There’s something wrong with a novel in which a twisted, exploitative sexual relationship is far less interesting than are...
The 2003 Nobel winner’s latest (Inner Workings: 2000–2005, 2007, etc.) is another drama shaped as intellectual argument, unhappily akin to its immediate predecessors Elizabeth Costello (2003) and (the somewhat livelier) Slow Man (2005).
Its protagonist, an eminent and aging author initially identified as Señor C., has agreed to contribute his thoughts about the state of the contemporary world to a volume presenting its several contributors’ “Strong Opinions.” As C. undertakes this task, he simultaneously develops an avuncular relationship with Anya, the gorgeous young woman he meets in their building’s laundry room, and eventually establishes a more formal acquaintance with Anya’s lover Alan. The latter is an “investment consultant” who tests Anya’s resolve by suggesting strategies to exploit C.’s evident appreciation of her beauty, and embezzle funds from his presumable great wealth. In a narrative that we read both from top to bottom of each page and horizontally, following arguments continued on facing pages, C. fulminates, Anya frets and Alan schemes. C.’s strong opinions consider the formation of political states; the current administration's rampant contempt for law and the related “crimes” of its enablers; radical feminism's attacks on pornography; the inhumane treatment of animals and indifference to their rights; the devaluation of modern culture; and the “authority” with which great writers (notably Tolstoy) render the warp and woof and detail of human experience. Late in the book, Coetzee’s serial drone, the aforementioned Elizabeth Costello, shows up (doesn’t she always?), and any pretense that C. is not Coetzee is airily abandoned. Otherwise, there’s no development. C. brandishes his erudition. Anya is, fleetingly, intriguingly fiery. And Alan is a bloody bore.
There’s something wrong with a novel in which a twisted, exploitative sexual relationship is far less interesting than are dozens of pages of discursive commentary. But that’s the new, improved Coetzee for you. Maybe we should blame the Swedish Academy.Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-670-01875-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2007
Nabokov is not unknown here. Pain (reviewed p. 14-1957) had a good press and a discriminating reading public. Conclusive Evidence, an autobiographical segment, had great charm and a certain satiric humor in its recall. But Lolita — to judge by the fan-fare and shocked whisperings of the grapevine — will make him famous- or infamous- according to the market. Some may seek to assess it as an allegory; to this reader this seems far-fetched and a transparent sort of evasion of what might more aptly be termed as a fictionalized panel of Kraft-Ebing, handled with a tenuously balanced self flagellation and a wryly clusive kind of humor. The subject is an unpalatable one:- the ungovernable, torturing passion of a middle aged sensualist for little girls, nymphets he calls them. A Frenchman, he comes to America, trying to run away from himself; he is lured to a New England community because of a dream of an enigmatic nymphet — and finds himself in the trammels of an impossibly involved and tortured affair. His story is told in the form of a confession-published after the perpetrator's death in prison- a confession that traces his perversion back to a passionate interlude in early childhood, through various attempts on a relatively normal plane of passion, to a minute exploration of his fixation on the child Lolita, a spoiled, selfish, ruthless little egotist, out for what she can get. The tale of their wander-year, as they switch across the highways of America, with one night stands in countless motels, appals the reader in its utterly soulless conception of the country and its people. Nothing of beauty or sanity emerges. It is too a horrifying portrait of a Joyeur, whose twisted amorality is explored in intimate detail. That a book like this could be written- published here sold, presumably over the counters, leaves one questioning the ethical and moral standards. I don't agree that it has a titillating fascination that will lead any reader entry- as some feel. I do think there is a place for the exploration of abnormalities, that does not lie in the public domain. Any librarian surely will question this for anything but the closed shelves. Any bookseller should be very sure that he knows in advance that he is selling very literate pornography.
Pub Date: Aug. 18, 1958
ISBN: 0679410430
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Oct. 1, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1958
A quiet tale that considers the way small, human connections can disrupt the callous powers of authority.
A novelist tries to adapt to her ever changing reality as her world slowly disappears.
Renowned Japanese author Ogawa (Revenge, 2013, etc.) opens her latest novel with what at first sounds like a sinister fairy tale told by a nameless mother to a nameless daughter: “Long ago, before you were born, there were many more things here…transparent things, fragrant things…fluttery ones, bright ones….It’s a shame that the people who live here haven’t been able to hold such marvelous things in their hearts and minds, but that’s just the way it is on this island.” But rather than a twisted bedtime story, this depiction captures the realities of life on the narrator's unnamed island. The small population awakens some mornings with all knowledge of objects as mundane as stamps, valuable as emeralds, omnipresent as birds, or delightful as roses missing from their minds. They then proceed to discard all physical traces of the idea that has disappeared—often burning the lifeless ones and releasing the natural ones to the elements. The authoritarian Memory Police oversee this process of loss and elimination. Viewing “anything that fails to vanish when they say it should [as] inconceivable,” they drop into homes for inspections, seizing objects and rounding up anyone who refuses—or is simply unable—to follow the rules. Although, at the outset, the plot feels quite Orwellian, Ogawa employs a quiet, poetic prose to capture the diverse (and often unexpected) emotions of the people left behind rather than of those tormented and imprisoned by brutal authorities. Small acts of rebellion—as modest as a birthday party—do not come out of a commitment to a greater cause but instead originate from her characters’ kinship with one another. Technical details about the disappearances remain intentionally vague. The author instead stays close to her protagonist’s emotions and the disorientation she and her neighbors struggle with each day. Passages from the narrator’s developing novel also offer fascinating glimpses into the way the changing world affects her unconscious mind.
A quiet tale that considers the way small, human connections can disrupt the callous powers of authority.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-101-87060-0
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Pantheon
Review Posted Online: May 12, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2019
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