The Story of S | Ship of Thesus Lyrics

Translator's Note and Foreword
By F.X. Caldeira

I

Who was V. M. Straka? The world knows his name, knows his reputation as the prolific author of provocative fictions, novels that toppled governments, shamed ruthless industrialists, and foresaw the horrifying sweep of totalitarianism that has been a particular plague in these last few decades. It knows him as the most nimble of writers, one whose mastery of diverse literary idioms and approaches was on display from book to book, even chapter to chapter. But the world never knew Straka's face, never knew with certainty at single fact of the man's life.

Predictably, though disappointingly, the mystery of Straka's identity has become more intensely studied than his body of work. Interest in his life story is understandable, certainly, as he is widely acknowledged as one of the most idiosyncratic and influential novelists of the first half of this century. His appreciative readers wanted to know the man who created the stories they loved, and his enemies wanted to know who he was so he could be silenced.

The furor over Straka's identity is particularly intense due to the rumors about his activities and affiliations - rumors that are fairly bursting with tales of sabotage, espionage, conspiracy, subversion, larceny, and assassination. If there is a category of skullduggery to which Straka's name has not been linked in the popular press (and in some infuriating articles passed off as "literary scholarship"), I am not aware of it. Perhaps this is to be expected, as Straka's work itself often included secrets, conspiracies, and shadow-world occurrences. The author's personal reclusiveness was perhaps the grandest and most provocative of these.

But the focus on the Writer and not the Work dishonors both. Only in the author's private life - which was and is nobody's business - might it matte "who" he was. The few verifiable public statements Straka issued confirm that he, too, believed the authorship controversy was misguided - not to mention a pernicious threat to his safety, liberty, and peace of mind.

Nineteen novels are attributed to Straka, the first being the satirical adventure Miracle at Braxenholm, which was the toast of Europe in 1911, the final one being the book you have in your hand. Herein you will also find extensive annotations that I have contributed for the benefit of Straka's devoted readers and responsible scholars who study his work.

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Genius Annotation

A young woman picks up a book left behind by a stranger. Inside it are his margin notes, which reveal a reader entranced by the story and by its mysterious author. She responds with notes of her own, leaving the book for the stranger, and so begins an unlikely conversation that plunges them both into the unknown.

The book: Ship of Theseus, the final novel by a prolific but enigmatic writer named V.M. Straka, in which a man with no past is shanghaied onto a strange ship with a monstrous crew and launched onto a disorienting and perilous journey.

The writer: Straka, the incendiary and secretive subject of one of the world’s greatest mysteries, a revolutionary about whom the world knows nothing apart from the words he wrote and the rumors that swirl around him.

The readers: Jennifer and Eric, a college senior and a disgraced grad student, both facing crucial decisions about who they are, who they might become, and how much they’re willing to trust another person with their passions, hurts, and fears.

S., conceived by filmmaker J. J. Abrams and written by award-winning novelist Doug Dorst, is the chronicle of two readers finding each other in the margins of a book and enmeshing themselves in a deadly struggle between forces they don’t understand, and it is also Abrams and Dorst’s love letter to the written word.

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Release Date
October 29, 2013
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