Upcoming (re-)releases: William Gaddis' first two novels by NYRB

I'm sure most people have seen the news that New York Review Books will release William Gaddis' first two novels, The Recognitions and J R, this fall. From the Publishers Weekly article:

NYRB editor Edwin Frank, asked why the press planned to republish what he called Gaddis's "two showstopper doorstoppers," said that the answer was simple: "really good books, great books, don't represent things so much as they represent themselves: they change things, change the way we see language, change the way we see the novel, change the way we see the world around us, and The Recognitions and JR do all of that to this day."

If you're planning on tackling either or both of these novels, I'd like to recommend getting a copy of the audiobooks with Nick Sullivan reading them to go along with reading them yourself. I know, I know. That sounds strange, but trust me it will help you make sense of what is going on, especially in J R. The Neglected Book Page posted on these audiobooks when they were released and he was right: they are phenomenal accomplishments by Sullivan. (Wow, that was ten years ago.)

Also of help for first-time readers (and maybe repeat readers, too) will be The Gaddis Annotations (although I saved that for after I was through with sections of the book), and Gaddis' 1986 interview with The Paris Review.

These are two of my favorite books, so I'm looking forward to the responses of those who decide to tackle these difficult-but-rewarding books.

Update: Chris Via reviews Gaddis' J R at Splice. Reinforcing why listening to the book might be a good idea:

Indeed, with the early scene depicting the rehearsal of the Ring cycle, and repeated invocations of Mozart and Wagner, Gaddis effectively signals that he is conducting an operatic epic so that we, as readers, will not only need to scan his words but also listen to him (as Bast implores J R to do). And, as we listen, attuning our ears to his dialogue, we become acquainted with his characters solely through their voices, which in turn become the book’s leitmotifs.

Another recent post/review of J R is in The Paris Review blog, written by Joy Williams: William Gaddis’s Disorderly Inferno.

Dustin Illingworth has an article at The Point that addresses the two books: Unrecognizable, William Gaddis’s American pessimism.

Audiobook: Carpenter's Gothic by William Gaddis, narrated by Nick Sullivan

Carpenter's Gothic by William Gaddis
Narrated by Nick Sullivan
Published by Tantor Audio
Running time 9 hrs 34 mins

A few years back I posted a brief note on Nick Sullivan's narration of two of William Gaddis' novels. Mr. Sullivan was kind enough to email me that his narration of Gaddis' Carpenter's Gothic had just been released. Having had a chance to listen to it, I wanted to let others know it is another remarkable performance. The style is similar to J R, with unattributed characters' speech mingled with a narrator's voice (with a much shorter length and fewer characters). Sullivan once again masterfully animates the voices and captures the emotions of the many characters. Although Carpenter's Gothic is not one of my favorite of Gaddis' novels (more on that in a moment), I highly recommend Sullivan's narration whether you have read the novel or not. I don't think I'm overstating things when I say that listening to his narration will help you learn how to read Gaddis and get the most out of the experience.

Regarding Carpenter's Gothic, I guess I have a complicated relationship with it. I read it upon its release, my first exposure to Gaddis. Probably adding to my initial enjoyment was having just moved from near one of the towns mentioned in the book (Smackover) and its portrayed milieu. Its greatest contribution was that it spurred me on to read The Recognitions and J R, the only other books by Gaddis published at the time and each re-released when Carpenter's Gothic came out. While similar in style to J R, I found it less comic (although there are funny parts) and with a bleaker outlook. Gaddis teases the reader, not revealing crucial facts until near the end of the book, but that structure makes what happens in the final chapters more impactful. I found I still liked it, even with some reservations. Saying it's not one of my favorite Gaddis novels, though, is mostly because of the high bar set by his first two novels.

A quick note: Nick Sullivan has agreed to narrate Gaddis' Agapē Agape and a collection of his essays.

Links:
Nick Sullivan's website, with a page on the books he has written

The Institute of Contemporary Arts recording of William Gaddis talking with Malcolm Bradbury, recorded on February 20, 1986, just after the release of Carpenter’s Gothic in Great Britain. My notes on the recording.

What got me started on Nick Sullivan's reading of William Gaddis' novels: The Neglected Books Page review of the audio recordings of The Recognitions and J R.

The Gaddis Annotations' page on Carpenter's Gothic, with annotations for each chapter and links to other helpful pages. The link on the page to the Great Books Foundation study guide has changed. The study guide can be found here.

