04/14/2010: "Beatrice and Virgil (continued)"

Hi All,

I guess since I wrote that very ... not nice review of Martel's new book, I've had my eyes open for other reviews. I think it's the first time I've written a very, I don't know, HURTFUL review, is maybe the word. I've badmouthed movies and other things, but with books I'm pretty tender and pretty careful. I must say I do have a general pathology I follow, that being: if the writer is a big enough deal that whatever I say about him/her will have no fundamental impact on their livelihood, then okay, I can open the floodgates. The only two writers I believe I've been harsh on, that I can recall, are Atwood and now Martel.

But since Martel's PI was such a lovely book, and since I hadn't read any other reviews of Beatrice and Virgil before the one I wrote went to press, there was some nervousness in that I'd been too harsh, or perhaps - even worse - I'd missed the nuances of Martel's work. I'd focused on the surface gloss, where a more intuitive reader or reviewer would have seen that which Martel had set in place. So I guess I was a little concerned that (a) I'd let the private tales I'd heard about the author colour my review (and I've since heard very NICE stories about Yann, which I hadn't been privvy to prior to writing the review) and that I'd maybe, out of some sense of jealousy, maybe, or spite or something, purposefully misread the book - but then, if that were my mindset I suppose I would've misread PI, beacuse it will likely go down as Martel's masterwork.

Anyhoo ... this is why, ultimately, I'm not a good reviewer. I'm always thinking ill of myself if I come to a poor judgement on a book. Like, subconsciously I've got 'issues' that I'm unfairly taking out. And sure, I've got issues, but I like to think I keep them pretty well-buried - where issues belong! LA-LA-LA! HAPPY, HAPPY!

So there have been some reviews. One by Michiko Kakutani, grand dame of the NY Times. I'm not really a big fan of hers; she's either giving books unmitigated raves or she's putting a boot up their (metaphysical) asses. Well, Yann gets a boot up his:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/13/books/13book.html?ref=books

... and I should say that I'm linking to these, but I'm almost not sure I'd want anyone to read them. I don't like seeing books get slammed, really, truly, I'm not a fan of it. And I sort of hate the sick sense of relief that flooded through, me, too - it's this really parasitic version of schadenfreude, basically. But it was weird because, with this book, even as much as I was disliking it, there was always a feeling of: "Davidson, this is all flying over your head - you're missing every delightful, earth-shaking nuance, you fucking clod, you."

Then Ron Charles, the heavy hitter at the Washington Post - which, with the Times, are likely the two biggest or most impactful book review outlets - steps on Yann's neck, too:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/13/AR2010041303903.html

But then Pasha Malla, who's got a head on his shoulders and knows his shit, gives it a nice review at the Globe and Mail:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/books/review-beatrice-virgil-by-yann-martel/article1528941/

So there's a point where you think, well, someone's got to be right and someone's got to be wrong. But that's not it at all, with books.

But it does bring up one thing I've been thinking - when I was younger, I generally thought every book by a given writer was as good as the next, which was as good as the last. Like, I remember reading Stephen King and saying: I like Carrie as much as Salem's Lot as much as It. Or if not, at least I was thinking that no one book was really BAD; that, once you reached a certain level of craft, everything you write would be of generally equal merit. And then maybe I read Tommyknockers and sort of revised my opinion, but even then not really: it was that King had bent his craft in a direction that didn't appeal to me.

And I don't know where I stand on that, anymore. In a lot of ways, B&V is very similar to PI. The animal allegories. The simple but effective writing style. But the impact is so different. All the elements are the same, or close, but the overall feel is so much different. Diminished. And that's weird to me, still. It's like a basketball player hoisting a shot from the same spot on the court, the same loft, the same mechanics, and one's a swish and the other an airball. Which is reall reductive, but - you know? It's something you become aware of. A writer or director or musician or whoever can bring the same skills to bear, the same bag of tricks, and one succeeds where another fails - and sometimes fails spectacularly, where you get this sense of "How the hell did they pull it off in the first place?"

Anyway, there's no more to it my little screed than that. I feel awful feeling validated about this book, or at least having some other critics share my general opinion. I need to find other ways to pursue self-worth, I think!

All best, Craig.