I have this bad habit where I don't read the front cover flap a book before I start reading it. That's why I got fifty pages into The Master, thought to myself "Hey, is this set in the 1800s or something?" and then, after fifty more pages, thought, "Hey, is this guy real?". As a matter of fact, he was: his name was Henry James and he was a famous American novelist. |
I am not a famous American novelist, but I am a huge philistine. Case in point: I just almost mixed up Colm Tóibín and Colum McCann (the guy who wrote Let The Great World Spin, the best book about New York by someone who isn't from New York), but, come on, how many Irish writers with boners for New York City can there be? Answer to that question: Many. So many. Anyway, my point is, I've never read anything by Henry James, but Colm Tóibín, with his elliptical biography, makes me want to.
The first part about The Master is that, like James himself, the novel is super indirect. Tóibín does a Hilary Mantel thing where he avoids using James's name, sticking with pronouns as much as possible and sometimes even delving into epithet ("the American"), though, fortunately, he's classy enough to avoid referring to James as "the Master". I know I wouldn't be. James is a very evasive narrator, and, especially in the matter of sexuality, The Master avoids stating anything outright. "The Passion of Henry James" has more on that, as well as some biographical information about Tóibín himself. Henry James lived a life of omission and repression, and the narrative of The Master echoes that, which 1) further underscores the lack of satisfaction in James's life and 2) makes for a very slow start.
That lack of satisfaction, though probably very important to The Master as a work of biography and art and very endemic to literary fiction as a whole, was deeply frustrating to me as a reader. The whole time I was reading The Master, all I wanted was for Henry James to finally kiss a dude, and he never does. A hot servant pays a lot of attention to him. A guy invites him up to his rooms in Paris. Hell, he sleeps naked next to a guy and still doesn't get laid. Historically accurate, I know, but still, the poor guy.
Not that I feel too sorry for him: The Master does not shy away from showcasing Henry James's faults, such as, for instance, the ways he disappointed the important women in his life and the offence he takes at the idea that someone could dare have the temerity to have feelings at him, or place obligations upon him. I recognize his reflexive denial of responsibility, because it's a lot like my own, but Tóibín portrays it so uncompromisingly that I couldn't help but recognize its faults.
And there's the rub: Tóibín's a good writer. An incredibly good writer: he brings Henry James to life, and his description of James's creative process is fascinating to someone who hasn't read the works in question and most likely exhaustively researched. James takes his inspiration from everyone he's encountered or heard of, and the way Tóibín portrays the construction of novels and short stories, as the gradual layering of possibilities or ways to give people the lives they deserve, is fascinating.
Rating: Five out of five. It does get slow, but managed to immerse me in its language entirely anyway.
Turd rating: Two out of five: one for the way James treated Constance, Alice and Minnie, and another for judging Oscar Wilde.
The first part about The Master is that, like James himself, the novel is super indirect. Tóibín does a Hilary Mantel thing where he avoids using James's name, sticking with pronouns as much as possible and sometimes even delving into epithet ("the American"), though, fortunately, he's classy enough to avoid referring to James as "the Master". I know I wouldn't be. James is a very evasive narrator, and, especially in the matter of sexuality, The Master avoids stating anything outright. "The Passion of Henry James" has more on that, as well as some biographical information about Tóibín himself. Henry James lived a life of omission and repression, and the narrative of The Master echoes that, which 1) further underscores the lack of satisfaction in James's life and 2) makes for a very slow start.
That lack of satisfaction, though probably very important to The Master as a work of biography and art and very endemic to literary fiction as a whole, was deeply frustrating to me as a reader. The whole time I was reading The Master, all I wanted was for Henry James to finally kiss a dude, and he never does. A hot servant pays a lot of attention to him. A guy invites him up to his rooms in Paris. Hell, he sleeps naked next to a guy and still doesn't get laid. Historically accurate, I know, but still, the poor guy.
Not that I feel too sorry for him: The Master does not shy away from showcasing Henry James's faults, such as, for instance, the ways he disappointed the important women in his life and the offence he takes at the idea that someone could dare have the temerity to have feelings at him, or place obligations upon him. I recognize his reflexive denial of responsibility, because it's a lot like my own, but Tóibín portrays it so uncompromisingly that I couldn't help but recognize its faults.
And there's the rub: Tóibín's a good writer. An incredibly good writer: he brings Henry James to life, and his description of James's creative process is fascinating to someone who hasn't read the works in question and most likely exhaustively researched. James takes his inspiration from everyone he's encountered or heard of, and the way Tóibín portrays the construction of novels and short stories, as the gradual layering of possibilities or ways to give people the lives they deserve, is fascinating.
Rating: Five out of five. It does get slow, but managed to immerse me in its language entirely anyway.
Turd rating: Two out of five: one for the way James treated Constance, Alice and Minnie, and another for judging Oscar Wilde.