Romantic Egotist: An Unauthorised Biography of Jack Trevor Story - Brian Darwent

It is difficult to know where to start with this book. I read it because of my love of Story’s work, but I have to say I found the experience to be loathsome. On a very basic level, the book is badly written. The style is pedestrian. It rambles and, as a result, it confuses. It hasn’t even been properly proofed as spelling mistakes and typographical errors abound. As a biography it fails on a basic level. It cites no sources and seems to contain nothing that could not be gleaned from Story’s fiction (always a dubious prospect for whilst Story was known to mine his own life extensively for material, it was fiction he was writing).

Whilst we are offered a vaguely chronological amble through Story’s life, it is not placed in any but the narrowest social context. Rather like placing something on its own in a display case. Having no idea of how usual or unusual were Story’s circumstances in his early life, for example, it ends up being presented as something of a freak show. A person’s formative years are important to an understanding of their life, especially if their life is considered worth documenting. Without that background, without that context, we are adrift from the very beginning.

And this continues. Jack Trevor Story was a writer. Yet much of the work is glossed over as if the author of the biography didn’t want to talk about the books and other writings beyond mentioning that they were written at a certain time. To me this rather misses the point, particularly as some of Story’s work is now difficult to get hold of. Even a dedicated collector like me has only a fraction of his output. And where the work is mentioned, I could not shake the feeling that it was being sneered at.

This was a missed opportunity on a grand scale. Jack Trevor Story was a complex man whose life was equally complex, not to say complicated. He was certainly a highly talented, not to say unique writer - a man who never let his work settle into a rut. One would think that the point of a biography would be to try to unravel the complexity and explore the writer’s life and his work. In the end, however, we are left with the impression the author gave up trying, that it was all too much like hard work, that he expected Story to dictate his life to him in a coherent fashion. Story certainly wasn’t happy with what he saw of it. Neither was I.

Story’s life and work is fascinating, as is the milieu in which he worked. The opportunity is there to explore how publishing worked for the jobbing writer in the ‘50s and ‘60s and beyond; how the television and film industry treated writers (and still does); how someone managed to keep writing and producing fresh material despite (and because of) the events in his life. The opportunity is also there to place Jack Trevor Story where he firmly belongs in the top rank of writers of the second half of the twentieth century. Sadly, all that has been wasted.

If you want to know about Jack Trevor Story, do not seek out this book. It would be a waste of effort and money. Seek out Jack Trevor Story’s books instead. There you will find writing of rare talent that outshines much of what passes for literature today; that is genuinely comic; and which reflects the chaos that is modern life.

Steppenwolf - Herman Hesse

It is sometimes difficult returning to a book that you read in your late teens and have not re-read since then. There is a huge accretion of memory (often erroneous as memory can be) and emotion, especially when it is one of those books you recall as having had a profound effect. So much so that I went on to read whatever of Hesse I could find.

Returning to this, I am struck by two things that I probably didn’t consider on the original reading. The first is the language. My German has never been good enough to tackle something like this so I rely on translation. That means I do not know if it is the original or the translation that is so stiff-necked, so formal, but it simply felt at odds with the subject of the book. The structure is by no means standard for a novel. Hesse is happy to play with that. It seems unlikely he would be so in thrall to his native language that he would not know how to match the language to the various moods of the book.

The second is that for me, this will always be a book associated with adolescence and a flowering of my creative side. To my adult self it seems a juvenile work. Interesting, but a bit embarrassing, a bit too conscious of its literariness. This does not mean I do not like it. Every work as ambitious as this must be allowed a level of ‘roughness’ because it is venturing into places no one has been before.

Although a novel this stems from an age before writing courses and professionalisation of the art dictated current ‘axioms’. It is a novel of ideas. Whilst things happen (although not very much), the work is more interested in the development and exploration of ideas. The plot, such as it is, is a very loose framework on which to hang the discourse. Characters are almost irrelevant.

When I was reading the end section I was put in mind of the TV show The Prisoner (the original, not the appalling ‘remake’). That too had its faults, but it was nonetheless intriguing and explored many of the themes to be found in Steppenwolf - about identity, about being trapped, about escape, about trying to make sense and impose a pattern on an essentially chaotic world. And ending with a seemingly bizarre series of surreal events from which ideas and messages can be constructed to your heart’s content.

I am glad I took the time to revisit, and I would recommend it to younger readers as it is a book that anyone concerned with the nature of our inner lives should read; but it should be read early when it has time to imprint those essential messages, especially those about the way in which the life of the mind cannot be sustained without recourse to the feeding of the body and the senses.

