Enigma Variations by André Aciman
Published 2017 · 76,175 words · about 5 hours at an average pace
How hard is Enigma Variations to read?
Enigma Variations scores 54 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it quite demanding. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 58 out of 100
- Educated, allusive vocabulary.
- Sentence structure: 62 out of 100
- Long, digressive sentences.
- Abstraction: 55 out of 100
- Desire turned repeatedly into reflection.
- Information density: 50 out of 100
- Light on event.
- Narrative indirection: 55 out of 100
- One man across five episodes, self-serving throughout.
- Symbolic density: 50 out of 100
- The workshop and the tennis court recur.
- Ironic distance: 48 out of 100
- Light irony at his own expense.
- Resolution withholding: 58 out of 100
- The pattern is never broken or explained.
- Structural complexity: 55 out of 100
- Five separate movements across decades.
How Enigma Variations is regarded
Enigma Variations holds a literary regard score of 37 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.