BAY MAGAZINE SEPT 09 BOOK REVIEW
The Booker Longlist --Will losers be winners again?
What defines a geat work of literature? The oldest written comments on the subject are from ancient Vedic scriptures (Natyashastra) which prescribe the criteria that characterise a great work of art. Greatness can only be ascribed to an opus if it contains all the following creative components but can still be appreciated (and possess genuine merit) at every individual level of human understanding it addresses:
i. Straightforward narrative for the intellectually undemanding
ii. Stylistic excellence for the discerning.
iii. Timeless/eternally valid truths for the seeker of beauty
iv. Universally valid analysis and insights for the intellectual
v. Philosophical propositions and questions for the spiritual
The winner of the Man Booker (or any) Literary award must demonstrate viability at all 5 levels to qualify as the greatest book of the year. With rare exceptions it never has, because the judges have lacked artistic integrity --- their decisions have been compromised by considerations such as ,inter alia, political correctness, topical validity , easy accessibility and facile populism.
Here are quick reviews of ten entries from the 2009 longlist,submitted by their publishers. The missing three titles were not received from the publishers and were not available from the library.The shortlist will have been announced at the time of going to press.

Me Cheeta by James Lever HarperCollins - Fourth Estate £7.99
Unlikely for shortlist.This autobiograpy or better anthropomorphography is written(in the first person) by Tarzan’s chimp Cheeta. It’s main significance is that Cheeta’s life both in the African jungle and in Hollywood is mirrored by the harsh experiences of the superstars of the thirties, whose long-forgotten names are dropped like confetti throughout the narrative.The only qualification for this book appearing on the longlist is that title and content are easy to remember.
The Quickening Maze by Adam Foulds Jonathan Cape £ 12.99
Definitely on shortlist. A bit of biography, a bit of history,a bit of romance all in a narrative that is lyrical in style.Quite poetic –very apt since it’s main characters are Alfred Lord Tennyson and the ‘ploughman’s poet’ John Clare. A pleasant read but lacking in the insights and depth necessary for an outstanding novel.A book full of hidden shallows, innocuous enough to be a possible winner.
The Wilderness by Samantha Harvey Jonathan Cape £12.99
Definitely on shortlist.Disease is the new fad in fiction.We’ve had Parkinson’s, cancer, schizophrenia, psychotic paranoia and now with The Wilderness, it’s Alzheimer’s. Whatever happened to good old violence,crime,sex and romance?Illness seems to have its own literary merit and it is not done to slate a book on such a worthy subject.I personally am bored by books on illness and fear illness itself abjectly.Is the success of this genre evidence of the masochistic streak in every Brit?
However it has to be said that Sarah Harvey’s debut novel cannot be dismissed in this fashion. It is a compassionate portrayal of an architect’s experience with Alzheimer’s, tracing the degenerative development of the disease with great sensitivity in commendable prose and intriguing narrative.The Wilderness does make a contribution to the body of good literature and deserves respect. A possible winner on the grounds of general worthiness.
Heliopolis by James Scudamore Random House - Harvill Secker £12.99
Heliopolis is very like last year’s Booker winner,Aravind Adiga’s White Tiger.I had a feeling of déjà vu as James Scudamore took his protagonist Ludo through the heat, the squalor, the slums, the bankrupt economy, the dirty politics and the uneasy wealth –not of India but of Brazil, a location established early by the (frequent) mention of caipirinhas.
Our hero Ludo is rescued from the slums by plutocrat Ze and is given a sinecure in the family marketing firm.He is overwhelmed by having to deal with the betrayals and secrets of his wealthy new milieu but finds solace in the occasional snort of cocaine and a great deal of alcohol.His relationships with his mother, his adoptive sister and the office cleaning lady would be hilarious if they weren’t laden with the inevitable doom of a classical tragedy. This unremarkable book will make the shortlist because it is within the judge’s comfort zone.It may even win.

