Volume 44, Number 11 · June 26, 1997
Welcome to Moor
By D.J. Enright
The Dog King
by Christoph Ransmayr, translated by John E. Woods
Knopf, 355 pp., $24.00
Moor is a village, one of a cluster of villages encircled by mountains, presumably in Germany. There used to be a spa resort on the shores of its lake, and some hotels still survive in a state of disrepair. Moor has also been famous for its high-grade granite, and latterly the quarry was worked by slave laborers from a nearby camp. (Seeking to be helpful, the blurb of The Dog King tells us that we may recognize Mauthausen.) The war is over, and Moor has been occupied successively by Siberian troops, a French Moroccan battery, and a regiment of Scottish Highlanders. And finally, as the story begins, by American troops under the command of a Major Elliot from Oklahoma. Major Elliot has principles (the inhabitants of Moor think him crazy), and is determined to keep the wickedness of the locals (no more guilty than anyone else in the defeated country, less guilty than some) ever fresh in their minds. On the terraces of the old quarry he has conscripted the village's stonemasons to cut a huge inscription, ceremoniously unveiled, reading:
Review, 2295 words
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