Gaddis' Winter 1987 interview with The Paris Review (sometimes behind a paywall, sometimes not).

ICA talks: William Gaddis and Malcolm Bradbury, in conversation

I have enjoyed listening to some of the Institute of Contemporary Arts talks and wanted to share some notes on some of these recordings over the next few weeks. In this case it is William Gaddis talking with Malcolm Bradbury on February 20, 1986, soon after the release of Carpenter’s Gothic. Similar to other talks in the series there is little new here but it was the first time I actually heard Gaddis speak. At times Bradbury takes forever to get to some semblance of a question, only to have Gaddis veer off in another direction or completely dismiss his point.

As anyone who has read Gaddis (or read any of his interviews) will know, he hates to have to explain the work in too much detail or provide more information than is already on the page. There isn't much new here for anyone that has read an interview with Gaddis, but I enjoyed it anyway. Here are a few notes from their “conversation”:

Carpenter’s Gothic was written with a series of self-imposed constraints, including limiting the number of characters, keeping the setting in one place, and do it all in fewer pages than his other works. Gaddis wanted to take clichés and make them work. Bradbury likes calling it a novella, at least when compared to Gaddis’ other works. Many events take place through the mail, newspapers, and television and on the phone. Gaddis says he likes using the different methods of communication to move the story along. Bradbury noted and Gaddis confirmed that Carpenter’s Gothic contains more rage than JR.

They talked about several authors (Hawthorne and Melville especially) and focused on the subject of confidence men and swindling as it appears in Gaddis’ book. Gaddis likes the way confidence men provide good theater, relating a recent experience of being robbed on a bus in New York City.

Bradbury wanted Gaddis to touch on the term “carpenter’s gothic” since it mind not be as understood as well outside of America. Gaddis notes the phrase works on several levels in relation to the book: architecture, style, religion, and economy. Regarding the architectural term, Gaddis said he liked the style in its imitation of a more ornate style but using simpler materials. The style emphasizes outside appearance at the expense of inside utility (noting his experience with his house of the same style). The religious imagery, Jesus as carpenter, may be a little strained but works with some aspects of the novel. Gaddis also noted the economy of the style—the houses were built by a stylebook that could be easily copied and applied.

On writing, Gaddis noted he can’t resist certain things, satire and pastiche for examples, but always with entertainment in mind. He can’t believe some reviews of his books that don’t mention the humor in them (I’ll add my bewilderment on that point, too). One thing he tried to do in J R was completely remove the author from the book. In this case, reading the book requires the reader to participate in what emerges. Despite the length of the novel, there is a type of economy in doing this, revealing only what he feels is enough for the reader to understand characters, scenes, etc. The reader has to be willing to accept the ambiguity that arises in some areas. For example, even though no character in J R is provided with much description, Gaddis had an idea of what the characters looked like. When Harper’s had an illustration accompanying a review of J R, Gaddis was amused to see that the artist’s rendering of Edward Bast was completely at odds with how he pictured him. Once he begins writing, though, the characters and storyline may take him in places he didn’t intend at all. Back to J R—as Gaddis moved through the story, Jack Gibbs became a much less likeable character than he had intended when he started the book.

A common theme in the talk, and in Gaddis’ books, is the feeling that things are out of control. While everyone recognizes that in the differing times to some extent, a pervasive lack of responsibility seems to underlie much of it. As he has pointed out in other interviews, he occasionally says he has a naïve notion that pointing out the problems will lead to corrections…that the overall system is viable. At the end of the Q&A session Gaddis veers off into politics, but thankfully there’s not much of it before the recording ends

J R audiobook

I finally finished the audiobook of William Gaddis’ J R and thoroughly enjoyed it. I recommend it, especially for anyone that has wanted or tried to read it and felt overwhelmed at keeping so many unattributed conversations straight. Narrator Nick Sullivan provides distinctive voices for each character. Think of it as the color-coding Faulkner wanted to use for The Sound and the Fury. In addition, The Gaddis Annotations should help as does Gaddis’ interview in The Paris Review.

