The Aspern Papers

Aspern Papers reminded me of Nabakov's "Pale Fire". In both, an academic is obsessed with himself and a certain poet. They both display the dirty underbelly of academic research. In Aspern papers, the narrator goes to grand extremes of deceitfulness in order to obtain the papers from the poet. Stylistically it is fairly good, though the pacing can be slow and the story somewhat repetitive. I grew to hate the narrator while also wanting him to succeed.