Both of these books fell short
of my expectations. THE DINNER went too far into an unrealistic portrait of
criminal insanity. THE SIGNATURE OF ALL THINGS was maybe slightly a bit
paternalistic and plodding and unremittingly accepting of mediocrity.
Let’s just say that I saw the
announcement of an upcoming novel by Herman Koch and I wanted to read it; I
have no desire to read EAT, PRAY, LOVE or whatever Elizabeth Gilbert writes
next. That said, THE SIGNATURE OF ALL THINGS might be a better book. It’s more
ambitious as a story, and probably more successful at taking the reader where
Gilbert wants her to go. It’s just that I am more interested in Koch’s promise
as an author than in Gilbert’s. I feel like this book was Gilbert giving it her
all. I think Koch spent some time with an interesting idea and just didn’t hold
himself back at the end from taking it all the way to a slightly illogical
conclusion.
Here’s what I mean; I believe
that boys like the boys in THE DINNER might find it entertaining to harangue a homeless
woman. They might find it funny to set her belongings on fire, and might
accidentally set her on fire in the process. They might then be sort of scared
and fascinated, and fail to put her out. She might die. They might then both
lie about it to their parents and talk about it on social media to their
friends. They might threaten their step-brother to keep the secret safe from the
police. All this seems plausible. Might they then go so far as to kill the
step-brother to avoid jail? Sure, maybe. Might their mother cover for them?
Their father? Yes, absolutely. Might their father, Paul, brutally assault his
son’s school principal, in his office, in the middle of the day, with
witnesses, and get away with it? No, absolutely not.
Then are we supposed to believe
that Paul is an unreliable narrator given to flights of fancy, possibly caused
by his genetic predisposition toward violence? Well, maybe, but that throws the
entire premise of the novel—that these events happened and Paul is relating
them faithfully, and we are supposed to be horrified both by the events and by
Paul’s equanimity in their telling—into question. If Paul is unreliable, did
his sons really commit this crime, or does he just imagine they did because
they were out on the same night as the crime occurred and they won’t share their
YouTube passwords with him? If Paul is unreliable, is his wife really
supporting him in his criminality, or is he imagining she is because it allows
him to avoid thinking that the person he cares most about might think he needs
to change? Paul can’t be unreliable. So we have to imagine that in this
Holland, Paul never attracts police attention. Claire does, for doing basically
the same thing that Paul did. I believe everything but this. I believe that
Paul would have been arrested for assaulting the principal. It’s a small point
to belabor, but it ruined the novel for me—as did the extremely, er, powerful
amniocentesis—and I can’t quite get over it.
THE SIGNATURE OF ALL THINGS, on
the other hand, is a novel about a woman, Alma, who is very highly qualified to
be a scientist, and yet fails to push herself to achieve. Anything, basically.
Ever. She chooses a field of study particularly because it is under-studied and
no one cares about it. She publishes two books on moss. When her father dies,
she realizes that she hasn’t ever left her hometown, and decides to follow her
deceased ex-husband to Tahiti. Here is where the novel swerves into an odd ignoble-savages
interlude that I’m going to fall slightly short of calling racist. Certainly
the only people Alma feels are worthy of talking to are the white pastor, and
his adopted Tahitian son who has accepted Western ways and converted to Christianity.
Then she independently comes upon the theory of evolution. And writes it up
into a pamphlet, and then sits on it. Doesn’t publish it. Gets scooped not only
by Darwin but by Alfred Wallace, also. I was just upset throughout this story
that Alma had so much promise, and just refused to fulfill it. She refuses to
fulfill herself in other ways, too; all she wants her entire life is to sleep
with a man, and she just never makes it happen. Do we need to talk about the
binding closet? The binding closet is not a fair exchange for a fulfilling relationship
with another human being, which Alma never finds. Not that there are a lot of
human beings around deserving; Alma is roundly chastised by her nurse (and
basically by Gilbert) for ignoring her sister and her sister’s abolitionist
family. Well, her sister never spoke to her, is basically a Puritan, and has
consigned herself to an unhappy relationship for the sake of pissing off the
whites in their town and educating young black children. To be honest, I don’t
blame Alma for not being BFFs with Prudence. Prudence never made the effort.
THE SIGNATURE OF ALL THINGS does
show a remarkable curiosity about, and admiration for, the natural world. As a
scientist, I liked it. I was interested in mosses by the end of it, or at least
more interested than I had been from the beginning. I was just disappointed in
Alma. And I suppose she might be disappointed in herself, too.
Book winner: THE SIGNATURE OF
ALL THINGS
Overall author potential
winner: THE DINNER
The ToB and I agree on this
one, and we will revisit the binding closet next week.
Read the official Rooster
judgment here.
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