The Moving Target - Ross Macdonald

As someone who much enjoys the work of Hammett and Chandler, it seemed only right that at some stage I would seek out Macdonald’s books. That it has taken so long is a bit of a mystery. I knew he was considered the heir to Hammett and Chandler, but somehow I had never got round to reading any of his work. It’s something I’ll be putting right in the near future.

Although not his first novel, this is the first of a series to feature his private eye Lew Archer. Archer is cast in the same mould as others of his ilk. He has been a policeman, served in Intelligence during the Second World War, has a broken marriage, is something of a tough guy, but is not as tough as he acts. Because his inner world is available to us through the use of first person narrative.

In the same West coast settings as Hammett and Chandler, Macdonald explores the same territory and uses the same settings, yet we have a view of the world that is from a slightly different perspective. This is partly due to the fact that Macdonald takes up the reins in the post-war era. I’m looking forward to his work written in the 60s to see how he observes the social changes of the time.

In The Moving Target, he notes how some men who flourished in a combat situation had trouble readjusting to civilian life and often fell into trouble or made a concerted move into a life of crime. This is introduced as a natural part of the story (a kidnap caper that goes wrong and exposes the ways in which upright citizens can be corrupted by the influence and presence of the corrupt).

By the time Macdonald wrote this book, he was had already proved himself as a writer. It is somewhat lacking in variations of pace. In part that is the race-against-time element of the story, but a few moments to draw breath would have produced greater contrast for the tension. Apart from that, this is a slick novel that pays great attention to detail, not just in terms of plot and character, but in the mechanics of writing as well.

It’s always a joy to find a ‘new’ author whose books one enjoys. I can see lots of pleasurable reading ahead.

Dance Your Way To Psychic Sex - Alice Turing

This book is something of a literary earthquake. From the very beginning you are aware of a fault line; you know that in the depths there are tensions building. And as with all earthquake zones, the eye moves from place to place assessing the safe spots, the danger points, the escape routes, all in the knowledge that when the earth moves, all bets are off. Because when and where an earthquake is triggered and with what ferocity is wholly unpredictable.

Here, the seismic rumblings are of a personal nature. As the book opens, we follow Henrietta into the epicentre. And already we can feel the coiled energy that will release and turn everybody’s life upside down and inside out, knowing they will have to cope with a world full of aftershocks as they survive in the ruins and start the long process of rebuilding.

Such a novel could be unremittingly gloomy. Happily for us, it is not. The themes of love, loss, betrayal, faith, and illusion are handled well. There is no moralising, no sense that the author has an axe to grind, merely that she has an insight she wishes to share and the talent to share it in such an interesting and entertaining way. It treats serious subjects with sensitivity, yet it manages also to be comic. There are no knockabout routines, no custard pies in the face. The humour and the comedy are integral to the characters and to the situation – and much of what happens grows out of the characters in an entirely natural way.

Indeed, the book put me in mind of Jack Trevor Story, for it is a somewhat surreal yet convincing tale populated by characters who, for all their oddities and intensities, are wholly believable and deftly drawn. These are characters not always in control of their fate, who view the world with a bewildered eye, but who manage to survive. Swept away by the craze of Psychic Dancing, we are offered glimpses into the world of stage magicians and mentalists, as well as the lives of those caught out by success.

The author also does the reader the honour of treating them as intelligent. No spoon feeding of pap on plastic spoons. Rather, we are fed morsels of the best quality with a spoon that… Well, maybe there is no spoon. The writing is smooth and clear, like a good whisky; because it is also intoxicating. The story is well constructed and complex without resorting to tricksiness. The resolution is satisfying even if, like real life, all the ends are not neatly tied in a bow.

There were a couple of times I found myself wondering why it had been written in the present tense. I normally find this difficult to cope with, but the pace and content soon made me forget about it. It did however put me in mind of a film script and made me realise what a great television series this would make.

If you like an intelligent read that is both thoughtful and entertaining; if you like a book that is well written; if you like something a little out of the ordinary; then I suggest you buy this book. You’ll be doing yourself a favour and you’ll be supporting a writer who deserves much greater recognition.

The Bad Sister - Emma Tennant

Often billed as a retelling of James Hogg’s masterwork, it is a great deal more than that, and to suggest otherwise seems to me to belittle what the author has achieved. Indeed, this is Emma Tennant at her very best. Confident, intelligent, and searching, she has produced a novel of great simplicity and enormous power.

