Possession by A.S. Byatt – Writing Gods and Reading Angels

The job of a reader in the early days of literature was to admire, study, and learn. The only book on the shelf was the Bible, with an additional offering, after a while, of the rediscovered works of apparently superhuman Greek writers. The idea of having a go yourself was almost unthinkable. It was against the natural order of things. Echoes of this outlook remain in the academic world of modern times. A.S. Byatt was a prominent academic, before she became a writer. In her 1990 novel Possession we meet academics living in the shadow of the writers they study, in this case a pair of fictional Victorian poets, Randolph Henry Ash and Christabel LaMotte. But as we get to know these writers through their poems and letters, we see that they are no different to the people who study them. Ash and LaMotte read each other’s work which feeds into their own. Writers and readers are not different species, with the blessed former up there, and the many latter down here. It’s a two way street. People seemingly hanging onto the coattails of others are actually helping to fashion their fancy coat, as something they can both wear.

Possession is very enjoyable, full of excellent fake Victorian poetry by fictional poets, and interesting ideas alongside down to earth romance tropes – such as two young people getting thrown together by a snow storm. The book is extremely sophisticated, but also enough of a romance novel with obvious scenarios and highly unlikely plot twists, to exist as a book with a human voice, serving to remind us that people rather than literary gods write and read.