Nobody else' s book club: William Trevor's "A bit on the side"
My introduction to William Trevor was made through "Summer and Love", the last of his novels. I absolutely loved the unpretentious, nostalgic, tender, and absolutely perfect way this simple (but not simplistic, much less soppy) love story was told. William Trevor, who has also written novels and plays, is better known for his short stories and "Summer and Love" feels like a short story that has become too long to be one. After that I have read quite a few of his books, but I did not appreciate what Hermione Lee calls Trevor's "sensationalist appetite". In his stories, there is an excess of perversion (sexual or otherwise) that I prefer too believe is rare in real life (thank god for that) and why dwell on it more than necessary? Life is already cruel enough as it is. So I had put "A bit on the side" aside several years ago and did not read it until now.
And it is thinking of this sensationalist appetite that I first notice that the first two books on this book club are both written by two Irish writers who have a penchant for the thing. This, I assure you, is a coincidence, but a nice one, because the two books add to each other and allow a reflection on the Irish national character and its (literary) appetite for perversion. I dare say the latter because I do think from my past reading experience that McBride and Trevor are not alone, even if they may take it to a height above others I have read.
But let us focus on "A bit on the side". This is a collection of twelve stories published in 2004, but which had previously appeared in different publications. A note on the side: The New Yorker, which has published several of these stories, has collected all of William Trevor's work published in it and you can read it here. Back to a "A bit on the side". The stories are absolutely perfectly written, not a single word out of place, missing or in excess. Their style is similar: the story starts to capture the imagination from the first sentence and grows slowly, its essence administered with the precision of a dropper. Only near the end do you finally understand it in its entirety. They are are often unsettling, always unusual (even if you can often recognize in them other stories you have witnessed in real life), and they all have a hard core. Misery and solitude, death and lives that lack meaning, that have been wasted, are their common subjects. Still, even if they are tragic and sad, there is a beauty to them and a kindness in Trevor's voice that makes the experience of reading this book not only pleasurable, but even cathartic.
I have no words to describe how good this book is, and nothing negative to say about it, which coming from me is a great compliment indeed (rarer than the Nobel prize itself).
And it is thinking of this sensationalist appetite that I first notice that the first two books on this book club are both written by two Irish writers who have a penchant for the thing. This, I assure you, is a coincidence, but a nice one, because the two books add to each other and allow a reflection on the Irish national character and its (literary) appetite for perversion. I dare say the latter because I do think from my past reading experience that McBride and Trevor are not alone, even if they may take it to a height above others I have read.
But let us focus on "A bit on the side". This is a collection of twelve stories published in 2004, but which had previously appeared in different publications. A note on the side: The New Yorker, which has published several of these stories, has collected all of William Trevor's work published in it and you can read it here. Back to a "A bit on the side". The stories are absolutely perfectly written, not a single word out of place, missing or in excess. Their style is similar: the story starts to capture the imagination from the first sentence and grows slowly, its essence administered with the precision of a dropper. Only near the end do you finally understand it in its entirety. They are are often unsettling, always unusual (even if you can often recognize in them other stories you have witnessed in real life), and they all have a hard core. Misery and solitude, death and lives that lack meaning, that have been wasted, are their common subjects. Still, even if they are tragic and sad, there is a beauty to them and a kindness in Trevor's voice that makes the experience of reading this book not only pleasurable, but even cathartic.
I have no words to describe how good this book is, and nothing negative to say about it, which coming from me is a great compliment indeed (rarer than the Nobel prize itself).
Next book: "Ficciones" by Jorge Luis Borges
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