Perfume: The Story Of A Murderer
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Edition: First UK Edition
Condition remarks:
Book: Very good
Jacket: Very good
Pages: Yellowed
Markings: Previous owner
Condition remarks: Small marking on reverse fep (top left corner); otherwise, internally sound. Binding remains tight. Unclipped dj.
In the fetid, sensory-overloaded streets of eighteenth-century France, a boy is born with no scent of his own but an supernatural gift for smell — and from this arresting premise, Patrick Süskind crafts one of the most hypnotic and deeply unsettling novels of the twentieth century. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer chronicles the life of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, an orphaned, socially invisible figure who becomes a master perfumer driven by an all-consuming obsession: to capture the perfect human scent, no matter the cost in human lives. Süskind writes with a darkly ironic precision, drawing on the traditions of the Gothic novel and the Bildungsroman while subverting both to create something entirely singular. The novel presents a profound meditation on beauty, obsession, identity, and the terrifying amorality of genius, all rendered in lush, almost suffocatingly vivid prose — translated here into English by John E. Woods with remarkable fidelity. A modern classic that has captivated millions of readers worldwide since its original German publication in 1985, it leaves one question lingering long after the final page: what does it truly mean to be human when one is driven purely by instinct?
Author: Patrick Suskind
Format: Hardback
Published: 1986, Hamish Hamilton, London
Genre: Historical fiction
Edition: First UK Edition
Condition remarks:
Book: Very good
Jacket: Very good
Pages: Yellowed
Markings: Previous owner
Condition remarks: Small marking on reverse fep (top left corner); otherwise, internally sound. Binding remains tight. Unclipped dj.
In the fetid, sensory-overloaded streets of eighteenth-century France, a boy is born with no scent of his own but an supernatural gift for smell — and from this arresting premise, Patrick Süskind crafts one of the most hypnotic and deeply unsettling novels of the twentieth century. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer chronicles the life of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, an orphaned, socially invisible figure who becomes a master perfumer driven by an all-consuming obsession: to capture the perfect human scent, no matter the cost in human lives. Süskind writes with a darkly ironic precision, drawing on the traditions of the Gothic novel and the Bildungsroman while subverting both to create something entirely singular. The novel presents a profound meditation on beauty, obsession, identity, and the terrifying amorality of genius, all rendered in lush, almost suffocatingly vivid prose — translated here into English by John E. Woods with remarkable fidelity. A modern classic that has captivated millions of readers worldwide since its original German publication in 1985, it leaves one question lingering long after the final page: what does it truly mean to be human when one is driven purely by instinct?