The Bells of Bruges

The Bells of Bruges is a study of obsessive love which is steeped in the melancholy beauty of Bruges. There are three loves in the life of Joris Borluut, the town carillonneur of Bruges. He marries the fiery Barbara, whose dark beauty is a reminder of Belgium's Spanish heritage. Repelled by her harshness and violence, he starts an affair with her sister, the gentle, soulful, fair-haired Godelieve. When her sister discovers their affair, Godelieve enters a Beguine convent and Joris devotes himself to his first love, the old city of Bruges. i iMike Mitchellis translation of The Bells of Bruges opens with one of the most arresting scenes I read in the shortlist. A crowd gathers to hear bell-ringers competefor the office of town carilloneur. 'Here, in the meditative land of Flanders, among the damp mists so antagonisticâ€to the brilliance of fire, the carillon takes their place. It is a display of fireworksâ€that one hears: flare, rockets, showers, a thousand sparks of sound which colourâ€the air for visionary eyes alerted by hearing.i The novel is a story of love and obsession, of two beautiful sisters and a man who†marries the 'wrong' sister, of an artist in sound whose dedication to his office hasâ€something terrible in it. But the dominant character is the city of Bruges, which comesâ€to possess the readeris imagination as it has possessed Rodenbach's and then Mitchell's. This is a beguiling translation, which captures a Lawrentian intensity of sensuous experience.†Helen Dunmore, novelist and chair of the Oxford Weidenfeld Translation Prize judges. It will appeal to lovers of Symbolist prose and fin-de-siecle fiction. Essential reading for anyone visiting Bruges.

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