A Novel in Verse
Autobiography of Red
Anne Carson
There are very few books which, immediately after finishing them, I want to start over at page one. There are even fewer books that I can honestly say I have read five times and intend to read another five times. There is only one book that I cite as my favorite thing -- yes, thing! -- in this world. That book is Autobiography of Red, a novel in verse about Geryon, who may or may not be a red-winged red monster, and his coming-of-age. It is a novel in verse that takes the only extant fragments of a then-avant-garde epic by Stesichoros and rewrites them into our times. It is a novel in verse that combines the classic and the modern, the disarmingly simple and the mind-bogglingly complex, the poetic and the prosaic into something that is undeniably, indubitably beautiful.
I must admit, I have hesitated writing this review for quite some time. After all, I am not a biased critic -- at least not when it comes to this book, which has been a major part of my life since I first read it in February of 2003 -- and everything I have read so far that has been written on this book is either blatantly incorrect or painfully insufficient. Nevertheless, I do feel almost as if I am some sort of AoR evangelist, and so I must spread the word. And here I go.
One caveat: Autobiography does depict an explicitly sexual (though not too explicit) relationship between two men. If this is an issue, cancel your subscription. And now, on with the evangelizing!
But first, one more caveat: Autobiography of Red is not an easy read. An anecdote: in a contemporary poetry class I took a few years ago, we students broke into groups and had to decide on a book of poetry to read and then present to the class as a whole. My group's poet was Anne Carson, and I of course insisted on Autobiography of Red. The other students -- all of whom were well-educated, professional adults -- complained at first of the book's difficulty. It is poetry, not prose. Figurative language abounds. Ambiguity abounds. A resistance to undeniable interpretation abounds. Yet, by the time the other students had finished the novel in verse, they thanked me for having chosen it and told me how much they were looking forward to reading it again. One student even flipped back to page one the moment she finished page one-forty-nine. No, Autobiography is by no means a 'beach read,' yet it is quite rewarding, possibly the most rewarding book I've read to date, and I suggest that if you are even remotely interested in what I've to say in this review, you pick it up and refuse to put it down.
First, a bit about poetry. Although Autobiography of Red is a novel in verse, its readers may be surprised to see the sort of poetry it presents. There are no rhymes, no stanzas, no metrical feet. Unlike most poetry, the book is divided into short sections, which are numbered but never designated as 'chapters' or individual 'books' (à la Paradise Lost or The Divine Comedy). Some have argued that the breaking into lines is unnecessary, that if the line breaks were removed, the story would read the same; I most strongly disagree. Though there is no regular rhythm, the poetry of alternating long and short lines feels, as another critic put it, "almost like [you are] being rocked." Furthermore, the lines are spaced "commodiously" on the page, with lots of white space between lines. Combined, this rocking and this "commodious" spacing feel comforting. Each time I read a bit of this book, I feel as if I have just settled into my favorite armchair with a warm blanket and a cup of hot chocolate in the dead of winter. Prose does not (and cannot) do that.
Nevertheless, the writing of Autobiography is much more than prose. That is, its 'poetry' accomplishes more than just attaining a bit more whitespace on the page. Carson's ability to describe a moment or a feeling in the most unexpected manner is comparable to none. She describes Geryon, who is trying to find a way to let Herakles know he is ready to make love for the first time, and Herakles, who misunderstands Geryon's intentions, as "Not touching / but joined in astonishment as two cuts lie parallel in the same flesh." The moment Geryon and Herakles see each other for the first time, "They were two superior eels / at the bottom of the tank and they recognized each other like italics." That exact moment is "one of those moments / that is the opposite of blindness." These moments of linguistic clarity and brilliance pepper the entire novel, erupting like the volcanoes that feature so much in Autobiography's leitmotifs and plot, and, much like a volcano would, they make the novel quite, quite exciting.
