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Feb. 7th, 2006 06:41 pmI finished Dan Savage's The Commitment last week, although I don't remember exactly when. It was pleasantly quick, especially after spending so much time lately wrestling with Henry James, but it seemed somewhat heavier than I remember The Kid being. It was still a very funny book, but it had more politics, more personal history, more introspection than The Kid. That could just be faulty recollection on my part, or it could be due to the fact that some of the heavier parts of The Commitment hit rather close to home: Savage spends a lot of time talking about his grandparents' marriage, which is both utterly depressing and nearly identical to the story of my grandparents' marriage. Regardless, the book is good, and worth reading even if it doesn't add anything particularly new or revolutionary to the gay marriage debate.
After finishing The Commitment, I started in on Reading in the Dark by Seamus Deane. I'm about halfway through, and I like it quite a bit so far. It's strongly reminiscent of Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha--both are narrated by young Irish boys who are just beginning to figure out their families and the rest of the world, both are told through short, vivid vignettes and have almost no plot structure in the traditional sense--but it's still definitely its own book. Deane's narrative voice is quite different from Roddy Doyle's; Doyle told Paddy Clarke's story strictly through his own voice, but Deane's narrator uses words that Paddy would never dream of. This sophisticated vocabulary also makes it hard for me to pin down the age of Deane's narrator. He says things like, "Most of the time, the water looked metallic, but on occasion, when the sun shone, it became less burnished and softened to a sexual velveteen," yet his perceptions are clearly those of a child... It's a bit strange, but I find that it doesn't bother me. The whole book is mysterious and atmospheric, preoccupied with the supernatural, and this little disconnect seems almost to contribute to the feeling of strangeness.
After finishing The Commitment, I started in on Reading in the Dark by Seamus Deane. I'm about halfway through, and I like it quite a bit so far. It's strongly reminiscent of Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha--both are narrated by young Irish boys who are just beginning to figure out their families and the rest of the world, both are told through short, vivid vignettes and have almost no plot structure in the traditional sense--but it's still definitely its own book. Deane's narrative voice is quite different from Roddy Doyle's; Doyle told Paddy Clarke's story strictly through his own voice, but Deane's narrator uses words that Paddy would never dream of. This sophisticated vocabulary also makes it hard for me to pin down the age of Deane's narrator. He says things like, "Most of the time, the water looked metallic, but on occasion, when the sun shone, it became less burnished and softened to a sexual velveteen," yet his perceptions are clearly those of a child... It's a bit strange, but I find that it doesn't bother me. The whole book is mysterious and atmospheric, preoccupied with the supernatural, and this little disconnect seems almost to contribute to the feeling of strangeness.
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