How to Paint a Dead Man by Sarah Hall Faber and Faber £12.99
Faber&Faber is an imprint that is synonymous with literary excellence and it is only to be expected that Sarah Hall’s ‘How to Paint a Dead Man’ is an outstanding work of fiction. The structure of the novel is quite intriguing following four protagonists on their journey towards their respective destinies. Particularly haunting is the strand about the celebrated Italian artist who obsessively paints only bottles and his relationships with the local villagers --- somewhat evocative of Il Postino and Pablo Neruda.
Sarah Hall’s strong, stylish prose and her gift for impressing her readers with the originality of her perceptions make this book too good to win the Booker. Certainly a candidate for the shortlist ( and a possible winner)
The Children's Book by AS Byatt Random House - Chatto and Windus £18.99
WOW. We have a winner! AS Byatt pulls it off again with a gigantic tapestry of interwoven stories, peopled by strong and strange characters in a wide collection of settings . You could make your choice of which facet of the book you will follow avidly and which you will save for pursuing when you read it again.
As far as simple narrative is concerned, The Children’s Book deals with several dysfunctional families – adultery,incest, and paedophilia compete for one’s attention with warm, loving, domestic scenarios and positive resolutions of unsavoury problems.
The biography addict will also find satisfaction ---the novel is based on the turbulent lives of E. Nesbitt and Eric Gill. Equally if you enjoy a period setting, AS Byatt presents a detailed collage of Edwardian Britain with all the social constraints and movements towards personal liberation that were played out in that epochal era.
But for me the joy of The Children’s Book is the exploration of the puppet theatre and the Germanic folk and fairy tales that it evolved from. AS Byatt’s protagonist Olive Wellwood, serial adulteress and celebrated children’s author, writes an individual story book for each of her 6 children regularly adding fresh installments till they are adults .These books are informed by her research into fairytale and folklore that she uses in her commercial writing.
At the moment I am totally enthralled by the fabulous pageant of fable and folklore that Byatt parades before the reader,completely taking control of one’s imagination with a combination of dazzling erudition and profound love of the great German storytellers and chroniclers of the genre.I greedily gorged on her interpretations of ETA Hoffmann, Grimmelshausen, Gebrueder Grimm, Kleist and his famous essay on Marionette Theatre ---but no reference to Adelbert von Chamisso?Tut-tut.
If I were of a more philosophic bent I would take time to examine deeper the psychological and behavioural significance of each story as related to her relationship to each of her children.I will save that for my second reading of this wonderful book. It is the Booker winner,whether the judges concur or not.

Summertime by J M Coetzee Random House - Harvill Secker £17.99
Now that JM Coetzee has won the Nobel Prize for literature,I feel under increased pressure to find something admirable in his books –and continue to fail to do so. Kudos to Coetzee for being one of the few contemporary novelists to deal with the hands-on horrors of apartheid and for focussing international attention on this aberrant practice. But literary brilliance? Somebody show me where it is in ‘Summertime’ please. I feel very stupid to have to confess that it has passed me by totally.What I read is a dull,depressing story of four dreadful harpies that our misogynist narrator encounters. And who is the narrator? Wait for this amazing subtlety. He is none other than JM Coetzee’s biographe.
This type of gimmick does no favours for any writer and Coetzee steps up the annoyance factor by having several characters using the first person singular. Such ploys do not work if the reader can’t keep track of who is saying what about whom.
Credit must be given to Coetzee for using the phrase so beloved of James Joyce “Agenbite of inwit.” This is clearly a claim to erudition even if little else in the novel is. (Don’t know what it means?It’s Middle English for ‘prick of remorse.’It is used 8 times by Joyce in Ulysses.)
Coetzee’s misogyny is quite startling---does his negative depiction of the women in his life replace the emotional vacuum created by renouncing apartheid?
Apologies for being forced to point out that the Emperor has no clothes. Summertime should never have been selected for the longlist.Will the judges have the courage to exclude it from the shortlist?
The Glass Room by Simon Mawer Little, Brown £16.99
Simon Mawer has set his book in the midst of the anti-semitism of Hitler’s Europe. He manages to include every stereotype of the genre,from persecuted Jew to Nazi monster, from sly Slav to brutal Russian, not omitting the wartime whore, the brilliant architect , the evil scientist--- all in stereotypical situations that have, alas, been done to death in literature and film.
A significant literary talent like Mawer’s should not be trammelled by the dull litany of wartime tragedies and injustices.What if the scenario were to be turned about…..supposeHitler were shot by a Jewish sniper in 1930 .Suppose the Jews of Europe took their rightful place as the cultural,intellectual and financial leaders of the continent and Germany was renamed Israel. Suppose the Arabs continued to fester undisturbed and unchallenged in their empty deserts. No Ayotallah, no Taliban,no Al Qaeda.No terrorists……...
Literature is supposed to be about the imagination.And quite honestly the creative potential of pure imagination wins over dreary fact anyday –especially when the war novel has already been done so brilliantly by (to name a very few) Gunter Grass, Erich Marie Remarque, Joseph Heller, Leon Uris, Ernest Hemingway et al. Thumbs down for The Glass Room
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel HarperCollins - Fourth Estate £18.99
I don’t really want to be dismissive of this historical novel about the Tudors and Cromwell.There are 650 pages of good one-dimensional narrative of which I read 30 pages before deciding that life was too short to persevere with a book in a genre which I outgrew in my teens. Wolf Hall is a well written and very absorbing novel --- quite innocent, though, of the complexity or sophistication or insight or philosophic content required for a book to be included in the Booker longlist at all. Thumbs down.
Brooklyn by Colm Toibin Penguin – Viking £17.99
I enjoyed Brooklyn. It is a cosy girlie novel about a passive but pretty Irish girl who is despatched to New York by her family to make a living and a life for herself.She finds success, love and a sort of happiness till tragedy forces her to return to her native land to (passively) abandon her secret marriage and look after her mother.Not quite Mills and Boon but definitely a lightweight entry, alas not in the Booker league. However Tobin has been shortlisted for the Booker twice before (for much better books) and will probably find a mercy position in the 2009 shortlist.