on reading 2003 Literary Prize winners
(Feb 2006 : this page is now part of an archived web site. I have been unable, or too lazy, to update this web site for 18 months)
a: "Vernon God Little" by DBC Pierre
This is the much praised, much vaunted, winner of the 2003 Booker Prize.
I usually try to read something off the Booker Prize short list, and the 2003 winner looked, form all the hype, to be one of the better and more readable winners. However, I have the feeling that I have completely missed the point with this book.
I got to page 57 - pages that I really had to labour with - before I gave up. I often give up books after 10 or 20 pages, but this one I kept trying and trying. This book was supposed to be so good that I felt I had to keep going.
There are basic problems with it: call me a village idiot, but how does anyone know what is actually going on in this book? OK, I find the American drawl, the patois (call it what you will) used by the narrator, somewhat hard for my English ear to understand. But then he is not talking all the time; it's just one of those books where nothing is ever stated clearly, you have to figure it out yourself.
About the 'voice': I've heard or read reviews that eulogise about how this book extends the English language, how the voice is so original. Why is that? Because every other word is 'fucken' instead of 'fucking'? A new voice that vents biting feeling to the damage caused by 21st century life. By swearing alot.
Hey, think of some new swear words - maybe a new take on the F* word - be deeply cynical about eveything, and you have a 'new voice'. Hey, wish I'd thought of that.
This book reads to me like a load of middle class literary types decided that here was a new radical voice, and that to express misgivings about the book is to be square, conservative, reactionary.
Problem: I could not care about the author. Some of his quips - when I could undertsand them - I found midly funny. But I could not give a fucken shit about him and his oh-so-cynical-I-have-grown-up-too-soon-and-witnessed-too -much-and-that-is-why-I-am-bleeding-edge-fucken-cool attitude. If you can't stand a narrator who never shuts up then you might as well give up.
I read reviews that compare this character to Holden Caulfield in 'Catcher in the Rye' (in fact the back of book eulogies reference that book): I wonder, does it say more about cultural change, or my growing into a middle aged slipper wearing conservative (small c) , that I remember Holden being likeable, nay loveable, and fairly innocent, compared to Vernon Little? Maybe that's the whole point, which is just too hard for me to take: in the 1950s, 'rebels' were not generally massacring their colleagues with the latest high tech automatic weaponry. It is not Vernon Littles fault to have been born into that world. These day, it is , after all, always someone elses fault.
It is 6 months since I attempted to read this book. I've decided that when I go on holiday I might give it another go. I've been flicking through it, reading bits, trying to get a feel for it. As mentioned, there are milfly amusing moments in it - I like this for example:
"I just continue to flick through Dad's vidoes. Cash makes Cash, and Did You Ever See a Poor Billionaire."
b: "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" by Mark Haddon
This, by contrast, is readable, funny, sad, wise, intelligent, and original, with a main character with whom I could empathise. I love: short chapters, off-beat observations about everyday life, interesting digressions about mathematics, jokes, logic, maps, detectives, Occams razor etc. It is a book with lists in, which is generally a good thing if they are not overdone. It is ever-so-slightly-sentimental, in the way that books with a beginning, middle and end (and in that order) often are; they have to reach closure somehow.
Where DBC Pierre's book leaves me cold and empty, this book adds something good to the world.