Last Orders by Graham Swift

Well done to those of you who read the whole of my last post – it was a bit of a lengthy one – so I’ll endeavour to be a little more succinct in my ramblings…!  I’m having a harder time finding the books in my local library even armed with my new and improved alphabetised list of the winners!  It would appear that I have exhausted their ready supply of books and so now I have to resort to reserving and requesting books from other libraries.  This is a bit of an hassle as it requires a certain amount of planning ahead so that I don’t end up with a humungous pile of books to read while ensuring I am never without a new book to read.  Anyway, enough of the moaning, as the Long list for the Man Booker Prize 2011 has been announced – hurrah!  Although, now I feel the looming of another title to add to the already long list of titles I’ve still to read…

On starting ‘Last Orders’ I had an uneasy sense of déjà-vu; mature characters in a pub with flashbacks to their lives, ‘The Old Devils’ by Kingsley Amis comes to mind.  And overall this book had a similar premise of ordinary people dealing with ordinary life events, dealing with issues of guilt, uncertainty etc. with a certain amount of drinking in pubs.  The last orders referred to in the title is the request by a recently deceased friend asking that his ashes be scattered from Margate pier and so the majority of the story is based upon the journey that three of his friends and his son make to carry it out including various detours both physical and mental.  Swift adopts a multi-narrative style which switches quite abruptly between the characters and their view of the journey with personal insights into the events along the way and the reminiscences about their lives and of the illness of their friend, that are stimulated.

It is a sensitive story about how life unfolds and the various circumstances which occur, and how different characters respond.  The central characters are well constructed with their back-story filled in during the course of the story with various philosophical points raised as part of the very ordinary, matter of fact way, of daily life.  It wasn’t revolutionary, rather an insightful view on the reflections and memories that often surface around life events such as death through the eyes of ordinary people which left me feeling on the whole more positive than after reading the antics of ‘The Old Devils’.

Possession by A.S. Byatt

I have been to my first literary festival, albeit on a small scale as I only bought tickets to attend a session with Alexander McCall Smith.  But what an engaging character!  Despite having a staged conversation in front of hundreds he was incredibly natural and really funny – and what was perhaps most endearing was how he laughed along with the audience at his humorous anecdotes!  I am a loyal fan of his No.1 Ladies Detective Agency series, which is internationally popular, and I intend to sample his other series some time after completing this Booker challenge (yep, they are on the list!)  It got me thinking why none of his books had been considered for this prestigious prize which prompted me to actually look up the criteria used in judging he Man Booker Prize (a little late I suppose, 16 books in!) Nonetheless the criteria is as follows: “a) Any full-length novel, written by a citizen of the Commonwealth, the Republic of Ireland or Zimbabwe is eligible.  Such a book must be a unified and substantial work. b) Authors must be living at the time of the award. c) No English translation of a book written originally in any other language is eligible.

So there you go…now we know where we stand except it doesn’t really solve any questions about which books get submitted or how they get whittled down, apart from the fact that it seems quite reliant on publishers putting forth the books and then its up to the judges discretion.  I would have thought that the publicity sparked by being considered for the Man Booker prize would be desired by any author (and publisher!), however, on reflection it may also put people off as it may become branded as literary and therefore less appealing to some readers.  Frankly I’ve no idea what to conclude and so the debate regarding ‘popular’ fiction continues – with some indefinable element, that is uniquely personal, dictating what appeals to us.  Although something I am sure about is that it is important to expose yourself to as varied a selection of literature as possible to ensure that your tastes are as well-informed as possible. 

‘Possession’, I confess was a little tainted by preconceptions as my Dad had flicked through it and seen that poetry was intermingled with the prose along with correspondence between characters and even excerpts from literary academic works, in addition to diary extracts.  He wasn’t particularly keen and drew parallels to the vast swaths of verse in ‘The Lord of the Rings’ (by the way I promise I have read other books, as I seem to recall this is the second time I’ve referred to Tolkien’s work!) that he just skipped over, as they didn’t really do a great deal for plot development.

However, what Tolkien and Byatt both managed to do, which is enhanced by the inclusion of their verse, is infuse their work of fiction with an aura of reality, purely by the lengths they have gone to create a whole coherent context in which to place their story.  ‘Possession’ constituted a vast tapestry of narratives that was woven together with such skill that I actually found myself googling the two fictional Victorian poets to check that they didn’t actually exist! 

Moreover, the mystery-solving element of the contemporary characters trying to piece together, from the fragmented remaining sources, what had happened between these two poets was absorbing especially when there were other rivals hot on their heels.  There was a slight tendency towards ‘The Da Vinci Code’ style convenient discoveries and revelations just in the nick of time, although on the whole the writing was grounded in more authenticity and benefited from a slower pace and more consideration of the characters.  I particularly liked the feeling of the book being steeped in literature with references to numerous real works.  Furthermore, the novel highlighted elements of academic work and the competitive nature of ownership of important artifacts by rival institutions and the monetary value attributed to intellectual works.

The main charm of ‘Possession’ for me was the obvious love of language that infused Byatt’s writing (I was glad to get the dictionary out a few times!) and the consideration of how the wide-ranging interpretations of the written word can be altered by a variety of factors.  I enjoyed the interwoven depth of this novel and although I admit to only skim reading the verses, without them the story just wouldn’t work – so persevere and be rewarded for your efforts by this impressive achievement of Byatt’s.

The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst

I have to confess to being slightly distracted from reading the Bookers by the lure of tennis.  Yes, it’s that time of year when despite (sometimes) lovely weather outside I find myself glued to the television, eyes fixated on the lawns and whites of Wimbledon.  And when I promise myself I’ll just watch the end of this game/set/match, it then of course lasts forever!  Unfortunately it’s not an activity that can be combined successfully with reading, despite my best efforts, as I seem to miss the winning shot and/or end up re-reading the same sentence over and over again as I lose my place on the page.

Anyway, in the face of such other attractions I have managed to finish the 2004 winner.  And my lasting impression of this book is Hollinghurst’s delightful prose, which bodes well with the publication of his latest book, his first since winning.  The magnificent writing managed to embody the title of the book as my eyes just skipped merrily along the lines on each page instead of needing to be willed with concentration.  The subject of the title was also represented by various considerations of beauty within the pages; how it is subjective ‘in the eye of the beholder’ such as the worship of Margaret Thatcher by the Tories, and, in the same vein, how the same beholding eye can be blinded to less desirable aspects of situation or people, such as the protagonist’s rose-tinted view of the Feddens’ world in his eagerness to be included within it. 

The context of the story is interesting; an inside perspective from an outsider’s point of view of the mid-80s Conservative-dominated political bubble with an emphasis on the excesses of money and power, sex and drugs.  There was a pervasive sense of pretension, everyone on their guard to be something more than they were to fit in and progress into an elusive inner sanctum.  But, heaven forbid, you step outside the acceptable, the cold shoulders would exclude you from favour to prevent contamination by association.  This is literally represented in the seeming acceptance of the protagonist’s homosexuality until the AIDS epidemic becomes apparent and then he is ousted from favour to save the reputation of the family.

I found this story an interesting view of the willingness of people to belong, especially when power, sex or perceived glamour is the prize of acceptance.  1980s Britain was of course a volatile time and Hollinghurst’s novel explores a rather unpleasant world with the outward appearance of beauty with a balance that does not reject or accept any particular point of view, thereby allowing the reader to reflect on the judgements that we ourselves make and the way we behave in order to negotiate our own path within the subjective world in which we live.