Re-reads

The Night of the Hunter – Davis Grubb

The tone and atmosphere that envelopes this book is unique and effective. What Grubb establishes is a world far apart from ours. His novel takes place in the Ohio River Valley of West Virginia during the Great Depression. It’s an already impoverished area which holds onto strong fundamentalist religious beliefs. The story he tells is a child’s nightmare with the surrealistic elements of nightmares. What is the basis for the fears the very young have – of a monster in the closet, under the bed? John, at age nine, has to live in an all-too-real nightmare, and there is nobody he can share his burden with. His monster – the Preacher – wants to know where $10,000 in stolen money is hidden, and he knows that John knows where it is. But John has sworn a solemn oath to his father not to reveal the secret – no matter what. This is a boy burdened by a responsibility far too great to bear, and we watch with apprehension the effects on him. That’s the story, and Grubb’s artistry in telling it is remarkable. His  prose is rough-hewn, as if carved out of wood, which is exactly what it should be, and the people speak in the vernacular of their time and place. There are elements of a fable, of a gothic fairy tale, of a religious allegory concerning good and evil. We’re presented with a conflict between Love and Hate, those two words etched on Preacher’s fingers. Read this one – it’s an experience. 5

The Gypsy Moths - James Drought

This is the weakest of my deletes. I can briefly sum up its virtues. It’s an easy read, the scenes of parachute jumping are fairly interesting (Drought was trained as a paratrooper). And it’s short. But the first person narrator is limited in what he knows about the relationships in the family he and two other stunt jumpers stay with; there are dire problems between Mr. and Mrs. Brandon, the narrator’s aunt and uncle, but we never find out what they are. Also staying with them is a college student named Annie who wears the label “love interest” for our young narrator. (BTW, I’m not using the narrator’s name because I don’t recall it; he’s always referred to as “Kid” by the other jumpers). As for those two guys, we never know why Rettig has a death wish, which he carries out after, apparently, having, on his first and only night with the Brandons, a tryst on the sofa with the wife. (There’s a lot I don’t know, right?) Browdy, the third jumper, is only interested in profits. Anyway, after the fatal first jump there’s a second one the next day (to cover funeral expenses) in which the Kid does the dreaded Cape Trick. On the way down he chooses Life over Death. He and Annie decide to get out of the Brandon house, and to take a train to parts unknown. The End. The movie version, directed by John Frankenheimer, was, as I recall, good. It starred Burt Lancaster as Rettig and Deborah Kerr as Mrs. Brandon. Obviously, with those big stars, the script filled in the gaping holes that are present in this amateurish first novel. 1 (delete)

Little Man, What Now? – Hans Fallada (German)

A novel about love and money. Great topics, handled exceedingly well. Fallada presents us with a young couple, Hans and Bunny, who are both believable and appealing. (Especially Bunny – one of the strongest female portrayals in fiction.) That they love one another is presented simply and yet with depth. That’s the key element that marks this novel – it’s simply written and yet achieves depth. I cared about these two, from the first page to the last. The aspect of money comes in because they have very little. The novel was published in Germany in 1932, in the midst of that country’s economic collapse. While prices skyrocketed, wages were low and jobs scarce. This brought out the worst in many (especially those in charge) and the best in others. The novel begins with the couple finding that Bunny is pregnant; Hans promptly proposes marriage (this is not forced on him; they are already fully committed to one another). We follow them as Hans tries to find work, and then to hold onto a position as a salesman at Mandels Department Store. They move from place to place, always trying to make ends meet. When the baby is born, the pressure increases. The novel was immensely popular in Germany; it spoke to millions. The words “Nazi” and “Communist” appear a few times, but the book doesn’t concern itself with politics. Hitler’s name is absent, and, though a few characters happen to be Jewish, anti-Semitism is also not an issue. Again – this novel is about love. I can’t think of anything I’ve read about that emotion that rang so true. Fallada doesn’t give us romanticism; rather, he makes us believe in a bond that cannot be broken. At the end, Han’s self image as a man is shattered – but Bunny will stand by him. Of course she will. This ending is powerful, it left me shaken. I can only hope these two make it – somehow. 5

