Neil's comments (member since May 31, 2008)

Neil's comments from the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die group.

I’m kind of with Mara in being repelled but fascinated. I certainly wouldn’t consider myself prudish but a lot of this made a pretty uncomfortable read. (Maybe I’m growing squeamish as I get older but I reached a point where I didn’t want to know any more about the state of Keith’s feet!) Perhaps this overexposure to grotesque extremes of sex, drugs and violence is intended to numb us and reveal their banality. Certainly the characters seem bored with it to the point where they find their desires dulled and cannot be bothered to indulge them. I thought this sentence put it well:

“It was a feeling of vast but theoretical weariness combined with acute and local foreboding, petty irritation arm in arm with comic disgust, vexed fussiness married to apocalyptic fear.”

There seems to be a sense that a number of the characters are really yearning for a more conventional kind of pleasure despite their apparent dismissal of the conformist (which is all “dead babies”) and desire to break taboos.

On the question of what “dead babies” actually refers to: clearly it is used, predominantly by Andy, as a term of opprobrium but if anyone has a copy of the 1001 Books volume there’s an interesting suggestion there that a theme of the novel is the question of whether the characters are condemned from birth. This provides an interesting second meaning and it is notable that the origins of each character's neuroses are shown to lie in their childhoods.

Regarding the thing about Giles’ teeth, apparently Martin Amis himself used to have an obsession with the bad state of his and so this partly provided the inspiration for Giles’ insecurities.

Thank you Mara - that's very kind of you! And it's a pleasure to be joining the monthly book club for the first time. I look forward to many lively debates and discussions ahead!

You raise an interesting point about the narrator being relatively unsympathetic and this giving you a barrier to engaging. Certainly, even given one's sympathy with his bereavement, his behaviour comes across as quite obsessive and self-indulgent. Maybe the lack of connection with him is deliberate to a certain extent as if Auster wanted us to empathise with David more deeply then he could have pulled out all the stops to tug at our heartstrings and provided more detail about his family so that we felt their loss more keenly. In a novel of ideas - which I would say this is - how far do we need to engage with the characters? Is this perhaps a book more for the head than the heart?

If there was a character who is really appealing then I think that it's Hector. And he of course is symbolically absent for almost the entire book, a cypher who we learn about second or third hand, a blank screen on which others (including us as readers?) project their own opinions and interpretations. (If you'll allow me a film metaphor!)

I'm not necessarily try to construct a defence here given that I've already been clear that I'm quite ambivalent about the novel myself!

Vicky - a curate's egg is something that's partly good and partly bad. If I recall correctly the phrase originates from a nineteenth century cartoon which shows a curate who is given a stale egg to eat at a bishop's table. Being too intimidated to criticise the fare he tells the Bishop that 'parts of it are excellent'!

Always happy to educate. (Even if it's slightly off topic!) It sums up my overall feelings about the book quite well. I'd agree with those who felt that the arrival of Alma was the point where my enjoyment began to wane. Although there were some great moments subsequently - I really enjoyed The Inner Life of Martin Frost for example. As I say, a curate's egg.

I did feel that this was a bit of a curate's egg but in its idiosyncratic way I still quite enjoyed it. The switches in narrative direction and tone certainly kept me guessing as to where the whole thing was going. It seemed most interesting to me towards the beginning when the figure of Hector was at his most mysterious; I particularly liked the analysis of the conflicting newspaper interviews towards the start which made him seem a real enigma. The elusive nature of the 'real' Hector was rather fascinating and somehow the more the truth was revealed the less engaged I felt. I do concur with those who found the latter part of the book somehow less persuasive.

I also agree with Leila above that David's grief and depression were very well conveyed especially in the party scene. The moment when he realised that only through a lucky chance had he failed to shoot himself was good too although the whole sequence with the gun seemed slightly jarring.

The descriptions of the films I found strangely effective and enjoyable. I think there is perhaps another key theme here relating to the different genres and narrative forms of storytelling. It's interesting that silent film, a purely visual form, is made a significant medium in a novel which by its nature deals only in words. Or is it? Not sure!

I think that the criticism that the narrative is opaque as a effort to conceal a lack of ideas may be a little unfair. There are, I feel, fruitier candidates for charges of pseudo-intellectual obscurantism! I'm quite a fan of the jigsaw puzzle book which allows you to play with interpretations and piece together ideas. This obviously means that meanings can be read into it that may not have intended by the author but ambiguity is not necessarily a weakness and the converse can be true. I will concede that it's nice to feel the writer had a particular intention in mind though! I'll give Auster the benefit of the doubt on that one.