JB Book Club's First Book Reviews
Book Reviewed: Enigma of Arrival by V.S. Naipaul
Reviewers of this book are as follows:
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Okay, I ended up really digging this book, even though the first time I read it (it took me four weeks to plow through it) I wanted to scream: who cares where that hillock or haystack or copse or whatever the hell is, introduce me to some characters, have people talk for god's sake make something happen do something THIS IS A NOVEL. But then I thought, gulp, I'm really not giving this guy a shot to talk to me the way I think he's trying to talk to me. This book is one of those books you have to sit down with for two days and read, boom, don't get up and don't move on in the book until you get a sense of what he's trying to say. Reading it the first time allowed me to read it faster the second time so I didn't bog down as much, I anticipated the intricacies of the landscape, I understood some of what his reasoning was for making us walk so slowly through his perceptions - I ultimately came to think that walking slowly through one's perceptions and being available to the possibility of change was what he has talking about, and that the possibility of change is what allows for a sense of 'arrival' (for me that means authenticity, a sense that you are leading a thought-through, smart and centered life.)
I think the real enigma of arrival is that as soon as you think you've arrived, you are on some level looking less thoroughly at how you are living your life; are consequently becoming less 'authentic', have no longer 'arrived'. The enigma of arrival is there's no such thing - arrive at that!
Naipaul, I think, writes about people (himself included) that have been so checked in their impulse to perceive afresh, that they lead stunted, emotionally unavailable lives. Now that may be a sad point of view, and one not conducive to a brisk and cheery book but (sadly) for many people in this world it is a truth of how their lives go. It's why we have wars, and terrorism, and slaughter and famine and corruption, et al - because all of this 'stuckness', this inability to see what is around you with real imagination (another Naipaul word), will inevitably make you feel angry and want to lash out at others.
Look at how angry everybody in this book is, albeit in more internalized, less overt ways; look how sexless, passionless, friendless. It's a sad, but I think accurate, way of looking at how and why human's fail to develop.
Which is even true of Naipaul. He doesn't develop as fully as you wish he could - people didn't respond to him as a warm and caring guy. No one wants to read him again. But he presents himself that way, even as he presents himself as someone who does examine, does explore, does demand of himself renewed and ever renewing investigations. Paradox again. How much can you see, can you ever get to the bottom of the mystery of your own enigmas.
For me, what I found fascinating about this book was how much of a range of feeling I had for this author, as he talked about himself. I thought he was a cowardly bore in the first section, on some level, so absurdly rabbit like (the picture that he was painting of himself for me) that I wanted to scream 'OH GET OVER IT' when he wanted to hide cuz he saw someone headed towards him from the other direction. But then I had empathy and concern for him as he went on, to broaden and expand his sense (and mine) of where he came from , and why he was the way he was, and the price he paid for that aloofness. He did give you hints of the broader world he lived and worked and maybe even played in, but he was certainly talking about himself as ISOLATED MAN. I think that he thinks that he is just as stuck in the trap of history and inheritance and the accretions of custom as anybody else we meet in this book. I think, in that sense, it's extraordinarily honest and rare.
Paradox again, for me. To so admire someone I'm not sure I'd like. To so believe in what an author is telling me about how to live, even as he is telling me that he himself, for all of his efforts, can't seem to live that way himself.
Another thing that ultimately appealed to me about this book is that it was written in a way that really reinforced his themes - I love a good prose writer, someone for whom the how of the writing, and the why of the writing, comes together in the language. More than just a story (not that anything's wrong with a great yarn) but a story that is as much about the way it was told as anything else. On that level, the part of me that really admires HOW writers write, how they create and structure and think about their choices as they go, is what attracts me to a terrific book.
Naipaul, in this book, was like a guy at a yard sale: he picked everything up, put it down, went back to it again, circled round, picked it up again only this time with a slightly different perception of it, a slightly different perception of how it might fit into his life (each time you saw each object or person he showed you he gave you something new to ponder about that object or person: try tracing one character's development from scene to scene and see how little nuances keep changing your sense of who they are and what their lives are like.)
I think to get what Naipaul's doing the reader has to be able to track each fresh viewpoint, to read the book slowly enough to hit every detail; at the same time you have to kind of immerse yourself in it to get through multiple repetitions of each detail: I found, the first time through, that I had forgotten visual symbols and images by the time I came back to read my next section; because I had not really entered the initial image in my memory banks the subsequent mention of it (now altered slightly) didn't penetrate. It that sense, as I was intending to mention last night, it was a little like a poem. You can't put it down between stanzas.