The simplicity lies not in the story which is an interweaving of many layers, but in the telling. A lesser author would have made a hash of trying to keep so many narratives moving forward in such a way. Yet we are never lost in these layers, just as we are never lost in the mysteries. Nothing is explained, yet we are never left behind, because the author paints such a convincing picture.

The narrative is tight, tense, and slips in and out of the surreal in a way that many so-called magic realist writers have never managed. Such seamless writing is a joy to read; the use of such techniques enhancing the story. And there is extra joy in the fact we are left to engage with the story at our own level. A fantastical show is put on for our delight, both entertaining and thought provoking. How far we wish to go in looking behind the scenery is up to us. The door is there should we choose, but it is never once pushed at us.

Jane’s journey is one of feverish nightmare, never certain what is dream, what is hallucination, and what is real. Her encounters, her memories, and her actions move in and out of these different realms. And the end of the book takes us out of the quintessential urban setting with its noise and business back to the wilds where one can feel the cool, green, damp and the loneliness that lies at the heart of this sad tale.

Buy. Read. Marvel.

Literary Theory: A Very Short Introduction - Jonathan Culler

Like other books in this series, this is surprisingly comprehensive for such a short text – especially given the complexity of the subject. The author takes an unusual approach to the subject, leaving an explanation of various schools of theory to an appendix. Instead, he concentrates on questions and approaches that are shared by these various schools. In this way, he is able to introduce the subject in a way suitable for complete beginners without compromising depth. You come away from this book with a grounding in the subject sufficient to move to more comprehensive introductions, especially those that look in depth at the various schools. For that, this book is to be recommended.

On the other hand, as someone who knows something about the subject, the book simply entrenched my own thoughts about literary theory. But I’m a writer and I have never really understood the vast edifice of literary criticism and theory that has grown up around works of fiction. To me it seems like a Gormenghastian labyrinth encrusted about some simpler core whose goal was to make the reading of works of literature a more pleasurable experience through the medium of a greater understanding of the text. It often seems to me that the subject of literary theory is no longer literature, but literary theory.

For a writer, these things are a distraction. The many different ways in which people pull a work apart makes the assumption they know better, that their view of the world is superior, and gives the impression that somehow they need to (a) find a sense of humour and (b) get a life. These are books they are discussing. They may be important. Some works certainly change the course of history. But the extremes of literary theory treat literature (when it remembers that is the subject) as the be all and end all. This ignores the fact that a huge proportion of the world’s population cannot read, and that of those who can, only a minority read literature for anything other than pleasure.

So, if you are interested, this is a good book to get you started. But don’t take it seriously. By all means think about the things you read and the assumptions that the author seems to be making about the world. But remember also to read for pleasure – elevating small sections of literary output is to create divisions that should not be there. It also contributes to the somewhat absurd situation in which works now touted as ‘literary’ by publishers are mostly vacuous. Many works of the past now considered canonical were popular works. We have, through the literary industry, elevated them to an imaginary strata fit only for the intelligentsia; those in the know; those with the wit to ‘understand’ them properly. People should be allowed to approach books for their own reasons and pleasures, not those dictated by others. Readers should certainly have the basic tools beyond an ability to read, but the relationship they have with a work or with an author should be personal.

Visitants - Randolph Stow

In perfect tune with the setting (Papua New Guinea), this seems to be a languorous work. Each of the main participants in the story take their turns to tell short fragments, building a complex, multi-coloured, mosaic. This too adds to the atmosphere, painting a picture of life in tropical climes, hopping from island to island, walking through the humid air, taking everything at a gentle pace.

But this is a deceptive novel. Using a real event as its starting point (the Boianai Mission UFO sightings of June 1959), the book explores ideas of what it is to be alien, to be a visitant, the effect of different cultures on one another, and how that impacts on individuals, especially those living in an alien environment. That said, this is not science fiction. The UFO event is a trigger, but everything else is very much down to earth and part of everyday life.

The characters are beautifully drawn; all the subtle detail extracted through the relationships each has with the others in the small communities through which they move. And whilst the book moves at a gentle pace it soon becomes clear that there are strong, deadly undercurrents. The notion of alienness runs at many levels. This is made especially clear by one of the characters toward the end and the way in which this reflected in the events is a masterful piece of story-telling.

It is a book that stays in the mind for a long time, with images clinging like exotic and heady perfume. Deeply moving, in places shocking, there is an alienness in the almost clinical observation of people and events. Yet the book manages at the same time to be warm and sympathetic. Well worth reading.