The Mookse and the Gripes discussion
This topic is about
Days Without End
Booker Prize for Fiction
>
2017 Longlist: Days Without End
date
newest »
newest »
The book conveys brilliantly the reality of the Indian wars, the tension between law and order and treaty making and the civic or personal motivated revenge and tat-for-tat that lay behind many of the atrocities. It also captures the ambiguity and intensity of civil war, the incongruity of immigrants fighting to the death on either side for causes they barely even acknowledge or understand but driven more by loyalty to comrades.
This is one of a series of novels which recount the history of two Irish families (one of whihch is the McNulty's) and which also tells history from their viewpoint.
The clear theme of this book is to expose the brutality behind the American foundational myth and to show how the Irish disporsa, fleeing famine, and the way in which their experiences shaped their character, played a key part in the character and nature of that foundation.
Another theme of the book is how, even in the worse circumstances, love and relationships can sustain hope and life. The writing is beautiful, conveying the grandeur, beauty and terror of the American landscape.
At the same time this is perhaps the weakness of the book; written as a first person reminiscence, the voice is clearly that of the uneducated McNulty rather than an omniscient narrator and while some passages capture this well, others simply seem too elaborate.
Similarly the key relationships between the trio of Thomas, John and Winona seems at times to capture an anachronistic level of tolerance.
Overall then a book which is flawed but still powerful and memorable.
I have to disagree about the "anachronistic level of tolerance" critique. These are two young men who grow up alone, together. Their reference points for the world are each other. And the same goes for Winona, who is thrust into this new world, with these two young men as her only positive referents to how this world operates. So what many people of this time would view as a strange and immoral relationship wouldn't appear that way to Winona, who has only known kindness from these men.As for the elaborateness of certain sequences from an uneducated narrator, I can see this a little more. But this wasn't something that bothered me while reading the book. We don't really have any reference points for when this narration is taking place. If it's 10-20 years in the future? It's not unreasonable that he could have penned this book as it is.
But, quibbles or not, this is a beautiful novel, and one of the strongest of the longlisted books I've read, and I would be more than happy to see it take home the prize.
I've only read two Barry books (this and The Secret Scripture) and I struggled with both. The Secret Scripture telegraphed an ending from before halfway through and I was praying it wouldn't be so obvious, but it was. This one seemed to be a number of (beautifully written, I agree) set pieces but you always knew something would happen to make sure the hero would get through ok. So, it lacked any tension for me. I admire the writing, as I did in Scripture, but the actual story left me a bit cold.
Mod
My review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Incidentally the link to people's reviews wasn't working so I fixed it.
Read this one back in December and it didn't quite work for me. I concluded (presciently!):I suspect I may well be revisiting this one next year as it is an early favourite to be on the Booker list and perhaps I will appreciate it more if and when I do, as it left me a little cold on a first reading.
The prose is sublime but the problem for me was the plot, similar to Neil. It was far too Hollywood disaster movie with McNulty faces an extreme array of life-threatening situations - starvation, extreme cold, extreme heat, wild animals, Sioux Indians, Confederate troops, outlaws, even execution from his own side - but one knows a solution will always arrive in time. I lost patience when (no spoiler alert needed as there is no tension to spoil) a former colleague happened to turn-up, by a complete coincidence and a long way from where he was last encountered, right in the middle of a shootout
In 2016 this would have been a strong contender but in 2017 it feels out of it's depth vs, the others I have read.
Mod
Best to luxuriate in the beautiful prose, enjoy the quiet and beautiful relationship between Thomas McNulty, John Cole and the Indian girl they quasi-adopt, and simply gloss over the potboiler stuff he put in to bag a movie contract.Incidentally I suspect this works better for those who have read other Barry works where others from the McNulty clan appear. The Irish famine from which he fled is rather in the background in this novel.
I read this one late last year and would probably concur with the general sentiments expressed here. I thought it was a beautifully, if coldly crafted novel. I have read The Secret Scripture and recall enjoying it but this book put me at quite a remove. Partly, I think as Paul says these characters seem to survive an awful lot of stuff happening and yet remain curiously unfazed.
