In a Jerusalem both ancient and modern, where the First Temple squats over the populace like a Trump casino, two young poets are about to have their lives turned upside down. Struggling Jeremiah is worried that he might be wasting his time trying to be a writer; the great critic Broch just beat him over the head with his own computer keyboard. Mattaniah, on the other hand, is a real up-and-comer-but he has a secret he wouldn't want anyone in the literary world to know: his late father was king of Judah. Jeremiah begins to despair, and that despair yields a vision: that Jerusalem is doomed, and that Mattaniah will not only be forced to ascend to the throne but will thereafter witness his people slaughtered and exiled. But what does it mean to tell a friend and rival that his future is bleak? Can the very act of speaking a prediction aloud make it come true? If so, does that make you a seer, or just a schmuck? Dramatizing the eternal dispute between haves and have-nots, between poetry and power, Dror Burstein's Muck is a brilliant and subversive retelling of the book of Jeremiah: a profoundly funny comedy with apocalyptic stakes. . For readers of David Grossman and Etgar Keret

In a Jerusalem both ancient and modern, where the First Temple squats over the populace like a Trump casino, two young poets are about to have their lives turned upside down.

About the Author
Dror Burstein was born in 1970 in Netanya, Israel, and lives in Tel Aviv. A novelist, poet, and translator, he is the author of fourteen books, including the novels Kin and Netanya, and has been awarded numerous national prizes. GABRIEL LEVIN is the author of six collections of poetry, translations, and a collection of essays, The Dune's Twisted Edge: Journeys in the Levant. He lives in Jerusalem.


Book Information
ISBN 9781250234872
Author Dror Burstein
Format Paperback
Page Count 416
Imprint Picador USA
Publisher St Martin's Press