Angel – Elizabeth Taylor

Angelica Deverell is her name, and we follow her life from age fifteen to her death some five decades later. She’s the author of long novels teeming with opulent fantasy. These novels have no literary merit, but are wildly popular with a certain set of readers, and they make Angel wealthy. She’s a person who, since childhood, escaped into fantasy worlds; she didn’t accept the shabby one she was born into, or its people (including her mother). She sees herself as someone grand, and she fully lives out that role. Reality is rejected, or twisted, to suit her tastes. That she succeeds in self-deception is a mark of a strong personality, and Angel is definitely formidable. A force, one fully capable of plowing over anything or anyone in her way. But how long and faithfully can one carry out self-delusion? That’s the bare outline of the unique story that Taylor tells with ease and artfulness. It’s a complex tale, with many events, many characters. The depth with which those secondary characters are developed is one of the books achievements. This novel is full of remarkable achievements. One of which is the fact that I came to care about Angel, with all her enormous flaws (of which an oblivious selfishness is one). I even felt protective of her. 5

Re-reads

Momento Mori – Muriel Spark

Spark’s assemblage of mostly upper crust aged folk receive phone calls from an anonymous source that simply says “Remember you must die.” And they do die; most of those that don’t expire in the course of the novel are summarily put to rest in the last two pages. But this is not a dark book; it’s entertaining in a spirited way, and has a mordant humor. The writing is pretty much perfect, particularly the dialogue in the Maud Long Ward where the “Grannies” without money are housed. It made for enjoyable reading, though I felt that there should be a significant point. The only thing I can come up with is that Spark was showing people nearing death carrying on in the same petty ways they did all their lives. For example, wills play a large role, and are often changed (in one case, twenty-six times), based on shifting grudges and resentments. And the two most despicable characters wind up as major beneficiaries. Spark was only forty-one when she wrote this novel, and had, five years previously, converted to Catholicism – something that, she claims, greatly affected her writing (in Catholicism Death is the first of the Four Last Things to be remembered). While her characters on death’s doorstep don’t become wiser or more compassionate, neither, it seems, did Spark. When she died at age eighty-eight her will created a controversy. She and her son (an only child) had long ago broken off relations, and in her will she left him nothing. A final expression of spite? Though Mori comes close to a 4, I’m giving it a 3.

Stamboul Train – Graham Greene

Greene considered this“thriller” to be one of his “entertainments” (as opposed to his serious work, which usually had a religious theme). Problem is, it’s not very thrilling or entertaining. What succeeds is the depiction of the murky and ominous political atmosphere prevailing in Europe in the early 1930s (when the book was written). There are also some interesting characters in interesting situations, but most are not fully developed – or, in some cases, pretty much abandoned. Greene’s tendency was to ponder over weighty intellectual matters, which is anathema to a thriller. Too often I found tedium setting in. Anyway. . . One character, a businessman named Myatt, is Jewish – at times he’s simply referred to as “the Jew.” People can spot him as a Jew at first sight, and in many cases their reactions are highly negative. He seems somewhat stereotypical (eg., he’s “greasy”). He’s not a bad person – he acts generously toward Cora, a showgirl, to the point where she offers up her virginity to him. He also makes an aborted attempt to save her from peril. But at the end he’s forgotten her and his predominant interest is the closing of a business deal. Just like a Jew, right? Since I mentioned Cora (the virginal showgirl), she’s supposed to garner our sympathy, but she warrants a single summing-up word: unconvincing. I’m giving this novel a weak 2. (delete)

