Author(s): Anais Nin

Fiction

THE FOUR CHAMBERED HEART continues the adventures of Djuna, the eccentric star of the preceding novel, CHILDREN OF THE ALBATROSS. Djuna is in love with a husky and feckless Guatemalan guitar player called Rango. They make their abode on on a squalid, leaky houseboat anchored on the Seine which, like their relationship, is destined to go nowhere. Rango's volatile personality and bohemian outlook (he is described as 'a child lodged in a big man's body by a merry freak') ensures that the dream of accomplishing the very something that Djuna awakes in him will never come to anything. For her part, the self-sacrificing Djuna is forced to accomodate into her home Rango's sickly wife Zora to whom he is tied by a half-blind complicity in her desire to exploit all who come within range. Naturally, Zora assiduously cultivates her various illnesses in order to secure a stranglehold on the two lovers.