I know you are on the edge of your seats waiting for part 2. Here are the other five ‘greatest novels’, following on from the previous post. I’ve already apologised for the thoroughly misleading title.
Marilynne Robinson, Gilead.
Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go.
E. M. Forster, Howards End.
Michael D. O’Brien, Father Elijah.
Flannery O’Connor, Everything That Rises Must Converge.
Nope, not one of my top 3 are in there!
Like Mags, I am afraid none of my favourites are there either. Having said that, Father Stephen, you have served yet again to broaden my hoarizons through your blog by whetting ny appetite for one or two of the books you mention!
[WARNING: PLOT SPOILERS. (SW)]
(ChooChoo is my blogging name, but we have in fact met- you were phding and I was undergraduating, though I’d forgive you for not remembering me. Oops, that sounds scary. Zubin’s the name, and overly elaborate ways of introducing myself’s the game. Btw, moved over to your blog from a link at the Guardian Belief site).
Anyhow, wonderful list. But want to share something about Gilead (aside from the fact that all three of her novels are sublime – and, perhaps, Housekeeping is her finest) a novel I adore and have read through three times.
The reviews do justice to Robinson’s craft. And like the reviewers, I grew to love the Rev. John Ames. But upon rereading, I’ve come to see Ames very differently. Perhaps like Robinson, I still love him. But Gilead is not a straightforward novel about luminous moral goodness, but about a profound moral failure, a failure which Ames himself comes to see through a glass darkly.
I completely missed this the first time round. And I wonder whether I’ll be able to explain briefly. And don’t have Gilead on me. So probably not. But here goes.
It gravitates, I think, around historical memory and historical forgetting. As a town, Gilead was bound up with the abolitionist movement (an aspect of Mid-Western history Robinson is very interested in and feels has been ‘forgotten’). Ames’ grandfather – that strange man – was famous for it. (When Jack tells of meeting his belle’s father, even he had heard of ‘the’ Ames).
There are beautifully written passages throughout Gilead and in some of them, Ames reflects upon his role as prophet (he refers to the etymological connection through the French ‘predicateur’ at one point). There are subtle hints that he feels he has not quite been the prophet he has been called to be. (C.f. his memory of a sermon he did not deliver during the First World War).
There are also plentiful hints – almost despite Ames – of Gilead’s abolitionist history, of the way Ames and Boughton have not really been interested in the question. (Can’t remember if it’s in Gilead or Home, but Jack and his father briefly discuss a real lynching case. Again, first time round, it all seems very gentle and about the poignant sadness of thwarted reconciliation.
Both elements become accentuated upon rereading because we read them ‘through’ Ames fateful conversation with Jack towards the end. And if you look carefully, in that conversation – and in the remainder of the novel – Ames comes to call into question whether he has truly been a prophet.
Two examples. One is the brilliantly laconic conversation itself. Jack asks whether his wife and boy will be welcomed in the town. Ames really just fudges the question, and it’s like a stab to the heart when Jack points out that the ‘Negro church’ was firebombed. Ames realises that the town – and its preacher – have forgotten their history. Gilead, once a safe haven for runaway slaves, is now a white town.
Think about how deep a failure this is. Ames loves Jack – and Jack is cast as the Prodigal Son. He aches for reconciliation with this sad, flawed, loved, but also brave man. And at the moment where Jack seeks sanctuary, Ames comes to realise that Gilead cannot offer it – and that, in some sense, this is his failure. There is a passage not long after about Gilead being a pit of hell (or something like that). One of Robinson’s marks as a novelist is to show us this, very subtly, through Ames.
Ames has failed to be a prophet, he has been blind – and even remains half-blind – to just how profoundly he has failed. This may sound fanciful – but reread the novel with a conscious awareness of the racial question and it reads very differently. (Had a mini-argument about this once with someone who took me to task for judging racial sensibilities by current yardsticks. Basically, ‘you’re being PC’. Absolutely not – I mean look at the racial question and think about how Ames is a failure on his own terms).
It’s good to hear from you after all these years Zubin. I remember you well. The hair! And I think we bumped into each other after Uni too but I can’t remember where.
I like the thoughts about Gilead. I’m sure you are right; I’m almost ready to read the novel again after about a year. I haven’t read Housekeeping, but I have it on my shelf for later.
(The hair’s even worse now. And not just on top of my head. Sort of ‘mourning dress’, a look for the final weeks of writing up thesis – which is what I should be doing as I type this…)
Very interested to hear your thoughts on Flannery O’Connor (at some point in the future). And very much enjoyed reading through your blog today.