Baker, Nicholson - Richard Eder (review date 13 February 1994)

Richard Eder (review date 13 February 1994)

SOURCE: Eder, Richard. “Time in a Bottle.” Los Angeles Times Book Review (13 February 1994): 3, 8.

[In the following review of The Fermata, Eder finds fault in the novel's distasteful preoccupation with voyeurism and sexual exploitation.]

Poor Achilles. He never could catch that tortoise, not because he was slow or the tortoise speedy but because Zeno wouldn't let him. In the famous paradox, the tortoise gets a 10-meter start, say, and by the time Achilles runs the 10 meters, the tortoise has crept 10 centimeters; when Achilles goes the 10 centimeters, the tortoise has done a millimeter, and so on. But the rules are stacked. Achilles doesn't catch up in the first stage, lasting a few seconds, but he would do it in the next stage if it lasted even one second instead of only a few hundredths of one. Zeno arranges tinier and tinier distances in tinier and tinier intervals that rapidly...

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