The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter

I say this in all honesty; I am not entirely sure whether I have experienced a more brilliantly detailed and skilled novel as this in all my thirteen (almost fourteen) years. I must admit, this is not the first Carson McCullers book that I've read, and indeed, the two books that I have read of hers are entirely different that they cannot be compared in any way. What I shall attempt to do, however, is draw a sufficient picture of what this one was about, as it isn't the easiest of tasks.

I truly loved this book, although it's difficult to explain why, as there wasn't really a definitive storyline. It starts out by introducing each of the characters in the first two chapters. There is Singer, the deaf-mute central to the plot, Spiros Antonapoulos his mute friend, a cafe owner, a drunk, a black doctor and a teenage girl. The stories of each of these people are so incredibly mundane and prosaic that there is almost nothing interesting about them except for the nature of the characters themselves. The main story itself is made up of several big events connected up by small everyday occurrences. For me, the purpose of having such a structure for the storyline is to watch the development of each of the characters in response to Mr Singer. Possibly the most intriguing of these characters is Mick Kelly, the teenage girl who acts like a boy at the beginning of the book, and at the end has become a right young lady. We see how she becomes slightly obsessed with Singer and his silent listening as she rambles on and on to him about music, school etc. She is the most fascinating of the six characters for me, because I can relate to her the most. She feels self conscious at the beginning about her changing body, and is reluctant to wear girl's clothing to disguise the changes occurring in her. This assuredly female obsession with the appearance is personified beautifully in Mick, as it is through her that we see how innocent and childish it is, and how it becomes apparent in different people. Through Blount, the drunk, we see how obsession can take root in a person's mind, how it affects everything they do; through Doctor Copeland we see how ideology develops into an obsession; through Biff Brannon, we see how human affection can move from one person to another in the eyes of one who has obviously been thoroughly disappointed in life; through Singer, we see the bemused observations of an idolized man who has been turned into some sort of messiah by those who talk to him.

First come the chapters written in the perspective of each of the four people who talk to Singer personally, then comes the chapter written from the point of view of Singer, who comes off utterly bemused and perfectly baffled by the words spoken to him by his four visitors. To see this dichotomy within the very structure of the book is effective and amusing for the reader, particularly when we read about Jake Blount, and how he has the idea that Singer "knows" just like him, and then we read about Singer, who tells us that most of the time he doesn't have a clue about what Blount waffles on about. It is written with humour and quiet cleverness and with such detail that it is astounding to read such a book.

Whenever I was asked by any member of my family whether or not I liked the book, I would answer emphatically that it was amazing, possibly the greatest book I had ever read. When asked what it was about I would pause, think and answer confidently "Nothing really". This would always result in scoffs and guffaws from the family, and questions from my younger sister about how it can be a good book if there isn't a story (in answer to your question, Lottie, it just can.). But it's true; there isn't really a story to it, and yet I found myself totally in awe at how a human could've written such a masterpiece. The truth is that it doesn't really need a storyline to make it a good book, because the amount of description and characterization in it makes up for the lack of excitement. It is a book about ordinary people living in an ordinary town, doing ordinary things with their lives. Exciting things don't happen to us on a regular basis, so why should they in books? Altogether, I thought it was a work of pure genius! Next I'll be reading David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, so watch out for more updates!

Candide

This is incredibly late, considering that I finished the book quite a while ago, but it's here now, and I shall ramble on as I always do, and continue the next time I finish a book.

Voltaire seemed to have the rather brilliant idea of communicating an important message through the form of prose, and, in particular, a fairytale or seemingly innocent bed-time story; much like George Orwell, in fact, when he chose to write Animal Farm. However, the issue presented here is far more obviously presented to those that know little about the subject (like lowly old me) and it is far less political and far more to do with ideology and philosophy. Voltaire is constantly challenging the popular philosophical idea of the times; that all that happens to one is for the best. He presents this attitude in the form of the tutor Pangloss; Candide represents all those who will accept what they're told without question; the attitude of, presumably, Voltaire himself is represented through many characters along the way, although mainly through Candide's companion Martin, who thinks that humans are the creation of the devil and that they can do only evil to each other. This book puts blind faith in the spotlight, as Candide experiences many hardships along his journey and, at first, simply dismisses them with the affirmation that "everything is for the best; there is a better world where all shall be rewarded in due course". Voltaire's contempt for this theory is apparent throughout the book, and he presents those characters who believe in it as fools and ignoramuses, and he constantly tests it with the many hardships he throws upon Candide; he is robbed several times of all the gold he possesses; he is beaten many many times; he is thrown in jail for a period of time and has his lover Cunégonde snatched away from him on many occasions. However, despite the fact that he sets out to disprove this theory in as many ways as possible, Voltaire does give the story a happy ending, and so proves the theory by arguing that, if all of these terrible things had not happened to them, they would not be where they are and would not have all of the lovely things they do, not to mention the good friends, delicious food and profitable land.

In terms of the method of storytelling, I am of the opinion that it was an incredibly clever ploy to present such a heavy and usually unapproachable idea to a wider audience in such a light, easy manner. It certainly helped me, ignorant that I am on such matters, to understand the different views of others concerning, in loose terms, "the meaning of life". Indeed, I found that I didn't really need much knowledge on the subject to fully understand it. At the point at which this was first published, Voltaire had gained a reputation around Europe as being a writer of tragedies; this was probably written to lighten his reputation as well as keeping it intact, as the message it puts across to the reader is a very important, and one that most definitely should not be dismissed lightly.

Next I'll be reading (or blogging on, as I have only just finished it today, was about to start blogging about it when I realised I had done nothing about Candide. Shameful, I know) The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter, by Carson McCullers.

Thomas Hardy: The Time-Torn Man

Right, so I didn't actually finish this book, and I know that is a bit shameful (a friend of mine is constantly pestering me-in a good way-to finish the books I left partially unread, and in the case of Franny and Zooey, it shall be rectified, but not just yet) but I honestly didn't find it particularly well-written. Which is odd, considering that it was written by an award-winning biographer, Claire Tomalin. It isn't that Hardy's life wasn't interesting, it totally was (did you know that Hardy originally trained to be an architect? No? Neither did I...) but it was just the style of writing that bored me to death. She was writing it as a casual observer from the present, not someone who tries to get into the subject's mind, or even as someone who particularly cares about the subject's life and times; in short, she was writing it as a typical biographer. Yes, understood, it is what she was doing with the book, but surely a story, even if it was about someone's life, should be woven like a story, should be personal to the reader and most definitely shouldn't just be a casual, factual narration of someone's life.

In any case, I found it difficult to read and rather boring. I didn't manage to get past the time that Hardy was sixteen; every time I opened the book I would find myself reading the same page over and over and over again, until I absolutely knew who Hardy had gone to study architecture with, what he liked reading and why it was such a big and radical step for his parents to pay the £40 for Hardy's architect training. The book was pure facts and figures, and it had no emotional relationship with the subject or the reader, which, in my view, is its fundamental flaw; if a book is going to be good, it needs a relationship with the reader and subject, it needs a definite story, and it needs more than facts and figures to make up that story. Granted, it is a biography so a story is a given, but it was the ways in which she, Tomalin, told the story that so bored me.

Anyway, that may just be me, but I am thoroughly through with biographies for the time being. Instead, I shall be reading Candide, by Voltaire, the famous French dramatist who, I'm told, wrote but one happy book in his entire career-this one.