Eek, Mommy, there's blood on my gym shoes.
I've been reading as many books by Lionel Shriver as I can get my hands on. One recent acquisition was Double Fault, which was dismal to read. Two tennis players get married, and the woman can't stop herself competing with her husband. It destroys their marriage. End of book. It is technically well-written; that is, it contains some of the most elegant sentences that I have read in fiction for some time. However, the story drags and it is a litany of pain and misery. At the end, all I could think was "Why did I just read that? Aaaaaaaaaarg." It is rare for me to actively want to throw a book across the room. I had been expecting another Post-Birthday World, which spoke directly to me as I am constantly questioning and wondering about the road not taken. (TP-BW runs two parallel universes in alternating chapters, stemming from one crucial decision in the female protagonist's life.)
So I dug up a copy of We Need To Talk About Kevin, a story from a mother's POV about her mass-murdering son, how he grew up, and what her life is like now. This is probably Shriver’s most famous book and it is extremely emotionally grisly. It explores a certain avenue of maternal psychology with great finesse. It's great. Go and buy it.
Yet while it lacks the sucking despair of Double Fault, it occurs to me that all of these books have a commonality of tone, a certain dismal flavour. Out of all of them, TP-BW was the most “upbeat”, as one universe seemed to be the “right” one for the protagonist, but really it’s like saying “out of the three hurricanes, Katrina was slightly less windy.” Having read TP-BW first, the other two almost seem like a violation. I felt a slight disappointment upon reading Kevin, because suddenly what had first seemed like the exploration of a particular skill for the twists and turns of female psychology, now had the faintest flavour of self-indulgence to it. (Incidentally, this is one of the only times that I have "sensed" the author's presence behind the books. Usually you get this sensation with less skilled writers who can't help projecting themselves in some form or another into their own work. It seemed very out of place here, which I suppose is the whole reason for this post. It took me entirely by surprise.) Shriver now seemed addicted to misery rather than sharply exploring a new world, as though these books were all part of some kind of dismal pattern. Double Fault in particular seems like a sort of orgasm of despair and pain. So what drives someone to explore that? Is Shriver seeking media through which to express some inner trauma of her own, or is she exploring foreign ground in setting after setting, to understand or perhaps to achieve a near-experience herself?
Or maybe, and perhaps this is the most likely, this is what Shriver is good at. That her best work comes from dissecting and creating tragedy. I cannot fault that (no pun intended), because creativity thrives on conflict. Complexity grows in conflict. It is rare indeed to find a happy book which is also interesting and captivating. (The Bridge Across Forever by Richard Bach is one wonderful example of this rarity.)
And she does write her female protagonists so very convincingly. All of them are deeply flawed, but all manage to snag the reader’s understanding with perfect clarity - and largely, sympathy. I do wonder sometimes whether being able to write that convincingly might not be a pathology all on its own (and I use the word pathology possibly erroneously here, or at least loosely, until I think of a better term). Is the difference between various writing methods roughly equivalent to those between acting styles; that is, is there an equivalent to method acting? Is getting into a character’s thoughts and mind all-encompassing, and is it perhaps not a bit troubling if one is particularly good at it?
So I dug up a copy of We Need To Talk About Kevin, a story from a mother's POV about her mass-murdering son, how he grew up, and what her life is like now. This is probably Shriver’s most famous book and it is extremely emotionally grisly. It explores a certain avenue of maternal psychology with great finesse. It's great. Go and buy it.
Yet while it lacks the sucking despair of Double Fault, it occurs to me that all of these books have a commonality of tone, a certain dismal flavour. Out of all of them, TP-BW was the most “upbeat”, as one universe seemed to be the “right” one for the protagonist, but really it’s like saying “out of the three hurricanes, Katrina was slightly less windy.” Having read TP-BW first, the other two almost seem like a violation. I felt a slight disappointment upon reading Kevin, because suddenly what had first seemed like the exploration of a particular skill for the twists and turns of female psychology, now had the faintest flavour of self-indulgence to it. (Incidentally, this is one of the only times that I have "sensed" the author's presence behind the books. Usually you get this sensation with less skilled writers who can't help projecting themselves in some form or another into their own work. It seemed very out of place here, which I suppose is the whole reason for this post. It took me entirely by surprise.) Shriver now seemed addicted to misery rather than sharply exploring a new world, as though these books were all part of some kind of dismal pattern. Double Fault in particular seems like a sort of orgasm of despair and pain. So what drives someone to explore that? Is Shriver seeking media through which to express some inner trauma of her own, or is she exploring foreign ground in setting after setting, to understand or perhaps to achieve a near-experience herself?
Or maybe, and perhaps this is the most likely, this is what Shriver is good at. That her best work comes from dissecting and creating tragedy. I cannot fault that (no pun intended), because creativity thrives on conflict. Complexity grows in conflict. It is rare indeed to find a happy book which is also interesting and captivating. (The Bridge Across Forever by Richard Bach is one wonderful example of this rarity.)
And she does write her female protagonists so very convincingly. All of them are deeply flawed, but all manage to snag the reader’s understanding with perfect clarity - and largely, sympathy. I do wonder sometimes whether being able to write that convincingly might not be a pathology all on its own (and I use the word pathology possibly erroneously here, or at least loosely, until I think of a better term). Is the difference between various writing methods roughly equivalent to those between acting styles; that is, is there an equivalent to method acting? Is getting into a character’s thoughts and mind all-encompassing, and is it perhaps not a bit troubling if one is particularly good at it?