Which I definitely understand is not everybody's cup of tea.
As I say, but for the book club I'm not sure I'd have read that book again, and I'm not meaning to suggest that I even think it's a valuable way to read. I often envy people who can pick up a book and throw it away after a few pages if they're not immediately hooked and pick up another one, just like that. I think they may read more, and be less neurotic and better adjusted people. (ONLY PARTIALLY KIDDING) My father, who was the single most prolific reader (and generally least neurotic guy) I have ever known, read like that: if he didn't care for it, boom - next.
I'm like my mother the packrat. If I started it, I'm finishing it. If I didn't like it, I wanta know why. I'll poke at, it'll stick in my mind and annoy me. How come I didn't like that guy? And I'll wanta go back and try to see if I can meet him again, his book again, and a lot of times I find I didn't try to meet the book (him) on the terms that he wanted me to. I wanted to impose my terms.
I want to read a book really fast. Get onto the next one. Have all the experiences I can. Come on come on, life is short. And so for me, I have to kinda force myself to give a book the ability to breathe, I have to say 'hey, don't be in a hurry'. (We rush so through our lives, because we want so very much to live! Paradox again).
And maybe I think that's what the essence of a book club is, too, come to think of it. We should read books that we can really live with for six weeks. I don't know that I think a good mystery, for instance, as much as I like a good mystery; or any good, credibly written genre novel, gives you six weeks of thinking; and I guess maybe that's what I'd propose we do. Pick books that give us each six weeks of thinking I DON'T THINK ALL OF THIS MEANS IT HAS TO BE DRY AS DUST.
I love funny novels, I love great stories with real sweep. Just as long as there's stuff to talk about, cuz that what separates it from just regular ol' reading.
Some thoughts - let me know if you are more/less interested in any of the following - The Adventures of
Kavalier and Klay - Michael Chabon
What I usually do is treat my own library like a library and pick five books to 'check out': so those five, and a couple of histories, are on my shelf right now. And if people, by the by, want to read as much history as fiction, pipe up. That's fine too.
Thanks for taking the time to read this - whoosh, didn't mean to carry on so. Just ended up liking that book and wanted to get my two cents in. xox jb |
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I read the book jacket for “The Enigma of Arrival” and thought it sounded like it would be a very interesting book. I found the first chapter to be difficult to get through as there were too many detailed descriptions of the English countryside. By the time I got into the second chapter I found myself enjoying it. I loved hearing about Naipaul’s descriptions of leaving his home in Trinidad and arriving in New York. I remember my first trip to New York City and how overwhelming it was to me. It also struck me that many of his dreams and hopes of what things would be like when he arrived at school in England were vastly different in reality. This is something we all face at various times in our lives. This was the part of the book where I found myself identifying with the author.
As I began the third chapter I began having feelings of déjà vu. I kept thinking that my bookmark had fallen out and I was rereading a portion of the book I had already read. I found the author repeating himself quite often and it distracted from the storytelling. I found myself leaving this chapter and succeeding chapters with a feeling of loose ends and questions. I didn’t feel that I knew enough about the author’s cultural background, belief systems or values to understand why he saw the world around him like he did.
The part of the book which really stood out to me was in one of the final chapters, “Rooks.” Naipaul was talking about change. I can’t really express in my own words why this particular passage stood out and meant something to me so I will quote it from the book.
“I had lived with the idea of change, had seen it as a constant, had seen a world in flux, had seen human life as a series of cycles that sometimes ran together. But philosophy failed me now. Land is not land alone, something that simply is itself. Land partakes of what we breathe into it, is touched by our moods and memories. And this end of a cycle, in my life, and in the life of the manor, mixed up with the feeling of age which my illness was forcing on me, caused me grief. ……..From that first spring I had known that such a moment was going to come. But now that it had come, it was shocking. And as a death, everything here that had been a source of pleasure and surprise, everything that had welcomed me and healed me, became a cause for pain.”
