Hotel Savoy (Works of Joseph Roth) Review

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(More customer reviews)Gabriel Dan, a POW in World War I, is returning to Europe from Russia. He stops temporarily at the huge Hotel Savoy, the great building in a gray and grimy manufacturing town, where revolution is in the air and workers are on strike.
In this town, Gabriel meets at least 25 characters to whom Roth gives a name, an occupation, and a social status based on money. Most of these characters inhabit the six-story Hotel Savoy. Those who live in the top three stores are too poor to leave. Meanwhile, the first three floors are inhabited by the wealthy, who "plan to go into business" and "compete with him [God]"... "on an equally large scale."
In HOTEL SAVOY, Roth briskly explores the interaction among his many characters. When that interaction is between rich and poor, exploitation and anger are manifest. When that interaction is among the poor, the subject is the absence of money or the effort to make some. The characters are no more than their jobs and their expectations. Meeting them is like going to a bar and getting a quick impression of people who, for the most part, don't like each other.
HOTEL SAVOY has two great events. The first is the visit by Bloomfield, a wealthy American returning to visit his father's grave, who is said to be looking for investment opportunities. During Bloomfield's visit, a sense of hopefulness sweeps the town. Then, Bloomfield leaves and instability, in the form of a mob, returns.
In this novella, the narrative is frenetic and muddled and probably captures the social tensions affecting Weimar Germany at its nadir.
Some lyrical passages. Saved by its brevity.


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