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HHhH - Read Along Comments for Part 1 (April 2013)
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Daniel
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Apr 01, 2013 04:18AM
We will be taking a more thematic approach to discussing this month's read, but I still want to leave the door open for general impressions and comments as members read through the book. There aren't really any spoilers, but please do refrain from any mention of material from Part 2.
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Looking forward to receiving my library copy...
I'm up to section 63... I'm gripped. I love it.It's such a simple idea, the way he is combining history with his attempts to write it, with the perceptions of readers and those looking back on history.
I particularly like when other characters find it hard to believe that what he's writing isn't taking a degree of authorial license. It's very true: those writing 'historical' treatments, whether novels, films or whatever, rarely seem to care too much about the real accuracy when set against a good story. And in one sense that's fine; many of my favourite novels do this. But he raises interesting questions about what it leads us to believe about history.
I wonder if he'll talk about the fact that Americans who paid more attention to Hollywood than history may believe they cracked the Enigma code...
It's a good job I wasn't reading chapter 125 in public, or people might think I was laughing out loud about a book about The Head of the SS, without realising I was actually laughing out loud about the ironies of Wagner having a bigger nose than Mendelssohn, and therefore nearly being removed in his stead.
The Nazi point of view is mind-boggling.They would be hilarious if they had been completely impotent.
Terry wrote: "They would be hilarious if they had been completely impotent."Quite.
I've just read 75 (the account of how an eighty-one year old lady dies) and for the first time since starting the book I'm beginning to doubt this author. Hitherto I'd been happy to believe Binet - that this was authentic historical fiction. I'm so naive...
Sophia wrote: "I've just read 75 (the account of how an eighty-one year old lady dies) and for the first time since starting the book I'm beginning to doubt this author. Hitherto I'd been happy to believe Binet ..."I'm have an ever-increasing difficult time deciphering when what he's saying is truth, discovered as he's researching, and when he's going to come back six paragraphs later and say "Fooled you!"
This isn't historical fiction. It isn't history. It's more like a memoir with some researched facts thrown in (or created). This is a whole new genre - memoir fiction! (Or is that what James Frey created.)
Research fiction. That's what this is.
Ha! James Frey! I'll leave all my cheeky comments unvoiced for the time being, but hopefully you will see a yawning chasm between the two by the time you're finished!
Daniel wrote: "Ha! James Frey! I'll leave all my cheeky comments unvoiced for the time being, but hopefully you will see a yawning chasm between the two by the time you're finished!"I figured one of you would get on me for that comment. I haven't actually read Frey, so I won't be able to truly compare. I'm almost finished, realizing this is more fact based than not, but still frustrated with it.
I'm finding it fascinating. I agree that it's a bit frustrating and I find myself holding back and reading it with a bit of a cold eye. I keep thinking of his reaction to a friend who read a section and presumed it was fiction. I think he says something like, 'Why would anyone feel the need to invent the Nazis?'. It's a line I keep thinking of throughout the blurring of fact and fiction. I'm not even sure that the narrator is intended to be read as the author or whether this too is an invention. Having said all that, it's certainly fascinating and well written.
I'm not even sure that the narrator is intended to be read as the author or whether this too is an invention. I had the same thought and ended up believing that the narrator was also a hybrid - part fact, part fiction.
Interesting! And doubtless true. Even if he were giving us the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, I doubt it's ever possible. Aren't all narrators unreliable? And as for readers...
As some of you know, I'm firmly in the camp that says Binet has created a narrator named "Binet" as the means to demonstrate how wildly unreliable historical writing necessarily is. In short, I think he's having us on. As Sophia suggests, all narrators are unreliable, since it is impossible to recover Truth with language, though it may be possible to uncover a variety of truths...I think Binet plays with this notion, and plays with the entire project of history.Maybe:)
I'm troubled about what I am supposed to be getting out of the historical accounts. This and some other threads have pointed out some areas where the narrator realizes a prior error and corrects it. What is not pointed out, though, are the parts where the narrator makes an error and does not correct it.I happened to look up the murder of George Strasser on the Night of the Long Knives (Ch. 39-40). Fabrice thinks the narrator it: "What about Strasser? Heydrich going there in person, giving the order to let him suffer a slow death. that too he though I'd invented. I am mortified and I should 'But no, it's all true!"
