A review by gorecki
Second Place by Rachel Cusk
3.0
And the day I finished my first Rachel Cusk novel finally arrived (a couple of weeks ago). I’ve been mulling over this one ever since I finished it and I still can’t seem to get over all the mixed feelings I have for it. On the one hand, it was very intelligent, remarkably quotable and filled with the finest of introspection, but at the same time I felt it very often shifted towards pretentiousness, whining and… lack of sense.
The story, told by M, is a sort of reimagining of D. H. Lawrence’s stay at Taos, an artist colony, as told by Mabel Dodge Luhan in her memoir from the 1930’s. The main character, M., invites a famous painter into her remote home surrounded by marshes and the sea where he can stay as long as he likes and paint. And as easily as that the book veers into all the clichés there are about art and famous painters.
As usual with introspective and contemplative books, I was blown away by some of the writing and couldn’t stop marking up quotes I would love to get back to again later, quotes I still find quite brilliant. “Still”, because the more I read, the more annoyed I started becoming by the pomposity of another side of the book that seems to build up with every next page. Some of the writing is brilliant, but some sounds like a senseless cluster of fancy words which I had to read a few times before realising they are not clustered to make sense, but to sound fancy and smart. I feel this is one of those books that, as fine as the writing is in many places, is purposely overcomplicated and pompous just to dazzle its readers with its ungraspable intelligence. A book you just have to say you loved, because otherwise everyone would think you’re just not smart enough and have missed the point. The point being a meaningless combination of big words. The cherry on top for me personally was when M., this composed, intelligent and otherwise strong character, had a major breakdown because said painter refused to make her portrait. It just diminished everything she said until then.
So yes, I have some rather conflicting feelings: the finest quotes I’ve found in a book in the past couple of years and the most jarring non-sensical art intellectualism.
The story, told by M, is a sort of reimagining of D. H. Lawrence’s stay at Taos, an artist colony, as told by Mabel Dodge Luhan in her memoir from the 1930’s. The main character, M., invites a famous painter into her remote home surrounded by marshes and the sea where he can stay as long as he likes and paint. And as easily as that the book veers into all the clichés there are about art and famous painters.
As usual with introspective and contemplative books, I was blown away by some of the writing and couldn’t stop marking up quotes I would love to get back to again later, quotes I still find quite brilliant. “Still”, because the more I read, the more annoyed I started becoming by the pomposity of another side of the book that seems to build up with every next page. Some of the writing is brilliant, but some sounds like a senseless cluster of fancy words which I had to read a few times before realising they are not clustered to make sense, but to sound fancy and smart. I feel this is one of those books that, as fine as the writing is in many places, is purposely overcomplicated and pompous just to dazzle its readers with its ungraspable intelligence. A book you just have to say you loved, because otherwise everyone would think you’re just not smart enough and have missed the point. The point being a meaningless combination of big words. The cherry on top for me personally was when M., this composed, intelligent and otherwise strong character, had a major breakdown because said painter refused to make her portrait. It just diminished everything she said until then.
So yes, I have some rather conflicting feelings: the finest quotes I’ve found in a book in the past couple of years and the most jarring non-sensical art intellectualism.