SOURCE: “Life Studies,” in New Statesman & Society, March 8, 1991, p. 38.

In the following positive review, Pavey offers a positive assessment of The Big Glass, praising its “seamless quality.”

The Big Glass of Gabriel Josipovici's title is closely related to the artist Marcel Duchamp's “Large Glass, the Bride stripped bare by her Bachelors, even.” That singular work, with the accompanying Green Box of Duchamp's notes, has attracted respect and the word “enigmatic” ever since it was (un)finished in 1923. Josipovici is not seeking to explain it, nor to fictionalise Duchamp's life. He has written a novel, using his rare capacity to be both maker and critic at the same time.

Harsnet the artist and Goldberg the critic are the main characters. Harsnet retains much of Duchamp; he too is working on a “delay in glass,” writing notes to go with it, taking a long time, playing chess, being intimidating. But...