TBR Challenge: David Lodge - Thinks...

Ralph Messenger is a man who knows what he wants and generally gets it. Approaching his fiftieth birthday, he has good reason to feel pleased with himself. As Director of the prestigious Holt Belling Centre for Cognitive Science at the University of Gloucester he is much in demand as a pundit on developments in artificial intelligence and the study of human consciousness - 'the last frontier of scientific enquiry'. He enjoys an affluent life style subsidised by the wealth of his American wife, Carrie. Known to colleagues on the conference circuit as a womaniser and to Private Eye as a 'Media Dong', he has reached a tacit understanding with Carrie to refrain from philandering in his own back yard.
This resolution is already weakening when he meets and is attracted to Helen Reed, a distinguished novelist still grieving for the sudden death of her husband more than a year ago, who has rented out her London house and taken up a post as writer-in residence at Gloucester University, partly to try and get over her bereavement. Fascinated and challenged by a personality and a world-view radically at odds with her own, Helen is aroused by Ralph's bold advances, but resists on moral principle.
The stand-off between them is shattered by a series of events and discoveries that dramatically confirm the truth of Ralph's dictum, 'We can never know for certain what another person is thinking".

Comment: One more Wednesday for the scheduled TBR Challenge post. This time, the theme is "back in my day" and I've seen that our host, Wendy, the SuperLibrarian, has suggested something related to an old school vibe, which this book could match since it was published in 2001. 

Nevertheless, this time I've also considered this theme to suit something personal. I've thought of the idea as being something related to my old days of university, when I discovered this author. It's been 22 years since I've started my university degree... sometimes, it feels like yesterday...

In this book, in the fictional university of Gloucester, Ralph Messenger is a prestigious teacher and one who enjoys the perks of his career, such as traveling and meeting as many women as he can, even though he is married. His wife apparently doesn't mind it as long as it doesn't affect their social life around the university. Then, for one semester only, Helen Reed is hired to replace another teacher in the literature department and Ralph is incredible attracted to her but she resists his advances. It seems nothing will change when a sudden discovery starts off a series of events none of them could predict...

By now I've read several of this author's books although way before I've started this blog and that's why most aren't mentioned here. My absolute favorite, of which I have so many wonderfully funny memories is Small World, which is part of a series about university teachers. How much I laughed and laughed reading that book...! Since David Lodge was also such a teacher, a lot of his commentary was purposely very analytical under all the funny plots.

Thus, this is why all these thoughts kept playing in my head when I read the expression "back in my day". I know that was not the intended meaning, but to me it was what came to mind and it did remind me of a time in which I was a student. Very convenient too, that the plot of the book is set on university/educational environment, somehow it all made sense to my personal interpretation.

The plot is very simple, in fact, basically Ralph is pursuing women, namely Helen, and many things contribute to delay or avoid the decision of them being together. While all this is ongoing, the author keeps adding many cultural, literary, mathematical, philosophical layers of commentary and this alone made the book for me. I can understand why many readers have found this element of the novel boring or as if it's just fillers for what seems to be a very poor plot, but to me this is the true beauty of the author's writing. A lot of what he learned and taught as a teacher comes across and I did like the musings shared about several subjects.

The plot is, indeed, too simple and to make it worse, the end is too open and I've felt no character really had to learn something from their adventures and options. On one hand, this happens because the author just can't avoid it to add some humor to his stories and we do get the feeling some things are too unlikely they border on fun, and then, the point of the story is not to present a good vs bad scenario, but one in which people often do things or assume things and reality might not be that straightforward.

I also think part of more negative opinions is related to the characters, namely Ralph. He is truly unpleasant and his adultery behavior makes him seem loathsome, which is a pity since he is quite clever and some of the more interesting passages come from his thoughts. He also feels he is entitled to this adultery and I really struggled to feel any kind of positive emotion towards him and applauded Helen for resisting him. Of course, some plot situations happen and we get to think of the characters through different perspectives but this is not a subject that changes, Ralph remains unfaithful.

As things progress, we discover some other issues have different POVs and what felt obvious was not so. I think the author was clever in organizing what he wanted to convey, although I'm not yet certain exactly what. Perhaps that we, humans, cannot limit our actions to simple ideas and everything can have more than one POV? That what is in our private thoughts if shared could reveal a different side of us that isn't so if we don't share them? I think any reader can have completely different conclusions.

All in all, a book that made sense to me, but I can see why it doesn't for others. I like the author's style for the most part and this helps too. There are still a few of his books I haven't read which I will, at some point, but this one worked out well enough for me to have thought the experience positive.

