Here’s the stinker I told you was coming….I hate to say I told you so, but….
I’m posting the two latest reviews because I think they clearly prove my point about reviewing, reading etc, in that both reviews say as much about the reader as about the book. This is not to contest the idea of quality — I believe that while there is no quantifiable way of measuring the quality of a work, everyone recognises that some works have greater value than others, so that, say, a work of fiction by Dan Brown can be arguably and demonstrably proved to be a lesser work of fiction than a work by Saul Bellow. I would look at construction of sentences, at the density and power of description, at the overall thematic structure of a work and how well or badly the characterisation and structure and voice and tone of a book holds together. No-one could argue that the work of Shakespeare or Tolstoy or Flaubert is not of a demonstrably higher level than the work of — oh, I don’t know — FIFTY SHADES OF GREY.
Of course, we can argue that within the great recognised works of the western literary canon, many works have been left out — and those would be books by women, largely. And we can also argue that there is something about the way we organise the literary superstructure, so to speak, the prizes, the books editors, the reviewers etc tends to favour the works of male writers over female.
But, even taking all this into account, there is still the undeniable fact that one person’s sensibility and lived experience will differ from another’s — hence, here are two reviews of the very same book that could not be more different if they tried. If or when you are inclined to be next influenced by a book review, or a movie review, or any other sort of review, always remember that your own sensibility and experience of life may differ wildly from the reviewer’s — in other words, take any review as a guide, not as a proven fact.
Here’s the stinker, from Gillian Dooley on Radio Adelaide
Here’s the good one from Emily Maguire in The Australian (sorry had to cut and paste because of the –ahem — pay wall)
Susan Johnson counts life’s loves, chapter by chapter
by: Emily Maguire From: The Australian June 30, 2012
IN her 20-plus years as a journalist, novelist and memoirist, Brisbane writer Susan Johnson has built a reputation as a fearless explorer of the sometimes dark and bitter underside of love – whether platonic, sexual or familial.
In her 2003 memoir A Better Woman and 2004 novel The Broken Book, Johnson focused on the intensity of maternal love and the ways in which it can constrict and enhance creativity.
Johnson’s ninth book, My Hundred Lovers, is, thematically, a culmination of all that came before: the novel is the story of a single life and how it is changed for better and worse by love in all its forms.
On the eve of her 50th birthday, a woman named Deborah finds herself “gripped by an urge to sort through (her) body’s memories” and, in the course of 100 short chapters, each dedicated to a single “lover”, she does just that.
The word lover is defined loosely with chapters dedicated to coffee, feet and houses as well as family members and pets. The inclusiveness is part of the point. Why talk only of passion when the steadfast love of friends shapes us just as powerfully? Why single out sex when the body receives just as much (or, arguably, more) pleasure from food and music and wine?
Not that there’s a lack of sex in My Hundred Lovers. Chapters called The Knee-Trembler and Three Men in One Day deliver precisely what their titles promise, but there’s plenty of naked flesh on flesh in other, more subtly named chapters as well. And whether it’s erotic, funny, awkward or painful, Johnson gets it exactly right. She is especially good at portraying the greedy, reality-denying rush of infatuation and the deeper, lengthier “erotic swoon” in which a previously sensible person turns into a muddle-headed, sex-induced addict.
Deborah refers to many of her sexual partners by slightly cruel nicknames such as “the sad-faced boy”, “the older filmmaker” and “the bottom lover”, and these memorable but less transformational encounters are given only a single chapter each.
In contrast, the true loves of her life – her grandmother, her friends Ro and Steph, her child – recur throughout the book, each broad sketch or small detail building on the last. Sex is not part of these love affairs, but Deborah’s memories of them are deeply grounded in the physical: “the sensation of love in the rhythm” her grandmother tapped out on her back while hugging her, “the hot swell of newborn flesh” against her breast as she fed her son, the “beautiful rolling bottom” of Ro as she walked ahead.