Anne Carson is smart. Very, very smart. And she is not afraid to flaunt it. This is a good thing. Carson's erudition shows in the way the novel alternates between the relatively mundane events of Geryon's story -- his relationship with Herakles, his flying to South America, his taking lots of pictures -- and bits of extreme thinking (I'm hesitant to use the term 'philosophy') -- what do roses sound like?, what is time?, what is suffering?. When we become bored with Geryon's story, we are suddenly thrust into some sort of intellectually incendiary. When we feel a bit too philosophical, we're taken into an airplane over Argentina or a train station in Geryon's hometown or a village in Peru. Carson's back-and-forth between these two things acts, basically, as a two-sided assault: she moves not only our hearts but also our minds.
The reason, though, that Autobiography is so absolutely amazing is not in the poetry, nor in the twists and turns of the philosophical and the mundane. It is not even in linguistic imagination and creativity. It is in Geryon. Carson manages to create in less than 130 pages the most real, the most palpable, the most sympathetic character I have yet to come across, and I have come across quite a lot of characters in quite a lot of pages. (I spent over 2,000 pages with Richardson's Clarissa Harlowe, and she pales in comparison to Geryon.) To be honest, I do not even like thinking of Geryon as a character. When I read criticism and reviews for Autobiography, I feel acutely wrong when an author refers to Carson as author of Geryon. (I feel acutely wrong for other reasons, too, one being the relative disregard for misinterpretation that runs rampant in Autobiography's criticism.) One article attempts to prove that Geryon is but a mask for Carson's own loneliness, and I had to quit reading because I felt so disturbed at the thought of Geryon's being someone else or someone else's creation. Whether he is a somewhat slow kindergartener or an extremely educated college student, I identify with Geryon. I want to console him when he's sad and I want to celebrate with him when he's happy. I want to beat Herakles over the head when he breaks Geryon's heart. I want to be his friend, more than I've wanted to be any other literary creation's compatriot. And this, I suppose, is why I have read this book so many times in the past three years and why I plan to read it so many more in the next three. And the next three. And the next three.
511 x 1069 / 10 stars
amazon.com
Barnes and Noble
Anne Carson
There are very few books which, immediately after finishing them, I want to start over at page one. There are even fewer books that I can honestly say I have read five times and intend to read another five times. There is only one book that I cite as my favorite thing -- yes, thing! -- in this world. That book is Autobiography of Red, a novel in verse about Geryon, who may or may not be a red-winged red monster, and his coming-of-age. It is a novel in verse that takes the only extant fragments of a then-avant-garde epic by Stesichoros and rewrites them into our times. It is a novel in verse that combines the classic and the modern, the disarmingly simple and the mind-bogglingly complex, the poetic and the prosaic into something that is undeniably, indubitably beautiful.
I must admit, I have hesitated writing this review for quite some time. After all, I am not a biased critic -- at least not when it comes to this book, which has been a major part of my life since I first read it in February of 2003 -- and everything I have read so far that has been written on this book is either blatantly incorrect or painfully insufficient. Nevertheless, I do feel almost as if I am some sort of AoR evangelist, and so I must spread the word. And here I go.
One caveat: Autobiography does depict an explicitly sexual (though not too explicit) relationship between two men. If this is an issue, cancel your subscription. And now, on with the evangelizing!
But first, one more caveat: Autobiography of Red is not an easy read. An anecdote: in a contemporary poetry class I took a few years ago, we students broke into groups and had to decide on a book of poetry to read and then present to the class as a whole. My group's poet was Anne Carson, and I of course insisted on Autobiography of Red. The other students -- all of whom were well-educated, professional adults -- complained at first of the book's difficulty. It is poetry, not prose. Figurative language abounds. Ambiguity abounds. A resistance to undeniable interpretation abounds. Yet, by the time the other students had finished the novel in verse, they thanked me for having chosen it and told me how much they were looking forward to reading it again. One student even flipped back to page one the moment she finished page one-forty-nine. No, Autobiography is by no means a 'beach read,' yet it is quite rewarding, possibly the most rewarding book I've read to date, and I suggest that if you are even remotely interested in what I've to say in this review, you pick it up and refuse to put it down.
