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.
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