Speaking of which, the annotations (and almost everyone else that talks about J R) highlight the opening line of the novel “- Money...?” as the major theme of the novel. Scarcer (I originally said ‘never’ but I now see Frederick R. Karl mentions it in his introduction to the 1993 Penguin edition) is any focus on the closing lines. J R’s plaintive eleven-year-old voice issues from a dangling phone receiver: “So I mean listen I got this neat idea hey, you listening? Hey? You listening…?” Karl touches on the irony that a novel of voices has a surprising lack of communication. The Recognitions was similar when it came to the inability to connect but, thinking back on it, I would say the failure to communicate (sorry…I couldn’t resist) dwelt more in the struggle of the characters to express themselves. In J R, though, the conversations aren’t incomplete but interrupted. Everyone talks past each other, with the opening scene between Coen the lawyer and the elderly Bast sisters providing a hilarious, perfect lead-in to this attribute.

Highly recommended.

Related:
That is where he would have done it
Point is...
A landmark indeed

Point is...

Richard at Caravana de recuerdos had a post last week on Doctor Faustus by Thomas Mann. I've mentioned I'm listening to the audio version of William Gaddis' JR and as luck would have it I heard a brief mention of the story the same day I read the review. I love coincidences like that, with the added bonus of hearing an explicit mention of the Faustus legend in JR since it underlies a major part of Gaddis' The Recognitions.

I know the excerpt won't do it justice. You will have to imagine a drunken slur as Jack Gibbs unsuccessfully tries to make a point to Beamish, the lawyer of Schramm's estate (he recently hanged himself), about Schramm's manuscript and his experience in World War II. Tom Eigen supplies the interruption as Gibbs tries to make a point about the lie a general told to protect himself for leaving Schramm alone while protecting his retreat during the Battle of the Bulge:

- Trying to hurry Beamish…the cup came up for a long pull and he reached for the papers. – point is Schramm wasn’t just trying to write another God damned war book, whole God damned point in Faust the Lord has everything laid out for Faust to win but he won’t tell Faust, what the hell do you expect Faust to do? Lord staying above the God damned battle letting him break his God damned neck fighting for what was planned for him all the time what the hell do you…

- Jack, shut up! We’ve got to …

- Look how the hell do you expect me to read this whole God Damned thing to Mister Beamish without filling him in on the facts, ever see Schramm’s Western Beamish? Wrote a Western didn’t even have his name on it, point is he’s out there hanging on waiting for orders to fall back that never came from the Lord and this God damned general radioed him was a God dmaned lie, comes out saying he won the bet and…wait what the hell are you doing, expect me to read this whole thing to Mister…

(page 391 in the 1993 Penguin paperback edition)

Yeah, it loses a lot in carving it from the whole...hopefully the take on the Faustus tale still comes through.

That is where he would have done it

Thanks again to The Neglected Books Page for last year's mention of the release of two of William Gaddis' works, J R and The Recognitions, on audiobook. I have just started listening to J R and I'm captivated by Nick Sullivan's performance. Oh yes, the book, too. I can't recommend both of these performances by Sullivan enough--they are outstanding.

While listening to J R I was reminded of the line from Educating Rita (the movie, I haven't seen the play) that seemed appropriate: "In attempting to resolve the staging difficulties in a production of Peer Gynt I would present it on the radio because, as Ibsen says, he wrote it as a play for voices, never intending it to go on in a theater. If they had had the radio in his day, that is where he would have done it."

Previous comments on the audiobook version of The Recognitions can be found here and here.

A landmark indeed

The Neglected Books Page had a review of the audiobook releases of William Gaddis’ The Recognitions and JR. Based on the review, I downloaded The Recognitions and have been listening to it for the last two weeks. It is everything said in the Neglected review—Nick Sullivan’s performance is amazing. Reading Gaddis can be frustrating, trying to figure out who is speaking. Sullivan’s performance makes this aspect of the book much easier to digest. Each character is given a unique voice that can be identified immediately. Based on Sullivan’s performance (well, and Gaddis’ work, too) I intend to listen to JR as well. Highly recommended.

Oh…so how’s the book itself? Chapter One hooked me. Hard. I loved the dark humor running through it. I bogged down in the next three chapters, but I like the way Gaddis develops the themes of authenticity (not just in art or money but in other areas such as values, too), salvation, innocence, and the relationship between artist and public. The character of Wyatt, someone with incredible talent but no…vision? belief? intrigues me. The other characters provide interesting counterpoints when compared to Wyatt. They have an attribute of Wyatt’s character but lack other dimensions. For example, some have belief or vision but no talent. Now, especially since many threads are beginning to come together, I’m still interested in listening to it each day. (Keep in mind I’m only halfway through the audiobook so my comments and assumptions on themes and descriptions may be premature)