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y separately published work icon Double-Wolf single work   novel  
Issue Details: First known date: 1991... 1991 Double-Wolf
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Double-Wolf, Brian Castro's third novel, is a brilliant fictional creation which succeeds also in being humane, utterly readable and sometimes very funny.

'It takes as its starting point the life of Wolf-Man, Freud's most famous patient who inspired his work on infant sexuality, a life revealed in counterpoint to that of Artie Catacomb, con-man, psychoanalyst and archivist, who ends his days in the Blue Mountains, relegating the Wolf-Man to the world of myth even as he avoids the baleful glare of the shop assistant who would prevent him from entirely reconstructing the Wolf-Man's story.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • North Sydney, North Sydney - Lane Cove area, Sydney Northern Suburbs, Sydney, New South Wales,: Allen and Unwin , 1991 .
      image of person or book cover 8146689761010963255.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 226p.
      Description: port.
      ISBN: 0044423470 (pbk.)
    • Adelaide, South Australia,: Lythrum Press , 2005 .
      image of person or book cover 1899870922836422135.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 201p.p.
      Note/s:
      • Introduction by Katharine England.
      ISBN: 1921013052

Works about this Work

The Wound That Does Not Heal : Brian Castro's Literary Career Shannon Burns , 2022 single work essay
— Appears in: Meanjin , December vol. 81 no. 4 2022; (p. 188-195)

'Brian Castro dramatises and even valorises forms of literary and artistic failure throughout his fiction, but his body of work is a raging success by mortal standards. None of his novels disappoint on close inspection. Double-Wolf and Shanghai Dancing are endlessly rewarding; The Swan Book is gorgeously written and deeply moving; After China is conceptually neat, seductive and stylish. Others, such as Drift and The Bath Fugues, appeal to select readers but are dazzlingly rich and structurally brilliant. Even Stepper—which Castro sees as a relatively conventional spy novel—is a satisfying and affecting Nabokovian game. Every novel is stamped by a talent that induces envy as much as gratitude. You want to know what it feels like to write that way.' (Publication abstract)

Stealing the Scene : Brian Castro's Double-Wolf Tony Hughes-d'Aeth , 2020 single work criticism
— Appears in: Antipodes , June vol. 34 no. 1 2020; (p. 85-100)

'Brian Castro's novel Double-Wolf (1991) is a playful fictionalization of the life of the Russian aristocrat Sergei Pankejeff (Pankeyev, 1886–1979), known to history as the "Wolf Man." This essay seeks to situate Castro's novel within the context of both psychoanalysis and literary postmodernism and to explore the particularities of the Wolf Man case as a narrative that problematizes the borders of fictionality. Like Pankejeff himself, Castro's Double-Wolf remains both skeptical and faithful to Freudian precepts. To maintain this double affinity, the novel adopts a parodic stance and is written in the form of a postmodern farce. However, the purpose of the parody is not finally to suggest that the insights of psychoanalysis are nonsense but that their truth so radically disrupts common sense that they can only be upheld in an absurdist register. Just like Freud's case history, the novel turns on a primal scene, and it is only the existence of such a scene that makes the encounter between the novel's two protagonists (Sergei Wespe and Art Catacomb) meaningful. While the plot of the novel revolves around the attempt to prevent a scandal—the fear that a suddenly chatty Wolf Man might belatedly subvert the psychoanalytic practice that his neuroses helped establish—its true subject is the deeper scandal of knowledge itself and the fact that it might end in a scene and not a statement.'  (Publication abstract)