I don't know, I feel like it's one of the few books I would reread again if it won because its entirely possibly I just came at it with the wrong mindset.
Lovely, precise language. Dead-on sentences to re-read and admire. And laugh heartily again.I’ve lived those places. Barry paints them from photographic memory and bone-felt experience. I’m glad to know someone of Barry’s aesthetic awe walks the Earth. Most writers cannot describe the natural world (or human nature) as well, ergo, I skim, but not one sentence here is wrong. He vivifies the U.S. from California to Tennessee to my Maryland cherry trees. And one of my credos is “On Going a Journey” by Wm Hazlitt. Please!, hush.
As to complaints of McNulty not being fully characterized, he’s meant to be emblematic of a North American. We’ve washed ashore, dirty, sick, rotting, poor, deserted, enslaved, and jumped up right quick to brutalize and degrade one another as we’re blasted through the depths and the heavens. We’re no less “radical” than any other nation or people. We’re only benighted to our own kinds of bigotry and barbarism. At least characters in this novel are right and wrong, self-righteous and self-doubting, intolerant and clement.
As to complaints of anachronism, of current “trends” being applied retroactively, LGBTs are not a recent invention of sin or liberalism. That theme couldn’t be more apropos given Rump’s recent ban of transexuals in the military.
To complaints of language too sophisticated for an uneducated man, I say, many is the, e.g., slave narrative or letter that surpasses poetry of the ages, that will quake any sensate person. Barry creates a novelistic language, one of great imagination and amusement. Besides, being under-educated does not preclude wisdom, IQ, introspection, observation, humor… And who knows the expression of an Irish boy in 19th century America. Not Hollywood! Even a brief classical education could create someone who surpasses current literacy levels. Read an SAT passage from 50 years ago. Teens today struggle with: “Even if history is viewed from other than egalitarian perspectives, and it is granted that differentials in economic rewards are morally justified and socially useful, it is impossible to justify the degree of inequality which complex societies inevitably create by the increased centralization of power that develops with more elaborate civilizations.” and “The philistinism of interpretation is more rife in literature than in any other art.”
Does battle after battle, war upon war, stench upon suffering run on and run together? Yes, because that is the brutal and beautiful saga of America. Ambivalent at every turn. “Everything bad gets shot at in America… and everything good, too.”
Fascinating take in this review that perhaps the whole story is "a dream on the other side of death". https://www.ft.com/content/4245e980-9...
Ctb wrote: "Lovely, precise language. Dead-on sentences to re-read and admire. And laugh heartily again.I’ve lived those places. Barry paints them from photographic memory and bone-felt experience. I’m glad ..."
If there was a "Like" button for comments in discussion threads, I would be pressing it now.
Gumble's Yard wrote: "Fascinating take in this review that perhaps the whole story is "a dream on the other side of death". https://www.ft.com/content/4245e980-9..."
Can you summarise for us? You have to be a subscriber to see the content.
Neil wrote:Can you summarise for us? You have to be a subscriber to see the content.
"a dream on the other side of death"
and click on the link. It takes you to the same URL, but without prompting you to subscribe. If this doesn't work in your browser, click on the link to the cached version.
Cool - thanks!It makes the series of miraculous escapes more "believable" if you interpret it that way, but it seems a bit forced.
Interesting.
Just re read this and while I stand by my criticisms that started this thread and agree on reflection with Paul and Neil's criticism of what the FT article describes as "they make one hair's breath escape after another, with what finally seems like miraculous and indeed impossible luck", I still found it a beautiful and powerful read. While not my favourite for the prize by any means, I would see it as a worthy winner.
I have read the first chapter and it's looking good!Another theme, which is emerging is the notion of gender, as it also has been tackled in both The Ministry.. and Autumn.
Reaching the half way mark and I'm struck by how beautifully Sebastian Barry writes.It's not easy to write in a way that conveys the vocabulary and language of the uneducated, and in the style of the c.19th. Barry's prose flows easily.
