2666

This is a quick follow-up to my earlier post about 2666.

I've now finished the part about the murders, and I've shifted my idea of what the book is about.

Although the book is full of dead ends and wrong turns, it also seems to be about pushing forward regardless. The fourth part ends without an actual resolution to the murders, but it somehow feels closer by the end than it did in the middle. The part ends with a politician vowing to push on until she finds out who is behind the murders.

It's interesting that this politician (whose name escapes me) is staying in the same room in the same hotel in Santa Teresa as Liz Norton was, back in part 1. I'm still trying to figure out the thematic significance. Both are staying in a room where two mirrors can be maneuvered to reflect each other, yet not show the person who sees the reflections. Are the mirrors supposed to represent Liz and the politician, each reflecting an aspect of the other? Or is it to say that both of them don't belong in Santa Teresa, which is why the mirrors (which are part of Santa Teresa) won't reflect them? Or is it on a grander scale, to say that the two parts are fundamentally connected, even though they seem so different from each other?

After the 4th part, the part about Archimboldi is rather anti-climactic. What I've read so far covers Hans Reiter's life from his birth in 1922 to his WWII experiences in Germany and Russia. I'll write more about it once I've read more; I'm only a few pages in.