I enjoy reading for two main reasons; either for pure enjoyment and getting away from “real life” for a time or for learning something new. I found this book fulfilled neither of these purposes for me. I came away with more questions than answers about the author’s life. There were bits and pieces of his writing, such as the above quote, which touched me and made me feel that reading the book was not a waste of time. I know that there are some who have enjoyed the deeply detailed accounts that Naipaul uses in his writing. I found it too repetitious to be enjoyable. While I cannot say I liked the book, I can appreciate that there are those who did and I hope to learn something from their views. I also realize that if you are not enjoying a book or getting into the author’s message you tend to overlook some of what he says. Sometimes hearing another person’s perspective on a book can open our own eyes to something we missed. I look forward to hearing other opinions and reviews and taking a second look at what I may have missed in the first reading. |
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I am allergic to nature so I think “The Enigma of Arrival” should come with a warning label. I demolished a box of tissues just getting through Jack’s garden. I think it was the intense descriptions of nature that originally put me off the book. I am not a “Nature Girl.” I get nervous if I can’t see concrete. I would never have picked up a book like this on my own. That
doesn’t make it a bad book. Nor does it mean I regret reading it. While I had
a hard time with the book, it did make me think. I thought about my life, my
history, my writing but most of all it made me think of my own sense of
“otherness.” I related to many
things in this book without ever really caring about what happened to our
narrator. I sympathized at his struggle with his writing. I cringed when I
recognized myself fifteen years ago when I left my small world for the “Big
World.” It
is Naipaul as writer that causes all the problems. He is outside his environment. He observes his physical surroundings in minute detail but he is
never really part of it. None people in his village are fully developed because
he doesn’t really know any of them. He is the person on the outside looking
in. Like a tour guide on an African safari he has a lot of surface knowledge of
the area that is very interesting. But, he is too rushed to get down deep where
all the really fascinating information lives. He couldn’t get deep into other
people’s lives and maintain his otherness.
This
need to remain “other” got to me after awhile.
I wanted to know more about certain things. What had happened to Alan in
his childhood to cause such unhappiness? What was it that finally pushed him to
suicide? Did Bray revert to his old life once his “fancy woman” was gone?
Did Mrs. Bray calm down? Did she get her full freezer? I’m sure our narrator
could have answered all these questions if he had wanted to. In a way he never
stopped being that boy who looked for big stories and important words. He gives
us an interesting series of vignettes. I suppose he has to keep it short - he
has a lot of ground to cover. In the last section, our narrator talks about his
sister’s death and how thinking about death lead him to write about Jack. He
had a destination in mind before ever starting the book. Maybe that’s why he
doesn’t get in too deep. Too much would have derailed his theme of decay and
death. The
art of this book is lovely. Naipaul knows how to use words. He knows how to
create rhythm and atmosphere. He knows how to develop themes but in this book
his art sometimes gets in the way. At first the repeated words, phrases and
ideas were annoying. Then I realized that this book is a life. Life is a series
of repetitions. Life moves forward very slowly. In
life things change over time but one day is very much like the next until
something makes us notice the change around us. We get up everyday; we go to bed
every night. In between we eat, work and play. For many of us the same patterns
are repeated day after day until we have a day off. Tuesday is much like the day
before. It contains many of the same repeated elements but it builds on Monday.
Wednesday builds on Tuesday. One month builds on another. One year. One decade.
One life. “The Enigma of Arrival” is a life. It has all of life’s
repetitions and slow changes. Yes, it gets boring, but then something happens
and things are slightly different. Then the new pattern asserts itself and the
process starts again. It is the way Naipaul weaves this invisible, infinitesimal
motion into his novel that impresses me. The slow decay of his physical
environment is just a journey of a living thing, our narrator makes the same
trip. The
one thing that really bothered me about the book was the way women are
represented. The men all seem to have virtues, even poor Les, but the women are
not treated kindly. Women are more apt to be neurotic than noble. A piece of
furniture not a participant. Reacting rather than acting. The only woman who
does act, Mrs. Phillips, often does so out of spite. Our narrator doesn’t know
how to handle women. He may even be slightly afraid of them. There is not one
woman here I would want to be like. Well,
that’s it. I cannot say that I liked this book and I cannot say that I hated
it. Obviously from this rambling post I had something to say about it. Maybe
that makes it a good book. |
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The Engima of Arrival" is a very interesting book, it is not a book full of fast adventure and humor, but a book about a few moments in the writer's life. It is definitely not a "formula" book, you know the kind you can skim through quickly without missing anything important to the story line. It is not a book for intellectual snobs, it is written in a simple, everyday style of vocabulary that anyone, who reads English, can follow, understand, and probably relate to. The author does go into detail describing the landscape in which the book is set, which some readers may feel is a bit slow, but it is important to the book. It is the changing seasons, and the changing over time of this landscape, and the people in it, that corresponds to the internal changes that the author himself is going through. From his melancholy at the beginning of the story, to his finding a sense of peace within himself, to his illness and his slow healing, to finally, his need to move on and building his own house. Through this book one discovers the ups and downs of everyday life, the author's and those around him.