Rosemary’s Baby – Ira Levin

A book should be judged by how well it succeeds at what it attempts, and Levin has succeeded in writing a horror story that’s compelling and convincing. It’s done with an intelligent efficiency – the plot unfolds with momentum, and there’s not a boring page. Every character comes across clearly, every situation is constructed with logic. This is, simply put, damn good writing. Levin stated that he didn’t believe in the devil, and neither do I. So how can a book in which the Devil does exist be credible? Well, in a sense it isn’t. But I found Rosemary to be real and appealing, so I cared about the situation she becomes enmeshed in. To me the horror is the way people use her – evil exists in people. The worst of the lot is her husband; while the others act out of a belief, he sells Rosemary to advance his acting career. Her aloneness comes across with force, and at the end she’s emotionally and mentally broken. Roman Polanski did an excellent job of adapting this story to the screen. Many of Levin’s novels were made into movies because they’re so cinematic – that is, they embed real people in a fascinating plot that moves. 5

Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont – Elizabeth Taylor

This novel is the best of all the books I’ve reread so far. There’s one primary reason: it got to me emotionally. It did so in a quiet way – no fireworks go off in this story of an elderly lady who takes up residence at a hotel that has a few permanent guests (all of whom are also elderly). The writing is perfect in a straightforward, unembellished way, but what matters are the insights into age (or, more correctly, the human condition) that are imbedded in the story. These insights are simple, but how seldom are they presented so clearly. If you want to know about the feelings of those near the end of life – a difficult stage, particularly for the ones who are alone – this book will show you. And it will tell you, even if you’re young, something about yourself. It isn’t depressing or dark; it has an engaging plot, and a host of characters you’ll get to know (and whose minds you sometime enter). Of course, Laura Palfrey is foremost, but there’s a young man who is very strong. We can understand why Laura develops feelings for Ludo. It’s not sexual love, but one based on an attraction to a person who is kind, handsome, lively, funny (“kind” comes first). A caring love. Anyway: read this book – it’s one of the few that really matter. As an author Elizabeth Taylor was burdened by her name’s similarity to that of some actress. Palfrey was nominated for the Booker Prize in 1971; Saul Bellow was one of the judges, and he dismissed it as “a tinkling tea cup novel . . . not serious stuff.” It’s an ignorant statement; there are no tinkling tea cups, and my entire review addresses the book’s serious nature. Maybe the lack of pretentiousness turned Bellow off. (V. S. Naipaul's In a Free State would win the award that year.) Taylor was fifty-nine when she wrote Palfrey, and she died five years later. 5

The Walking Stick – Winston Graham
The walking stick is used by Deborah; when she was eleven she contracted polio and was left with a withered leg. At age twenty-six she holds a respected position in a high-end London auction house. She’s fairly content; romantic love has been denied her, but she’s resigned to that fact. And then, at a party, she meets Leigh. . . . This book has elements of a thriller, but it’s primarily a psychological study in which love plays a dominant role. “I love you, Leigh,” are the last words Deborah speaks to the man who brought her out of her shell, broke down her resistance and insecurities, made her feel wanted and valued, gave her sexual pleasure. And then she walks off and does something that will shatter his life and that of others – including her own. For Leigh had made Deborah vulnerable to pain; the corrosive emotions that surface in her are entirely credible. I found her willful destructiveness both exhilarating and poignant. To generate a visceral response in a reader is a goal most sought by all artists. Art is another subject that Graham addresses, for Leigh’s passionate desire is to be a painter. But when he shows his work to an expert he’s dismissed as no more than an illustrator: “They are – pictures, if you know what I mean. They’re no better and no worse than hundreds of others about. But they’re not really – forgive me – paintings, as I understand the word.” Leigh accepts this evaluation; but his dreams have been crushed. And what’s left? As I felt for Deborah, I also felt for Leigh; they both suffer a devastating loss. The mystery element in the novel involves motivations – why a person does something. The truth of the matter always dawned on me before it was fully revealed on the page. This isn’t a criticism; Graham was writing about real people, so the reader was provided with everything he needed to discern how things would go. I even knew what would be on the last page, but that was because it was the only way to end the book. It had the impact of the inevitable. *

