Book 59: How to be Both by Ali Smith
Book 59: How to be Both.
Author: Ali Smith, 2014.
Genre: Historical Fiction Contemporary. Literary. Art. GLBT themes.
Other Details: ebook. 377 pages.
'How to be both' is a novel all about art's versatility. Borrowing from painting's fresco technique to make an original literary double-take, it's a fast-moving genre-bending conversation between forms, times, truths and fictions. There's a renaissance artist of the 1460s. There's the child of a child of the 1960s. Two tales of love and injustice twist into a singular yarn where time gets timeless, structural gets playful, knowing gets mysterious, fictional gets real - and all life's givens get given a second chance. - synopsis from UK publisher's website.
When I reviewed this novel last year ( 2014 Book 171) I noted that I would welcome re-reading it at some point. This opportunity presented itself when the novel was short-listed for the 2015 Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction.
Although I had some issues on my first encounter, I did find that a second reading improved my opinion of the novel. Possibly this is because I could better appreciate the links between the two sections and familiar with its unusual structure was able to focus on its themes and the playfulness with which Smith deals with both time and space.
On a side note I will mention the front cover. When I first saw it I assumed that it was a generic photograph that had no relation to the novel. However, I was wrong as the photograph of Sylvie Vartan and Françoise Hardy, French singers from the 1960s, does feature in the novel as part of George's story.
This is a novel that will not appeal to everyone but I was glad I read it again. I am also pleased that it won the 2015 Baileys for its depth of appreciation for art, exploration of the flowing nature of gender and the universal theme of loss and grief.