Furthermore it can't be easy to write so beautifully about subject matter that is so brutally ugly.
I do think that the style and storyline is very derivative of Cornac McCarthy's Blood Meridian but so far Barry is far superior in writing style
Jonathan wrote: "Reaching the half way mark and I'm struck by how beautifully Sebastian Barry writes.It's not easy to write in a way that conveys the vocabulary and language of the uneducated, and in the style of ..."
I totally agree! I also see shades of Laila Lalami's The Moors Account - mainly cause of the war and disease elements though.
Ehh mixed reactions. Here's my GR review:Days without End tackles a subject that I have difficulty in appreciating - war, namely the U.S. civil war of . Although I do know that the war is a bit of a cover up for a deeper plot, I did have to struggle with this novel.
Thomas McNulty is an Irishman who joins the U.S. army. The thing is McNulty is gay and favors cross-dressing, something which is taboo unless in a dancing house. He is also in a relationship with another soldier and the book details their relationship during the bloody civil war. Along the way an Indian girl is adopted, which changes McNulty's life as he has to be a caretaker, juggle his inner feelings AND survive in a cruel war torn America.
It's deep stuff. Also the book is narrated via McNulty's 'uneducated' - something he openly admits - English. It gives the novel flair.
My problem with Days without End was the battle scenes. After a time I kind of got fed up reading about them as there are way too many and wanted the book to concentrate more on the complex relationships between the characters, which I thought was the strength of the novel. In fact the last 50 pages or so just take the book to another level.
I desperately wanted to like this book but this niggling detail held me back.
I started reading this a couple months ago and put it aside, thinking that if it makes the longlist I will pick it up again. Well, I did, but I find it awfully boring and I'm just skimming, so might just leave it again. I've read enough, I think, to rank it, and it's not going to be high on my list.I've read a lot of Sebastian Barry and liked them all up until this one.
Reading this now. I thought the narrative voice in the first couple of chapters was excellent and it felt really quirky. I was confident I would enjoy the book. Five days later, with only 35% read, I am finding this to be the Book Without End. It just seems to be the narrator and his friend riding across flat land, meet some Indians and kill them, meet some Indians and don't kill them, meet some Indians and kill them... It's very dull...
That's the exact same problem i had with the book. It does pick up towards the end.
Maybe I'll just skip to the end then.
I concede that the last two chapters are very good, as was the start of the book. It is not enough to make me want to read more of what's in between.
Mod
So far this is claiming my bottom spot for the shortlist, just above Autumn, based primarily on how much I enjoyed reading it. As a first person narrative I knew he would survive, but that didn't particularly bother me. I wanted to know how he survived, just like I always wanted to know how Nancy Drew solved her mysteries. I would have been deeply disappointed if she ever failed, let alone if she had died. So I thank Barry for an enjoyable read.The one problem I had with this book, and it never stopped annoying me, was how Barry wrote pitch perfect prose, no spelling or punctuation errors, and then gratuitously added thousands of verb grammatical errors. Ain't, brung... It is improbable that anyone with the background of the narrator could have written this. But it is beyond any possibility that anyone could write with this combination of lyricism, perfection, and elementary grammatical errors.
Lascosas wrote: "...The one problem I had with this book, and it never stopped annoying me, was how Barry wrote pitch perfect prose, no spelling or punctuation errors, and then gratuitously added thousands of verb grammatical errors. Ain't, brung... It is improbable that anyone with the background of the narrator could have written this. But it is beyond any possibility that anyone could write with this combination of lyricism, perfection, and elementary grammatical errors. ..."Why shouldn't the narrator speak a slightly different language, just to make us readers a bit uncomfortable? We are supposed to perceive him as "different", aren't we?
Different, yes. But the difference must feel consistent with everything else that is being written, and for this reader is didn't. It was arbitrary and in particular affected.
Jonathan wrote: "Reaching the half way mark and I'm struck by how beautifully Sebastian Barry writes.It's not easy to write in a way that conveys the vocabulary and language of the uneducated, and in the style of ..."