The Memorial – Christopher Isherwood
The book is subtitled “Portrait of a Family,” and the approach is to give characters a section in which we get a stream-of-consciousness view of their thoughts and feelings. It’s done lucidly – the prose is good. But we go from one person to another and then to another, and far into the book I was having trouble figuring out who was related to whom, and how they felt about each other. Someone of no apparent significance would make a brief appearance, but later it would turn out that he or she had an important role. And I’d wonder what this person had said and done on page six. To further muddle things the narrative skips back and forth in time. Book One is set in 1928; Book Two in 1920; Book Three 1925. Isherwood made an ambitious attempt to write a novel that, despite its modest length (it’s under three hundred pages), warranted the use of the word “Book.” That struck me as pretentious, as did the structural intricacies. But the most serious shortcoming was that, at age twenty-eight, the author simply didn’t know enough about people; everybody was walking around with a label. When the scene shifted to College, and sensitive Eric and irresponsible Maurice took center stage, I decided, with a sense of relief, that I had enough of this family.

The Soul of Kindness – Elizabeth Taylor
With simplicity and clarity Taylor goes deep into the emotional lives of nine diverse characters. Flora, the lovely centerpiece, has led an unruffled existence; by nature she’s a happy person who wants everyone else to be happy. None of them are, to varying degrees; a few are enveloped in an incurable state of loneliness. Elinor is married to a man who doesn’t care about her: “He could leave me in the morning lying stretched dead on the floor. And if anyone later in the day asked him how I was, he’d say, ‘Fine. Fine. Thank you’; and then he might suddenly remember and say, ‘Well, no, as a matter of fact, she’s dead.’ ” She tells this to Flora’s husband; Richard finds Elinor interesting, but he withdraws his companionship when he sees that it disturbs his wife; he feels a responsibility to keep her face free of concern: “. . . it would surely be his fault if it was altered, if the Botticelli calm were broken, or the appealing gaze veiled.” That calm is broken when Kit (who, since he was a boy, has been in love with Flora) attempts suicide. Flora receives an anonymous letter (it’s from Liz, the only malicious character in the novel) blaming her for what happened. But how is Flora to blame? She does nothing to encourage Kit’s feelings for her. He has dreams of being an actor, and in this she does encourage him, which is a mistake. When he’s ill with the flu she comes to his apartment to tend to him, and she turns to his dreams, which he has wisely discarded: “I know you have this gift.” He feels euphoria at her words, but after she leaves he sees clearly that he has no gift, no glowing future, and he sinks into a deep depression. Flora had acted out of kindness; her only failing is obliviousness to life’s harsh facts. All the others must face those facts; perhaps that’s why they either resent her or feel obligated to protect her (as one protects a child). This novel moves in a straight line, and it ends with no resolutions – it’s likely that some characters will accept compromises, but for others the problems they face are unsolvable. Even Flora’s continuing insularity is not assured. *

Fiasco - Stanislaw Lem (Polish)
An unusual reading experience. A third of the book was completely beyond my understanding, a third I partially understood, a third was fully intelligible. I didn’t object to the incomprehensible parts because the novel takes place in the distant future, and I have insufficient knowledge of science to grasp advanced technology. What grounded things for me was that the characters think and act like people of today (one of the points Lem makes is that human nature remains the same). Taken as a suspenseful space adventure, the book works. We send a spaceship to another solar system; our goal is to make contact with the planet Quinta, which gives strong indications of supporting a form of intelligent life. This is a reverse of the novels/movies in which Earthlings are visited by aliens (usually bent on harming us). To the mysterious Quintans we’re the feared invaders. And, as it turns out, we fully fit that role. The climax, when Earthling meets Quintans, needed impact, but I was left confused and disappointed. I don’t think Lem could bring a credible resolution to the conundrum he had created, nor do I think this bothered him. The reason to read this erratic and eccentric book is to engage with the author’s mind. It’s not outer space that Lem explores but the nature of man and his future. His conclusions are thought-provoking and ominous.