First, a bit about poetry. Although Autobiography of Red is a novel in verse, its readers may be surprised to see the sort of poetry it presents. There are no rhymes, no stanzas, no metrical feet. Unlike most poetry, the book is divided into short sections, which are numbered but never designated as 'chapters' or individual 'books' (à la Paradise Lost or The Divine Comedy). Some have argued that the breaking into lines is unnecessary, that if the line breaks were removed, the story would read the same; I most strongly disagree. Though there is no regular rhythm, the poetry of alternating long and short lines feels, as another critic put it, "almost like [you are] being rocked." Furthermore, the lines are spaced "commodiously" on the page, with lots of white space between lines. Combined, this rocking and this "commodious" spacing feel comforting. Each time I read a bit of this book, I feel as if I have just settled into my favorite armchair with a warm blanket and a cup of hot chocolate in the dead of winter. Prose does not (and cannot) do that.
Nevertheless, the writing of Autobiography is much more than prose. That is, its 'poetry' accomplishes more than just attaining a bit more whitespace on the page. Carson's ability to describe a moment or a feeling in the most unexpected manner is comparable to none. She describes Geryon, who is trying to find a way to let Herakles know he is ready to make love for the first time, and Herakles, who misunderstands Geryon's intentions, as "Not touching / but joined in astonishment as two cuts lie parallel in the same flesh." The moment Geryon and Herakles see each other for the first time, "They were two superior eels / at the bottom of the tank and they recognized each other like italics." That exact moment is "one of those moments / that is the opposite of blindness." These moments of linguistic clarity and brilliance pepper the entire novel, erupting like the volcanoes that feature so much in Autobiography's leitmotifs and plot, and, much like a volcano would, they make the novel quite, quite exciting.
Anne Carson is smart. Very, very smart. And she is not afraid to flaunt it. This is a good thing. Carson's erudition shows in the way the novel alternates between the relatively mundane events of Geryon's story -- his relationship with Herakles, his flying to South America, his taking lots of pictures -- and bits of extreme thinking (I'm hesitant to use the term 'philosophy') -- what do roses sound like?, what is time?, what is suffering?. When we become bored with Geryon's story, we are suddenly thrust into some sort of intellectually incendiary. When we feel a bit too philosophical, we're taken into an airplane over Argentina or a train station in Geryon's hometown or a village in Peru. Carson's back-and-forth between these two things acts, basically, as a two-sided assault: she moves not only our hearts but also our minds.
The reason, though, that Autobiography is so absolutely amazing is not in the poetry, nor in the twists and turns of the philosophical and the mundane. It is not even in linguistic imagination and creativity. It is in Geryon. Carson manages to create in less than 130 pages the most real, the most palpable, the most sympathetic character I have yet to come across, and I have come across quite a lot of characters in quite a lot of pages. (I spent over 2,000 pages with Richardson's Clarissa Harlowe, and she pales in comparison to Geryon.) To be honest, I do not even like thinking of Geryon as a character. When I read criticism and reviews for Autobiography, I feel acutely wrong when an author refers to Carson as author of Geryon. (I feel acutely wrong for other reasons, too, one being the relative disregard for misinterpretation that runs rampant in Autobiography's criticism.) One article attempts to prove that Geryon is but a mask for Carson's own loneliness, and I had to quit reading because I felt so disturbed at the thought of Geryon's being someone else or someone else's creation. Whether he is a somewhat slow kindergartener or an extremely educated college student, I identify with Geryon. I want to console him when he's sad and I want to celebrate with him when he's happy. I want to beat Herakles over the head when he breaks Geryon's heart. I want to be his friend, more than I've wanted to be any other literary creation's compatriot. And this, I suppose, is why I have read this book so many times in the past three years and why I plan to read it so many more in the next three. And the next three. And the next three.
511 x 1069 / 10 stars
amazon.com
Barnes and Noble