Jonathan, the book also made me think of Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West! It's very interesting how widely the reactions this novel evokes differ, and I think that is always a sign that a book is very particular and daring (which is of course a good thing). I wasn't bored für one second, and I liked how Barry used the battle scenes to reflect upon violence itself. I can totally see why some people could find this to "Hollywood", especially when compared to a book like Solar Bones (which is great in its own right), but I didn't mind it as I felt that the text was not written simply to stage effects.
Here's my take on it:
From all books on the Booker list that I have read, this has the most beautiful prose – more beautiful even than the writing of George Saunders and Ali Smith. There are two main threads in this novel: The love story between the protagonists Thomas McNulty and John Cole, and the establishment of America, where the frontier myth is intertwined with the Indian Wars, and the fight for the abolition of slavery almost tore the union apart.
The story is told from the perspective of Thomas McNulty who left his native Ireland when he was a teenager in order to escape the Great Famine to which the rest of his family has succumbed. After his arrival, he accidently meets and falls in love with John Cole. Thomas and John fight in the Indian Wars on the side of the settlers, but later, they take on a young Native American girl as their daughter and try to build a domestic life. When the Civil War erupts, they become soldiers again and fight for the North. Barry does an amazing job when it comes to describing what these wars meant for the people actually fighting them and what life at the frontier was like. The way he describes the attraction of violence and what it does to people exercising it and to people who fall victim to it is both scary and stunning.
Beyond that, Barry (who dedicated this book to his gay son Toby) tells the beautiful love story between Thomas and John, who want to live as a family with their adopted daughter Winona, but poverty and historical turmoil take their toll. Thomas likes to wear dresses and even publicly performs in them in two different contexts. He sees himself as John’s wife and Winona’s mother, and he is clearly happiest when he can fulfill these roles. At the same time, he is a very good soldier who successfully takes part in many battles. Barry created a Western with a gay couple at its center, zero clichés and a lot of complex patterns of action and reaction - wow.
On a more basic level, one could say that “Days Without End” meditates about the question what makes us human. Thomas takes a clear stance: If you can feel love, you are human, if you can’t, you are a mere ghost. About the death of his father (who starved), he says: “I loved my father when I was a human person, formerly. Then he died and I was hungry and then the ship. Then nothing. Then America. Then John Cole. John Cole was my love, all my love.” … and in this context: “Gives an idea of the victory meeting John Cole. First time I felt like a human person again.”
The word ghost reappears from time to time, always referring to people who are showing or are connected to a lack of humanity. Re-telling a massacre against Native American women and children in which he took part (they had expected to fight male warriors), Thomas explains: “There didn’t seem to be anything alive, including ourselves. We were dislocated, we were not there, now we were ghosts.” About the soldiers fighting for the South, he says: “Maybe they all ghosts and don’t need nourishment.” …and when facing them in battle: “Other things I see are how thin these boys are, how strange, like ghosts, like ghouls.”
The gruesome battles, the frontier as a place of violence, the evocative description of nature as a force to be reckoned with, and the mystical aspect of the ghosts – all this turns “Days Without End” into a piece of “Southern Gothic”. It reminded me of Cormac McCarthy’s masterpiece “Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West”, which also tells the story of a young fighter in the Indian Wars, but from an even grimmer, darker and more brutal angle. Although I am a huge fan of McCarthy, I liked that Barry combined the war stories with Thomas’ and John’s love story and, by doing that, made a point that when there is the possibility of inhumanity, there also must be the possibility of humanity.
There are some books on the Man Booker longlist that are current in a more in-your-face kind of way (like “Exit West” which is about migration, or “Home Fire” which talks about terrorism and racism), but Barry writes about how the United States were founded on immigration, the connection between the mythic frontier and the Native American genocide, racism and how it persisted after the North won the Civil War, and about the importance of love -all kinds of love- for the human soul.
“My fellow Americans, we are and always will be a nation of immigrants. We were strangers once, too”, Obama said in one of his speeches, and about race: “I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice if we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.” “Days Without End” makes you want to take a copy of the book and hit Trump over the head with it, again, again, and again.