The Devastating Boys - Elizabeth Taylor
“Flesh” is the standout success in this quality collection. After I read three stories (good ones) about women who are unhappy, insecure and timid, along comes brassy Phyl; her first words, to the barman at the resort hotel where she’s spending a post-hysterectomy vacation, are “Evening, George. How’s tricks?” She makes friends with a lonely widower who’s reinvigorated by her easy acceptance of life. Though Phyl is satisfied with her husband in London, she decides to have a one-night fling with Stanley. What harm will it do? Her husband will never know, and it will give Stanley pleasure. Infidelity as an act of kindness, and Phyl is definitely kindhearted. An attack of gout derails their plans; Stanley is mortified. In answer to his question, “How can you forgive me?”, Phyl says, “Let’s worry about you, eh? Not me. That sort of thing doesn’t matter much to me nowadays. I only really do it to be matey.” Though Taylor often writes about people leading muted lives, her range is impressive. The little girl who bustles “In and Out the Houses” isn’t as innocent as she initially seems; on her daily rounds she cunningly drops bits of gossip meant to create dissent and jealousy. And in the aptly-titled “The Fly-Paper” the reader is led into a trap; the ending is a shocker. The other stories stay at the level of good or pretty good; some are too slight, others trail off inconclusively. Yet in all of them Taylor establishes an intimacy between her characters and the reader. This was her gift. *

The Bachelor of Arts - R. K. Narayan
Chandran, the main character of Narayan’s second novel, is a university student. He comes across as a likeable boy, nothing unusual about him. After he graduates he dawdles through life, without purpose or direction. Then he sees a girl on the beach and romanticizes about her to the point where he must have her as his wife. His feelings are perplexing to the western reader because the two never speak a single word to one another. Yet he’s madly in love. When her family turns down his marriage offer, Chandran is in such despair that he flees to the city of Madras and becomes a sanyasi (a holy man who renounces the world). With a shaved head and dressed in a cheap loin clothe and an upper covering dyed in ochre, he wanders about accepting coins or food or a place to stay for the night. Often he goes hungry and sleeps in the open. My reaction to this plot twist was “Oh, no.” The Chandran I knew – the person Narayan had created – would never act in such a way. Without much ado Chandran recovers his senses, returns to Malgudi, gets a job, meets a new girl he cares for; all seems to be going smoothly. Then comes an ending so inconclusive that I searched for traces of a few missing pages. (I did a bit of research and found that events are carried forward in the next novel.) Despite these two glaring missteps, Narayan has a benevolence that’s appealing; neither his characters nor his humor come with barbs, and his prose is easeful. Still, there isn’t whole lot to this book. I found it most interesting when it deals with the cultural beliefs surrounding marriage. In Hindu India (circa 1930s), besides not getting to know one another, the horoscopes of the two prospective mates must match up; the amount of dowry offered by the girl’s parents plays a big role, as does each family’s prestige; people are judged by their skin color (a dark complexion is a drawback). Also, by age sixteen a girl is considered to be over the hill. Fourteen and fifteen are the proper marriageable ages.

Mr. Midshipman Hornblower - C. S. Forester
Forester had a considerable gift for narrative. He could move a novel along, engross the reader. How is this done? By writing clearly and simply, being able to recognize what’s interesting and leaving out boring filler; and, most important, by having a story to tell and characters that are engaging. Easy? Hardly. What raises this novel above a mere page-turner is that it shows the development of a unique individual. In the beginning Horatio Hornblower comes aboard ship, an unsure boy of sixteen. But in the first chapter he makes a drastic decision that he’ll stick to with iron resolve. I found this a bit hard to accept until I realized that this boy is unlike others. At the end of the book he’s a strong, confident man who will go far in his naval career – I fully believed in him and his abilities. Forester also describes the tremendous demands made on men who go to sea, especially those in command; it’s a hard, often brutal life. However, I won’t be following Horatio from Midshipman to Admiral; despite the virtues of this first installment in the series, the subject matter (nautical matters, naval warfare) holds little interest for me. Which is an added tribute to Forester’s writing, because I thoroughly enjoyed this opening salvo.

