Why Read Anita Brookner?
I first read Anita Brookner in my twenties in New York City when her Booker Prize winning novel, Hotel Du Lac, was published. I thought it was a short masterpiece then and after rereading it this year, I continue to believe it is. Brookner was big deal in her writing lifetime but faded into used bookstore anonymity after her death. I suspect (I hope) she is reemerging.
I decided to dig a little deeper into this writer I let slip away and read one of her earlier novels, Brief Lives, and discovered that it was equal to her Booker winner – maybe better. Another was set to be read but my oldest daughter took it with her on her travels and continued her Brookner binge. A millennial compliment that I hope suggests a reawakening of sorts. The great news is that there are a handful of reissued earlier works (widely considered to be her best) waiting to be read. They have certain things in common as my still cursory examination reveals. They are blessedly short and concise in every respect. She writes as if each word must be purchased. Her writing has a sharp, waterproof feel to it that is so refreshing in this wordy world of ours. Her novels are mostly about intelligent women dealing with relationships of all sorts, including none at all. Her sensibility is early feminist, if at all. She strikes me as a woman deeply allergic to labels and movements of any sort. Her mostly female protagonists are universally intelligent but equally insightful and blind.
While her contemporary Muriel Sharp (The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie) comes to mind as a close comparison, I struggle to put her in a slot. Reading her, I kept thinking that she would have been a terrific and terrifying lit teacher. As for the brevity of her novels, I imagine she lacked the patience or the degree of self-indulgence required to write a long windy novel. I will continue to read her and hope she has a new life among serious readers. The word that kept coming to mind as I think about her is “respect”. I respect her mind and her sensibilities without knowing anything about her because she respects the art of writing AND the act of reading. As a novelist and a critic of human nature, she is the doctor we all seek who is in equal measures, candid, concise and empathetic.
A Brookner List:
Brief Lives
Hotel Du Lac
A Start in Life
Look at Me
The Rules of Engagement
