The Mermaids

5W Eva Boris. New York: Farrar, Straus & Cudahy, 1956. First Edition.

Notes

The Mermaids by Eva Boros is a novel set in a tuberculosis sanatorium, weaving together themes of illness, love, and mortality with poetic sensitivity. The story centers around Aladar, who meets Lalla Pirola in Budapest and becomes a frequent visitor to the sanatorium where she is staying. There, he becomes acquainted with Lalla’s friends Kati and Franciska, experiencing their shifts between gaiety and despair, as the weight of disease bears down. Over time, Lalla’s illness becomes increasingly serious, and events like Kati’s death heighten Aladar’s restlessness with being the sanatorium visitor rather than a participant in the lives unfolding around him. His eventual attempt to move their relationship beyond mere visitor status ends in a painful reckoning, underscored by the pervasive presence of loss and the fragility of hope. 

The novel’s atmosphere is one of quiet melancholy—a “twilight dream” where death is always near and love often feels like a recessive illusion rather than a conquering force. Eva Boros’s prose is praised for its exceptional sensitivity, capturing both the shimmering moments of connection and the harsh realities of illness. The tuberculosis sanatorium is more than a setting—it becomes a place where mortality shapes identity, where the visitor Aladar must reckon with his role between love and detachment, and the inevitable gaps that illness carves between people. 

Description 

 Blue boards with yellow canvas spine. Green house on spine with silver lettering. Original dust jacket with small chip on lower board. Fine condition.