The Blush - Elizabeth Taylor
These are “nothing” stories (except for “The Letter-Writers,” which confirms that Taylor is capable of excellent work). When you finish a “nothing” story you wonder why you spent time reading something so insubstantial and why the author spent time writing it. Taylor may have been trying to capture the small but significant moment. But the significance wasn’t there, so the story was merely small. However, I don’t want to seem dismissive of the author of Angel and Mrs. Palfrey of the Claremont. She’s just not at her best in this collection.

The Bookshop - Penelope Fitzgerald
Fitzgerald has a sketchy style. She puts down on paper only the bare minimum needed to tell her story, and she moves from scene to scene without much fuss. A sketchy style can work if the author selects what’s meaningful; that which matters can then emerge. But little emerged for me, and not even the main character mattered. I only read half of this slim novella.

Penguin Island - Anatole France (French)
This isn’t a novel. It’s a unique and imaginatively conceived study of the progress of man, starting from his primitive beginnings. The word “progress” is meant ironically. Irony, cynicism, wit – all are used with remarkable skill. The author has assembled a miscellany that’s made whole by an insight into human weaknesses (and thus the weaknesses of society). France had no hope that things would change, man being what he is. Time has proved him to be right. He wrote Penguin Island in 1908; this date is striking because what he describes applies directly to our world today. There’s no point in trying to explain the book’s structure or content; it defies explanation. It is what it is: a monument to clear-sightedness. It should be read by all thinking people. *

The Way We Live Now - Anthony Trollope

Trollope is true to his title. He depicts the world of upper class Londoners in the1870s. There are at least ten major characters and as many secondary ones. All are drawn with intelligence and insight; the women play roles as significant as those of the men. I especially admire how people are not one-dimensional; they have good and bad qualities, strengths and weaknesses. Trollope embraces complexity and ambiguity; it took an extraordinary mind to create this novel. Many Londoners objected to the book because of the greed, decadence, false values, hypocrisy, prejudice (and a variety of other vices) to be found in its pages. But every country, in every stage of its history, needs a Trollope. The author provides a happy ending for most of his characters (in the form of marriages that will, ostensibly, be of lasting contentment). Well, happiness is to be found at one’s hearth. But the driving force behind this work is a cynicism about society and human nature. No single person dominates; what we get is a sprawling panorama of lives. I mentioned the complexity and ambiguity. Those qualities aren’t in the prose, which is simple and direct; they’re in the characters and situations, which are engrossing to a high degree. Trollope was so accurate an observer that he was able to bridge the barrier of time; remarkably, this novel has relevance for us, today. *

A Single Pebble - John Hersey

A thought-provoking short novel. It concerns a trip on the Yangtze River aboard a huge yak in the 1920s; the narrator is an American engineer who’s there to direct the building of a dam. The people he meets and the experiences he has during the grueling journey deeply affect him – and I could understand why. He’s immersed in a different sensibility, one which is embodied most vividly in Old Pebble; this character is no less than an elemental force of nature. The faceless trackers, the lowest of the low, emerge with a bit of the universal about them. Hersey uses too many words to describe the narrator’s feelings (which are vague and shifting). Also, people are one thing on one page and something else on another. It’s hard to anchor one’s feet; but that, in retrospect, is one of the novel’s strengths. In the last pages the author refuses to tidy everything up and put a bow around it. He leaves it messy and confused – which, in its way, is a statement about life. *

The Sleeping Beauty - Elizabeth Taylor

For the first forty pages I thought I was reading a well-written woman’s novel. Then, quite suddenly, everything shifts, becomes sinister, twisted, dark – becomes strong stuff. But in the last forty pages Taylor retreats; the ending is pat. Before this disappointing drop off, I was impressed by the depiction of the transforming power of passion; the selfishness of people (and how far they’ll go to protect their structured worlds); the tenaciousness with which a mother can hold onto a child; the way we face loneliness and aging. All very good. As for that ending, maybe the task of reconciling these complex matters proved too much for the author.