A Single Man in Queereaders

Dec 19, 2009 Jamie rated it it was amazing

Shelves: read-in-2013, read-in-2011, favorites

A short, sorrowful read. You know the story by now, whether from innumerable other GR reviews or from the Tom Ford adaptation: British academic loses his long-time lover; is lonely; has a fiesty drunk friend; crushes on one of his students; &co&co. Like Ulysses or Mrs. Dalloway, the narrative occurs over the span of a day, but unlike those novels, this is a much more straightforward sort of text, and one more invested (I think) in a kind of sentimentalism related to the experience of the mundane A short, sorrowful read. You know the story by now, whether from innumerable other GR reviews or from the Tom Ford adaptation: British academic loses his long-time lover; is lonely; has a fiesty drunk friend; crushes on one of his students; &co&co. Like Ulysses or Mrs. Dalloway, the narrative occurs over the span of a day, but unlike those novels, this is a much more straightforward sort of text, and one more invested (I think) in a kind of sentimentalism related to the experience of the mundane. That is, it seems that this uses the life-in-a-day technique to mourn the brevity of life, rather than to elevate the everyday to some sort of grandiose plane. (And don't let me ramble on how Woolf does it differently-and I think better-to Joyce.)

Point being. Isherwood's a beautiful prose stylist, though the of-its-time dialogue at times sounds silly to the modern ear: American slang filtered through a British narrator, rather than that same slang as perceived by someone inexperienced with it. Then again, there are turns of phrase so heartbreaking that I had to pause for a moment before moving on, particularly near the end of the novel. Admittedly, my vulnerable emotional state probably wasn't helped by the fact that I was stranded at a train station and exhausted after a bittersweet weekend reunion with old friends as I finished this novel, but...

Quite a bit different from the film, I think, perhaps because George's sadness isn't much tamed by the sophisticated visual appeal of Ford's aesthetic and Colin Firth's still-way-hot-self. The novel can be a bit pathetic, where the film refuses to move beyond the melancholic - but each of those things has its benefits. The film's emphasis on the visual is quite a bit different, I think, to the novel's, though there are moments where they seem very much in sync on that front (particularly when George cruises the tennis players and when he and Kenny go to the beach). The novel hurts a bit more, but is well worth the read. Looking forward, now, to more Isherwood!

ETA (2013 read): Decided quite randomly to teach this in my Queer Fictions class this term, and, though my students didn't seem much to like it, adored it on this re-read! Before I enjoyed it; now I see it as an astounding achievement, and my favorite Isherwood thus far. It also feels more expansive to me now than it did previously, when I imagined it largely as a kind of inward-looking exploration of the aging and melancholic identity. How had I missed the references to Cuba? The interest in a repudiation of "democracy"? The disparagement of 50s & 60s suburbia (which, in point of fact, George sees as more mechanistic and assimilationist than the WWII era in American culture - the true bohemia)? & yet of course it's also that exploration of the self - one which seems both compartmentalized & working desperately to shore up against the onslaught of modernity's "rubble," as George sees it.

But yet, stunning. Much more so on re-reading. ...more

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Nov 30, 2015 Gebanuzo rated it really liked it

Shelves: lgbtttiq

Siempre hago confesiones en las primeras líneas de estas “reseñas”, primeramente he de confesar que vi la adaptación fílmica de este texto hace ya algunos años; y me encanta. Creo que en parte porque los dos actores principales son de mis cosas favoritas. Segundo; no tenía idea de que existiera el libro, y tercero; lo mas penoso, es que no sabía que se trataba de una obra de Christopher Isherwood. Lo he descubierto hasta el momento de tenerlo en mis manos, caso contrarío de lo que sucedió con Ad ...more

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Jan 17, 2010 Gwen rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2010-read, lgbt, historical-fiction, really-good-books

Other reviews used the word melancholy to describe this book. I am going to agree with them. Christopher Isherwood is a superb author, taking us through the day of George, a gay man who has lost his partner in the 1960s. (At times, I felt as though I was George, due to the specatular writing style.) His willingness to go on after the death of his partner in a world where he could speak of it to no one. The community he lives may feel he is different, but they do not speak of it. We get an inside ...more

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May 04, 2010 Adam Jacobson rated it really liked it

How to say it? Beautifully depressing? This is not a book to read if you're in a dark mood but it's beautiful nonetheless. Isherwood brilliantly captures the despair of a nominally functioning gay man who has lost his long time lover. The language is wonderful but so successfully captures George's psyche that you'll be looking for something, anything to cheer you up after finishing it.
I wonder if the movie is quite so bleak.

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