I truly have enjoyed reading this book. It was a window into everyday life in a rural part of England, so very different than all the other stories that I have read set in England. I found the people and the setting to be very real, less face it, real life is pretty boring unless we watch for the eccentrities of those we come in contact with, and watch for the changes going on around us in nature. I found myself thinking of the many times that I've sat with older relatives listening to their stories of the past. Thanks John B. for choosing this book. |
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How to start. Well, if you like escapist literature, don't buy this book. I found this work to be grueling, yet rewarding, finding it very autobiographical for me as a reader, as well as an autobiography of the author. I too was surprised by the content, expecting a linear narrative and character interaction. However, I eventually became comfortable with the holistic 'right brain' approach.
My first impression is of the careful crafting of the words. Fluid, with the imagery clear, yet without encroaching upon the subject, picturing a setting always came easily in this book.
The next facet I noticed, was the theme of the constant evolution or adulteration of the surroundings by the people on the land at the time. What struck me particularly was not the change of the land, but, instead, its durability. No matter what was done to it, the land remained, and eventually reverted back to an approximation of its original state. We are the ones who change (or leave) and evolve instead. I saw the first chapter as an affirmation of a confirmed pantheist. He showed the futility of the constant drive of the human species to try and separate itself from everything and mold nature into its own image.
I did always feel like a slightly distanced observer within the countryside. I think this "outside observer" reflects Naipaul's interpretation of 'The Enigma of Arrival' by Chirico. He managed to transfer his feelings as an outsider completely to me as the reader. His observational point of view made sense to me as he was describing a colonial émigré's life. I though this to be a subtlety (humorous?) ironic move.
I honestly never noticed any repetition in the book. I looked for it after the first few posts mentioned it as an annoyance. However, I might have a jaded view there, I tend to repeat myself too. As one brought up in a 'colonial British' home, I recognized the revolving pecking order with which my family categorizes everything. Britain is superior to the world, but too controlling of the commonwealth. The West Indies consider themselves superior to their originating countries, but covet the depth of history of those lands. What seemed to some to be arrogance reminded me of my own father's insecurities/defiance of the 'Empire'. He too sprinted from his last 6-form class (in Barbados) to board a New York bound plane. And, although he emigrated to another colony (Canada), he never the shook the need to prove his ability to 'Mother' England. Yet the England he was trying to impress hadn't existed within his lifetime. I did empathize with the author and admired what I saw as courage to reveal his early insecurities and flaws. I'm really trying hard to edit myself here. I could go on (and on) for pages about the colonial aspect of the book.
Overall, the book seemed to me to be like a sari. Diaphanous, transparent at first glance, richly embroidered to the point of adding structure to the fabric, with occasional shisha mirrors catching me off guard with little, sharp, reflections of myself peeking through all the layers. |
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First, I kept hoping for the writer to find a wife or a girlfriend or a significant other or even some pets! He seemed lonely and depressed.
I did like the descriptions of nature and landscapes (I'm the nature loving country girl). One message I got from the book is to not take things for granted in life. The vivid descriptions of everything reminded me to pay more attention to landscapes, places and people. Appreciate ordinary things and feel the beauty and joy. The writer was very observant and used all of his senses.
This was an interesting look at a writer's life. We probably all "edit out" bad experiences in order to cope and we "improve" some things as the writer did. There was a lot of gloom and doom but the writer and some of the characters finally seemed to "get enlightened". He used the words "reawakening" and "rebirth" a lot.
The writer's extensive analysis of the people and his comparison's to himself helped me understand some of his thoughts.
The writer had painful memories from the past yet he eventually found himself at peace. He developed an interest in others. Natural things soothed his nerves. Learning the names of trees and shrubs added to his appreciation of them. Jack celebrated life. Bray and Pitton became happier.
I'm curious to see how people deal with death. The writer spoke about training himself to the ideas of decay and thinking instead of "change or flux" and the cycles of life to avoid grief. He said "we re-make the world for ourselves and we can't go back." There is "no ship to take us back." I'm still not sure I understand this but again, don't take things for granted. Live your lives and appreciate things.
I learned some things about Trinidad, the Hindu religion and what it might feel like to be a different race.
I didn't understand why the writer liked fevers. I'm sure the writer would find me an "oddity". He liked that word too. |
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