Ice is a book that takes you by surprise. It starts with a vivid description of a man driving through a blizzard, in the hope of reaching a mysterious pale woman he claims to be in love with. It’s a Douglas Sirk opening, heightened and melodramatic. From then on the novel evolves into something altogether more hallucinogenic. The man’s quest for the woman turns into an odyssey, set against the backdrop of a planet threatened by an existential ice age. There is also an implication of nuclear war, between undisclosed powers. The quest becomes more and more outlandish, each chapter leading the narrator no nearer to his goal, as he becomes more and more lost in the novel’s cruel logic.
The more you read, the more you start to wonder what Ice is really all about? It’s a symbolic, metaphoric text rather than a naturalistic one. The world the author is depicting would appear to be a representation of an inner landscape, an inner quest. I know nothing about Ana Kavan, but there’s a tantalising clue in the biographical note. Her tennis coach got her hooked on heroin (to help her improve her serve?). Reading Ice as an opiate nightmare would seem to make sense. Then again, maybe the world is an opiate nightmare? Kavan’s book packs enough of a punch to make us believe it might be so. In these days of climactic crisis and nuclear tyrants, it’s a vision which feels closer than ever.
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