"Grammars of Creation” : An Interview with Brian Castro : 24 November 2008 Marilyne Brun (interviewer), 2011 single work interview
— Appears in: Journal of the European Association for Studies on Australia , vol. 2 no. 1 2011;
'This interview with contemporary Australian writer Brian Castro addresses a number of themes and concepts that are central to his critical work and fiction. In the interview, Castro discusses his oeuvre as a whole, providing insights into the starting point for his first eight novels. He comments on the concepts of transgression, hybridity, polyphonia, cosmopolitanism and play, underlining the central significance of grammar, ethics and aesthetics in his work. The interview also includes reflections on the development of Asian Australian studies and the importance of translating novels. In the final sections of the interview, Castro discusses the relation between his critical work and his novels and reflects on the common conflation of the novelist and the theorist in much literary criticism.' Source: Marilyne Brun.
Couched Words : The Interimplication of Fiction and Psychoanalysis Jean-François Vernay , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: Etchings , no. 7 2009; (p. 153-162)
'Freudianism in Dire Straits' : The Representation of Psychoanalysis in Contemporary Australia Jean-François Vernay , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: Aumla , no. 112 2009; (p. 81-96)
Gives an overview of the use and impact of Freudianism in Australian culture and fiction. The author argues that 'the lack of appeal Freudianism has in the Antipodes can find justification in the fact that psychoanalysis and the Australian ethos are poles apart' (93).
A Noble Life Jane Messer , 1991 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Bookseller & Publisher , April 1991; (p. 22)

— Review of Double-Wolf Brian Castro , 1991 single work novel
A Howler John McLaren , 1991 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , July no. 132 1991; (p. 38-40)

— Review of Double-Wolf Brian Castro , 1991 single work novel
Grand Arabesque Through Time Helen Daniel , 1991 single work review
— Appears in: The Age , 22 June 1991; (p. 8)

— Review of Double-Wolf Brian Castro , 1991 single work novel
A Reappraisal of the Wolf-Man's Dreams Rob Johnson , 1991 single work review
— Appears in: The Advertiser , 29 June 1991; (p. 12)

— Review of Double-Wolf Brian Castro , 1991 single work novel
Wolves Howling at the Doors of Perception Peter Fuller , 1991 single work review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 13 July 1991; (p. C8)

— Review of Double-Wolf Brian Castro , 1991 single work novel
'Double-Wolf' : Writing and Time, Now There's the Rub Bernadette Brennan , 2008 single work criticism
— Appears in: Brian Castro's Fiction : The Seductive Play of Language 2008; (p. 49-68)
'Freudianism in Dire Straits' : The Representation of Psychoanalysis in Contemporary Australia Jean-François Vernay , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: Aumla , no. 112 2009; (p. 81-96)
Gives an overview of the use and impact of Freudianism in Australian culture and fiction. The author argues that 'the lack of appeal Freudianism has in the Antipodes can find justification in the fact that psychoanalysis and the Australian ethos are poles apart' (93).
Couched Words : The Interimplication of Fiction and Psychoanalysis Jean-François Vernay , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: Etchings , no. 7 2009; (p. 153-162)
"Grammars of Creation” : An Interview with Brian Castro : 24 November 2008 Marilyne Brun (interviewer), 2011 single work interview
— Appears in: Journal of the European Association for Studies on Australia , vol. 2 no. 1 2011;
'This interview with contemporary Australian writer Brian Castro addresses a number of themes and concepts that are central to his critical work and fiction. In the interview, Castro discusses his oeuvre as a whole, providing insights into the starting point for his first eight novels. He comments on the concepts of transgression, hybridity, polyphonia, cosmopolitanism and play, underlining the central significance of grammar, ethics and aesthetics in his work. The interview also includes reflections on the development of Asian Australian studies and the importance of translating novels. In the final sections of the interview, Castro discusses the relation between his critical work and his novels and reflects on the common conflation of the novelist and the theorist in much literary criticism.' Source: Marilyne Brun.
Outside the Prison of Logic Helen Daniel (interviewer), 1994 single work interview
— Appears in: Island , Winter no. 59 1994; (p. 20-29)
Last amended 24 May 2018 08:32:27
Settings:
  • Moscow,
    c
    Russia,
    c
    c
    Former Soviet Union,
    c
    Eastern Europe, Europe,
  • Vienna,
    c
    Austria,
    c
    Western Europe, Europe,
  • Katoomba, Blue Mountains, Sydney, New South Wales,
  • 1800-1899
  • 1970s
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