Wonderful review, Meike! Enjoyed your perspectives.Since reading, I've also realized Barry is trying to fathom American gun violence, our obsession with and desire for more and deadlier guns. Guns are currency, a means of superiority, and quick panaceas. Everyone autonomically loading, firing, loading, firing, shooting into and out of (the latter, debatable) every situation, for decades, then centuries, as if it's human nature. Just this week a Texas cop posted an FYI on FB that citizens were allowed by law to shoot to kill (after dark) anyone desecrating a Confederate monument.
I know I have rightly ranked this book my #1, b/c I feel nervous before reading this thread, worrying someone will think poorly of it. If they criticize my #2, Solar Bones, I can understand it.
Maybe the book you reference in your last line will be one of those that are hollowed out to hide a gun inside it.
Robert wrote: "That's the exact same problem i had with the book. It does pick up towards the end."I will never know. Life is too short for this. I once heard John McGahern say that the only point of reading was for pleasure; if you don't get pleasure then why would you bother? And so Sebastian Barry now enters the select group that includes Howard Jacobsen, Anne Enright and Hilary Mantel - whose works I will never again even consider reading.
Good point. Usually i drop books if I'm not liking the first 50 pages but with the booker i make an effort. I always give authors second chances. I couldn't stand the gathering but i thought the green road was great
If i don't like a book i wait after a period of time and reread as well. Books are about timing and you'll be surprised how perspective changes :)
Books may be about timing, but if I have not liked a book then I wouldn't even momentarily consider sinking even more time into it for a re-read.
MisterHobgoblin wrote: "Books may be about timing, but if I have not liked a book then I wouldn't even momentarily consider sinking even more time into it for a re-read."I know everyone is different but a lot of books deserve a second chance. Here's a list of books I disliked intensely at first but on second reading thought they were great and now rank as some of my favourite books of all time:
Don Delilio - Underworld.
Martin Amis - London Fields
Kiran Desai - The Inheritance of loss
Jennifer Egan - A Visit from the Goon Squad
David Foster Wallace - Infinite Jest
Thomas Pynchon - V
Ken Kesey - One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Margaret Atwood - The Handmaid's Tale
Arundhati Roy - The God of Small Things
Most of these I first read and hated in my late teens but then revisiting them in my late 20's helped build a newfound appreciation.
Now there are books which I have given a second or third chance and they didn't do anything for me. There are:
James Kelman - How Late it was, how Late
GrahamSwift - Last Orders
I suggest it to everyone! :)
Incidentally what helped with this is the fact that I am a music fanatic (and ex critic) as well. One sign of a great album is that the first listen is ok-ish but as you keep on playing the record the charms come out and by spin number three or four you are hooked - If I like an album instantly it's a bad sign because all the charms are exposed. I approach books I don't like the same way, obviously I wait a long time for a reread.
Mod
This got me thinking, since these are all writers I have enjoyed several books by and the only one of their books that provoked a similar reaction in me was The Finkler Question. There are writers I have left alone for a long time - I had a similar reaction to Robert to reading The Handmaid's Tale when young, but have really enjoyed coming back to Atwood.
This book is so atypical of Barry's work that to write the rest off seems very harsh, but he does have a weakness for the sentimental ending. A Long Long Way is definitely worth reading, and I have enjoyed elements of all of his books, though Annie Dunne was a bit dull.
I do generally subscribe to the life's too short theory when it comes to re-reading books I didn't like first time, or persisting with author I don't get. Ultimately there is only a finite amount of reading time in my life, and a much larger list of books I would like to read, so a poor book read or re-read is another more deserving book or author never read.
Having said that Howard Jacobson was one where, having read Kalooki Nights I had him in the 'never again' camp, then I felt obliged to read J after its double Booker/Goldsmiths nomination and liked it.
So I then read the Booker-winning Finkler Question and remembered why I disliked Kalooki Nights so much in the first place.