Grade: 7/10

David Lodge - Deaf Sentence

Funny and moving by turns, Deaf Sentence is a witty, original and absorbing account of one man's effort to come to terms with deafness, aging and mortality, and with the comedy and tragedy of human lives.
When the university merged his Department of English with Linguistics, Professor Desmond Bates took early retirement, but he is not enjoying it. He misses the routine of the academic year and has lost his appetite for research. His wife Winifred's late-flowering career goes from strength to strength, reducing his role to that of escort, while the rejuvenation of her appearance makes him uneasily conscious of the age gap between them.
The monotony of his days is relieved only by wearisome journeys to London to check on his aged father who stubbornly refuses to leave the house he is patently unable to live in with safety.
But these discontents are nothing compared to the affliction of hearing loss, a constant source of domestic friction and social embarrassment, leading Desmond into mistakes, misunderstandings and follies. It might be comic for others, but for the deaf person himself, it is no joke.
It is his deafness which inadvertently involves Desmond with a seemingly personable young American female graduate student whose wayward and unpredictable behaviour threatens to destabilize his life completely.

Comment: I saw this book at the library and since I've previously enjoyed other books by the author, I've decided to take a chance on this one, which wasn't familiar to me.

In this novel, we follow protagonist Desmond Bates, a retired university professor who happens to also be deaf. His hearing has suffered for years and while he now has a hearing aid, he still struggles and he has to live with the fact it does influence his social life and even his family interactions. He is also concerned because his 90 something father isn't well to live alone anymore but is too stubborn to think about leaving his house. Since his life is now so predictable and retirement not as rewarding as he imagined, his days are very monotonous and probably that is why he sees himself in the middle of an imbroglio with American student Alex, who wants his help with her thesis. The problem is how to get rid of helping her...

I've read eight books by this author and some were amazing, especially the ones whose setting is the academic world, but others didn't impress me as much. This one was a random choice since I wasn't even aware of it and if not for the library I'd probably not look for it. I'm also glad it's another book which features the academic reality in a way because it seems that, for me, that is the setting that makes me appreciate the author's work better.

I liked the protagonist, who tells his version of things in the first person. From the start, the idea is that Desmond is sharing his thoughts in a sort of journal but the graphics on the page aren't that specif and to me this felt just like any other regular novel. Desmond is disappointed with retirement, because his interests and goals for this period of his life aren't as exciting to work with as he imagined. He claims a huge part of it is his struggle with his deafness, that it does affect his way to interact with others and, ultimately, how he is able to enjoy even the little things.

I think the author did a good job portraying the difficulties of a person who slowly lost his hearing and how that affected him, physically but especially mentally. The author's writing style is also known for the humor and that is also something we can see here, I did laugh because of some passages. It was also interesting how the author also does some commentary on the stigma associated with someone who is deaf and on how easy it is to joke with those with this condition or how they find themselves the target of jokes, but all this was done well enough so that while it's something obvious, it still didn't detract from the fictional plot.

Portuguese cover

The author also added a note I found riveting, to the translators who would have a hard job with this novel for a lot is set on colloquialisms and idiomatic expressions which aren't easy to carry into a different language. I've studied translation at the university and I found myself as interested in the translator's notes as in the story itself, and how intriguing it must have been to do this. (I can also imagine the frustration when something didn't match properly) In fact, part of the fun of the novel is the mix ups in language and how much we rely on hearing what someone is saying.

Desmond was, conveniently, a professor of linguistics and there's enough content regarding that here, which I liked. I suppose for those readers who only wanted to focus on the fictional plot, these themes might not be as alluring but to me they were fascinating.

As for the plot, well, it's a set of confusion and miscommunications and weird characters and in the middle of this, Desmond must deal with many problems. I found the reading easy and fluid and while not everything was as silly-cute to me as the author probably intended, it was still fun to follow. The whole nuisance caused by the American student was sometimes too funny, others too sad, but it did give us another perspective of Desmond. The resolution of this part of the story was a bit vague, however. More serious were the issues regarding his father, and this too went a path which isn't surprising but still allowed for certain types of reactions from Desmond and the other characters.

All in all, I had a good time reading this book and I liked the perspectives presented, even though certain situations and the pace at some moments weren't as well achieved, perhaps to highlight details I wasn't as interested in. But apart from those things and the slight rush as the story came to an end, this was appealing for certain.

Grade:8/10