Self By Yann MartelPublished by Knopf Canada
Yann Martel’s novel Self (Knopf), seems aptly titled for a book that depicts a character growing from childhood into adulthood. Martel’s first book, The Facts Behind the Helsinki Roccamatios, kept me on my couch for chapter after chapter with tears in my eyes. Self displays Martel’s breadth of knowledge, his skill at prose and his lovely imagination. In spite of this, it has been resting at the bottom of my bedside reading pile with a bookmark stuck in about a third of the way through for at least a month now. Perhaps Martel’s obsession with bodily functions (really: pages and pages on acne, shit, masturbation, menstruation; with sex and a flesheating disease no doubt lurking in the pages I didn’t reach) turned me off. Or perhaps it was the moment when the main character, a male, without warning wakes up female. Not once does she look in the mirror to assess her new self, although she continues with his/her litany of other observations. The bodily change brings no change in thought process, not even surprise. So my interest waned. And, as is true for much of my life, I wish my faith in Self would return, because in spite of its faults I still have hopes for it.Geist Magazine, Issue #21Self –Round TwoSince my review of Yann Martel’s novel Self (Knopf) in Geist No. 21, I have retrieved it from my bedside table and read it to the end. It’s an attractive hardcover with a creamy yellow sleeve and the story, which stumped me at first, enthralled me when I continued where I left off. The way the character is initiated into sex, academics, travel, work and love is moving and often amusingly perceptive. I was so transported into her world that I thought about her even when I wasn’t reading the story, and when it came, the much-discussed ending jarred me as it was meant to. Self is worth pursuing past the sluggish part near the beginning; it is sure to win big literary prizes.Geist Magazine, Issue #22
Archive for November, 1995
My Messy Bedroom by Josey VogelsPublished by Véhicule PressI like good deals but sometimes a good tip will serve the same purpose. I was happy to find in Josey Vogels’s My Messy Bedroom (Véhicule Press) an intriguing tip on buying bras. In the chapter called “Booby Trap” she answers the question I’ve always had: how do you find a bra that does the job it’s supposed to? My mother tended to shoo me into the teen section and leave me there while she stood on the sidelines with her handbag. The bargain aisles of Eaton’s and the Bay haven’t taught me much about how a bra should fit or what it should feel like when it’s doing its job. The chapter’s opening sentence gives the store’s coordinates: “Thee Lingerie Shoppe on Hamilton Street in Regina” and the next time I’m in Saskatchewan I plan to drop by. Vogels’s chatter in favour of well-fitted bras is worth reading too, and helped banish the sugar-high feeling I got from reading her “fun” journalistic prose.Geist Magazine, Issue #21