Not sure what the moral of that story is. Perhaps stick with my instincts unless the Goldsmiths Prize tells me otherwise!
Mod
We all have different tastes. I have liked Sebastian Barry in the past - Aeneas McNulty and Annie Dunne, for example, but I think he has lost his way. He no longer tells stories, he finds a voice and a pretext to use it.With Jacobson, I hated Kalooki Nights and my friends tell me that the things I didn't like about it (whiney Jews looking for reasons to whine) is a leitmotif in his subsequent works.
As it goes, I loved Kelman's How Late It Was How Late and have generally enjoyed his works. But he is still not a writer where I feel an urgent excitement to read his next book.
I agree with Paul completely that rereading a book means not reading a new one - and that is a high bar to clear. I would never, ever pass by a potentially interesting new read to repeat a negative experience. If I lose some great reads along the way, that is a price I am willing to pay for the great new reads.
So bye bye Sebastian Barry.
Ah Jacobson. I didn't like who's Sorry Now, thought Finkler Question was great but I had mixed reactions with J (I will reread) and I didn't mind his retelling of the Merchant of Venice.
I don't know why we are talking about Jacobsen, but I hated Finkler, enjoyed J and laughed a lot at his re-telling of Merchant (it is set very close to where I grew up which helped).
Mod
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Ctb wrote: "Wonderful review, Meike! Enjoyed your perspectives.Since reading, I've also realized Barry is trying to fathom American gun violence, our obsession with and desire for more and deadlier guns. Gun..."
Thanks, Ctb! I didn't see the gun issue as a focus, but that's an interesting perspective. Clearly, guns and violence in general will not solve the current problems in the United States, and hate cannot be overcome by even more hate. Those who attack others based on hateful ideologies or simply for their own gain need to be proven wrong, but with peaceful means. (So I only meant to metaphorically hit Trump with Barry's book, not literally! :-)) Call me naive, but I really like your country and I know that it is full of wonderful people, so I am very hopeful that the positive forces that want to move forward will prove to be stronger than those promoting violence, hate, racism, patriarchy, and the rule of money.
For me, this was the Book Without End.It started so brightly. Two young boys willing to wear dresses and dance to entertain the miners in some wild west saloon. It's nice. It's different. It's unusual. It earns the novel a second star. But then the boys grow up and can no longer pass as women, so they go off a-soldiering. They meet some Indians and kill them. They meet some more Indians and don't kill them. They meet some more Indians and kill them...
It was just so repetitive.
And being honest, I never really bought the narrative voice either. It sounds arty and forced. Let's be arty and poetic, but toss in some grammatical tics to remind us all that we are dealing with burel men whose rude speche we must excuse.
This is not a long book, but I struggled to get a third of the way through it in a week. Every time I thought of picking it up, I got a sense of dread. And every time I put it down, I felt that it was an hour of my life that I would never get back (even though, I suspect, these hours lasted no more than 15 minutes apiece).
So, a third of the way through, I decided to stop. Some who have read the whole damned thing tell me that the last couple of chapters are quite good, but they agree that the vast middle meanders. This is the point where I have made a pact with myself not to read any more Sebastian Barry. I enjoyed Enais McNulty and Annie Dunne, but more recent stuff has felt tired. I feel as though Sebastian Barry is writing for himself and not for me. That's his prerogative, and it is clearly working for him and for Booker judges, but I'm not going to be part of it any more.
Sorry Sebastian.
Half way through, my first and hopefully only Booker dnf this year, ok so it's all pointless, cold and mosquito plagued and a bunch of sad wasted macho soldiers are making life miserable for the indians who retaliate on settlers. No story and very simplistic naration. Bored... Moving on
The Mookse and the Gripes
Books mentioned in this topic
The Finkler Question (other topics)A Long Long Way (other topics)
Annie Dunne (other topics)
Blood Meridian, or, the Evening Redness in the West (other topics)
Solar Bones (other topics)
UK Edition
Publication Date: February 6, 2017
US Edition
Publication Date: January 24, 2017