with its legends of dead witches and hauntings, of hallucinogenic mushrooms and mysterious deaths every November. It’s a twisted, foggy narrative with a lot of strands that, thankfully, come together in the denouement with a satisfying ending. It can be hard to keep track of this with so much going on at points and so many big ideas in play, but this is a Tokarczuk book, what did you expect?

Less all-encompassing and grandiose than “The Books of Jacob”, but more complex than “Drive Your Plow”, I enjoyed this book but didn’t love it as much as the two previously mentioned. It’s still a great read and recommended by me, but maybe some knowledge of “The Magic Mountain” would have helped with this?

My thanks to @netgalley and @fitzcarraldoeditions for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This will be released in the UK on 26th September.

Are you interested in this one?

I have to start this review by saying that this book was nothing short of spectacular. On the surface, The Empusium follows a group of young men who, suffering from consumption, have moved to a mountain town in Poland with the intention of recovery. As they go about their lives and their recovery, eating dinner, drinking liquor, walking in the mountains; the story of each of their lives is slowly revealed through the conversations they have.

This book has so much nuance. The relationships of these men and the roles they play in their relationships; their opinions about the world, and particularly of women; their sickness, and treatment; and of course the ever-lingering horror. Dubbed A Health Resort Horror Story, the horror elements of this story are so insidious that you don’t pay them much attention until the end.

I don’t want to say too much, but what I will say is - read this book. After reading Drive Your Plow at the start of the month and now this, I’m cementing myself in Olga Tokarczuk fanboy territory. If Olga has no fans, then I am DEAD.

WHEN you read this, do yourself a favour, and make sure you read the author’s note for a jaw drop/mic drop moment. Olga’s mind 🤯

4.5 stars. Olga pulled no punches!!

I loved my experience reading this book. The mysterious sense of dread creeps along through the narrative as we try to work out what is going on in this health resort and it leads to an absolutely excellent conclusion. I gasped several times in the final 15% and there is also an incredible speech by one of the characters that really summarises my feelings about one of the Hot Topics of the current age. And the author's note omg!!

It has a bit of a lull in the middle where it feels like nothing happens except these men sat around being dumb and misogynistic but it's really worth paying attention and pushing through.

It's definitely one I will re-read at some point as with the hindsight of knowledge, I think it will be even better.

Also don't google the title meaning until you've read the book.

Olga has done it again. On a first read, I thought I only skimmed the surface to this book - the depths I look forward to on a second or third read are exciting. Well paced, crafted, and further evident that Tokarczuk deserved to win the Nobel.

Tokarczuk's latest work in English is a fascinating one, blending a bizarre and captivating story with strong female symbolism. Her writing style, though simple, is remarkably beautiful, drawing readers into the narrative with ease. This unique combination of elements makes the book truly intriguing, showcasing Tokarczuk's ability to reinvent herself while maintaining the essence of her literary brilliance.

3,5 stars

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for my free digital ARC! My relationship with Tokarczuk is a rocky one - I couldn’t finish Book of Jacob, but I think Drive Your Plow is a masterpiece. I’m planning on reading Flights for Women in Translation month. I’m really unsure how I feel about The Empusium. The atmosphere and writing were glorious. It’s set in a remote mountain village where men go to cure their tuberculosis - the same way women were sent to the seaside to convalesce. There’s a strange plural narration at times that reminded me of When I Sing Mountains Dance, used to great effect to curate a sense of mystery and unease. There are mysterious deaths. But (and I had the same issue with Valérie Perrin’s Three) it always sits uncomfortably with me when authors use gender and/or biological sex as a plot device. It doesn’t sit right with me using these things a plot twist. I don’t necessarily think Tokarczuk exploits her characters, they’re treated with respect, but I dunno, just something about it.

It’s also a bit difficult to read at times since these convalescing men just sit around and talk about how inferior women are - but then in the author’s note, Tokarczuk reveals that all the misogynistic things said by the men in the book were a conglomeration of actual misogynistic things said by some of the most respected male authors in the literary canon. Honestly iconic shade from Tokarczuk.

Fantastic atmosphere and writing, a bit opaque in terms of resolution. Looking forward to Flights!

The Empusium is a gradually-building suspenseful horror story of a health resort with a terrifying secret. The prose is insightful and at times truly frightening, with just the right balance of intellectual musings, comically uneducated sexism and eery supernatural shenanigans. I thoroughly enjoyed this slow-burning thriller from a truly exceptional writer. The translation is excellent, with absolute coherence throughout and beautifully lyrical. I will be highly recommending this novel!

The Empusium: A Health Resort Horror Story by Olga Tokarczuk

I love Olga Tokarczuk so much, and this has been one of my most anticipated reads this year. I had extremely high expectations and she absolutely did not disappoint (obviously)!

This novel, a modern gothic tale set in a gentleman's health resort nestled in the Silesian mountains, is both abstract and multi-dimensional. Yet, it remains grounded and familiar through its exploration of humanity's various facets—mostly the darker ones. There are so many reoccurring themes throughout; death, gender, isolation, religion, illness, nature - the list could go on! 

If you're familiar with Tokarczuk's writing, you won't be surprised to find that this is a story that revolves around the power of landscapes, nature and also a little bit of astrology. Her vivid and atmospheric prose amplifies the isolation of the small mountain town and the claustrophobia of such a tight knit community that always seems to be watching. You also wouldn't be surprised to hear that she showcases the blatant misogyny prevalent within academic and literary circles throughout history. 

Most of the characters (all male) are insufferable, because that's how they're supposed to be! They're ignorant and pretentious and, despite the fact this book is set in 1913, unfortunately reflect the thoughts and mindsets of many men today. That being said, the main character, Mieczysław, is one of my favourite fictional characters of all time and is absolutely not insufferable at all - I just want to give him a big hug.

Overall, very atmospheric, mysterious and slightly disturbing. Would 100% recommend. I've given it a rating of 4 stars. 

⭐⭐⭐⭐

I wish I had read Magic Mountain first, it would have given me a better insight into the characters and area. Having said that, I loved the cinematic feel of the book and the writing, as in Drive your plow, is gorgeous. I will revisit this once I've tackled Thomas Mann!