Throughout the book, Johnson plays with the narrative point of view to great effect. Moments from Deborah’s occasionally abusive childhood and romantically tormented university years are narrated in the third person; it is “her”, “the girl” who had a knife held to her throat and who pined over an unattainable academic. After she flees to Paris (which itself becomes an important, long-term lover) the girl becomes “the Suspicious Wanderer” and remains so during the most troubled, restless years of her life.
The present (and occasional joyous moments from the past) are narrated in the first person, and it is clear that it is this woman – this “I” – who Deborah feels is her best and truest self.
As they must in any truly honest account of the physical self, disease, ageing and death feature heavily. Deborah observes that her mother and grandmother were “both reduced to pure body in the end” and it is to the “empty” bodies of her aged or deceased relatives that she compares her own ageing form. A newly formed bunion, for example, prompts the reflection that her foot now looks the same as her father’s did “when he was an old man, misshapen buckled, ready to walk towards the last of its numbered days”.
But although Johnson is blunt about the indignities and griefs of ageing, My Hundred Lovers is, in the end, a genuinely life-affirming book. Yes, it’s true that “every day unique in its details (is) already passing, vanishing, like breath”, but what a privilege to be able to enjoy this day, this experience, this lover right now. “I am an ordinary citizen of the sated world and nothing exceptional has ever happened to me,” Deborah says, yet how lovely it is to be just that: ordinary, sated, loved and loving.
My Hundred Lovers
By Susan Johnson
Allen & Unwin, 280pp, $27.99
Interesting, no, the difference between the two? Discuss.
I think readers’ reviews on sites like Good Reading are going to become more and more powerful, and the reviews published in newspapers and by the ‘establishment’ will become less influential in the next few years. This is partly because of the ‘closed shop’ you refer to of the literary establishment, which for too long has had little to no relationship to the books that the majority of people actually like and read. For example – novels by women. Anne Tyler, for example, who is a hugely popular and accomplished novelist, has won only won literary award in her long career. In the last twenty years there has been a ‘turning away’ from the people who tell us what to like and what is good, towards a more democratic and relativist view of culture. In many ways this is a good thing, but I also think it’s a shame, because once upon a time an educated, well read reviewer would have done more than tell a reader what to like or dislike, based on a narrow set of references, many of which the reader wouldn’t understand. I still read great reviews sometimes in places like The London Review of Books, but I read a lot of great reviews in places like Good Reading, or on Amazon, too. In regard to these two reviews, I found both of them rather thin. The first, positive one, gives an account of the book that will help the reader work out whether they might like it, too, which is useful, at least. The second, by Gillian Dooley, was confusing – where and why did feminism suddenly come into it? And narcissism? that’s a strong word to be using in the last sentence with very little preparation before hand. My guess is she is not a professional writer.
I agree that readers’ reviews are very influential, and possibly more so than “traditional” reviews — and with readers’ blogs and social media in general, will become even more so. We all know that — in the end — it is that nebulous and unpredictable thing called “word of mouth” that actually moves books — and no-one — no writer, publisher, publicist or literary God can manufacture or make that happen. I have taught several emerging writers in my time who believe that if you unpick the success of any particular best-selling book, you can replicate that and repeat that success, but, hey, it just aint true. The people will love what they love, and no-one can do anything about it.
But, re hyour other point about her not being a professional writer, apparently she is!
Vis a vis the two reviews, interesting thought that the first positive one at least gives an account of the book — I actually found the second pretty funny, that it was Deborah’s real estate fluke good fortune that was the most interesting bit!! I guess because — having lived in London for ten years — and knowing how very ordinary and commonplace it is for people to live in France (lots of my poor friends who couldn’t afford to buy a house in London bought in France, for very little money — I mean as little as $100,000 Australian, and even much less, and had much more productive lives there) that I found the idea of it being “exotic’ and a thing that “lesser mortals’ could never do, pretty funny…..aint that hard really, or that “exotic”. Even a poor person like me intends to do it one day!!
I don’t remember the narcissism bit — will look again — but, ahem, reminds me of what I used to cop from my ex-husband about writers and writing, so maybe she is on to something there!