So, as best as I can tell, Heydrich was involved in giving the order so is ultimately responsible, but there is no indication taht I was physically present at the time.
Now obviously, I am not an expert on Nazi politics, and even if I were I probably wouldn't know every "fact" listed. I only checked on that one because it was indicated that it was doubted. What am I supposed to get out the book if I don't even know what parts of the alleged history is real and which isn't?
And not just about Nazi politics. Describing Lina Heydrich, living in the castle that was the model for Disney's Sleeping Beauty. "She is the lady of the manor but, like the queen in Sleeping Beauty, she is also a nasty piece of work. She treats her staff harshly, and insults everyone when she's in a bad mood."I may not be an expert on Nazi politics, but I know my Disney classics. And the queen from Sleeping Beauty was kind-hearted. If he can't distinguish Sleeping Beauty from Snow White, I've got problems.
I think he's talking about Maleficent, not Leah.
Yes, but she was not the Queen, and more relevantly, did not live in the castle that Heydrich lived in. It's a very small point, but when you are creating an unreliable narrator, you need to be extra careful to be reliable about what you mean to be reliable about. If I can't rely on the historical portions without double checking, I'm not sure what the value is.
You also have to remember that there is both a translational and cultural gap at play. The original French version of Sleeping Beauty by Charles Perrault is very, very different from the Walt Disney version. The Queen Mother is actually of ogre lineage in the original tale, so Binet's usage seems pretty accurate to me.
Since he had just referred to the Disney version, it would make sense that he was referring to that one.The more important point, of course, is that he's getting WWII specifics wrong and not noting it. That is troubling.
I'm not sure. It's in the whole spirit of the novel that nobody is reliable. If he did what he did in the first part of the novel, and then his subtext for the second part was 'this is the truth; this is how it happened', that would seem incongruous to me.I guess it depends how you're approaching this and your thoughts on historical novels in general.
If he did what he did in the first part of the novel, and then his subtext for the second part was 'this is the truth; this is how it happened', that would seem incongruous to me.I agree. Which makes me wonder what I'm supposed to be getting out of the second part. If the first part is teaching me, "Nothing is reliable," then I'm reading this broadly historical account (it is a fact that Gabcik and Kubis killed Heydrich), and then there are a million details all of which I can only think, "But were they really in a crypt? Did they really try to flood them out?" I don't know, and I don't really have the interest in checking.
If I'm reading a historical Civil War romance, and the hero is killed by General Sherman as his wife leaves him on a rainy day in Georgia, and the historical record tells me it was sunny that day, I can say, "Well, the author chose to make it rainy because that added to the mood. The real story is about the romance, and the historical aspects are there to add flavor." But here the history IS the story -- the only plot is the assassination, and the people involved in the assassination plot. So I can't really say that historical inaccuracies add to the greater purpose, unless the greater purpose is to have me not care about the novel!
I understand we have an "unreliable narrator," but what is gained by having the narrator mis-state and then not correct that Freydrich was present at Strasser's murder? It teaches me to not trust his history, when by Part II all that is left is history!
Hmmmm. I can't really agree that history is the story here. It seems more the example by which Binet is illustrating his questions about writing historical fiction. Like Terry said above, I guess it depends on how you're approaching the subject matter. If you're only looking for an accurate historical novel, I think Binet's approach is bound to leave you disappointed.
I find between pages 72-79 I am often confused. He makes oblique comments about French notable people and events. He makes them seem like clarifications and explanations. But I walk away feeling a bit stupid. I'm just confused.
Aw crap, I just returned my library copy yesterday! If I remember the section correctly, I completely sympathize with your reaction. Does your edition include footnotes that explain why these people and events are important to the point at hand? Those footnotes helped me bridge the gap between feeling like a deer caught in the headlights, and at least having half a clue (even if I did end up feeling left out on the allusion).
It's the hard copy and not in every case.
Thing Two wrote: "Research fiction. That's what this is."Like my term papers!
