A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood

[Rob in Puyallup]

Don is a very good looking man, as well!

[Cally]

Yes!

[Janie-G]

I finished reading ASM over the weekend and thoroughly enjoyed it. 

[CellarDweller115]

I finished reading ASM over the weekend and thoroughly enjoyed it. 

Same for me, Janie!

[dejavu]

Good to hear that you both enjoyed it, Janie and Chuck.

I'm about three-quarters through with my second (third in some places) reading, and enjoying it more than ever, the more I get into it.

[janjo]

I was able to record "Chris and Don, A Love Story," to my hard drive when it was shown on Sky Arts 1 last week, and watched it on Thursday morning, which is my day off. I found it fascinating and an excellent piece of work.
Having read "A Single Man," through, and now following Debbie's tip of reading it again, I am full of admiration for Isherwood's writing. I am old enough to remember seeing him on TV and hearing him on the radio discussing literary matters, but apart from watching "Cabaret," I have not really been aware of his writing before. I fully intend to acquire some more of his books, and am really looking forward to our discussions here next week.

Once again, for all of the things I have read because of your reccommendations, thank you guys..........................

[Rob in Puyallup]

Having finished Isherwood's My Guru and His Disciple I have moved on to his book Christopher and His Kind which, so far, is very good!

[michaelflanagansf]

Here are the questions for the first section of 'A Single Man' for pages  1 - 41:

1.)  The opening of this book is quite unusual and breathtaking - the description of a person coming to consciousness, moving from 'it' to 'he', reflecting on mortality and finally identifying itself as 'George.'  What is your opinion of the opening of the novel?  Is it unique or does it remind you of other books or authors?  How did the passage affect you - does it draw you in or put you off?  Please share your thoughts on this interesting passage.

2.)  From the second paragraph of the book with the certainty 'it will come' to the notion of fear of being rushed to the awareness of Jim's death we are immersed in questions of mortality from the very outset of this book.  What do you think of Isherwood's addressing this topic so early in the book?  Is it heavy handed or morose - or do you feel that he is skillful enough as an author to make even fears that we would normally approach fiction to escape interesting?  Did the early introduction of issues of mortality put you off or did you find it compelling (or did it have another effect on you entirely)?

3.)  George and Jim fell in love with the house George now lives in the first time they saw it.  They loved it because you could only get to it by the bridge across the creek.  George refers to it as 'our own little island.'  Do you think that George and Jim were attempting to isolate themselves here?  If so who or what are they trying to isolate themselves from?  Does this relate to their being a different couple in the neighborhood?  Do you think the house still fits George or has it become something different without Jim - perhaps a prison?

4.)  What do you make of George's relationship with the children in the neighborhood?  Do you think he seriously dislikes or is irritated by the children?  Is his reaction to the children due to his being alone now?  Do you think that his reactions to the children have further isolated him in the neighborhood - set him apart from his neighbors with children?

5.)  The book refers to several gender related attitudes in this first section: 'Mrs. Strunk's hour and the power of motherhood'; 'the masculine hour of ball playing'; 'the doctor's pretty sissy son'; 'The Girls--as Mrs. Strunk and the rest will continue to call themselves' - do these descriptions act to further isolate and alienate George from his neighbors?  Do you think that these gender descriptions are meant to allow us to identify with George and take his part against the neighbors? How do the attitudes concerning homosexuality relate to these gender notions?

6.)  George has not told his neighbors about Jim's death.  Why do you think he hasn't told them what happened?  Does this decision tell you anything about how George feels toward Jim's death (e.g., is it his own personal pain and domain and does this make him unwilling to share it)?  Do you think this is making him more or less able to deal with his loss?  The discussion in which he says 'Jim wasn't a substitute for anything' is occurring entirely in his own mind.  Is Jim's death yet another isolation that George has imposed upon himself - should he be having this conversation with someone else?

7.)  Why does George reject Charley's invitation?  What does the conversation tell you about their relationship?  

8.)  There seems to be an underlying tension and revulsion with 'progress' in the book.  On page 17 we read how Camphor Tree Lane has changed from the period when the 'pioneer escapists' founded the neighborhood to the present and when is driving to work the book points out that he is hyperconscious of all bylaws and feels a nerve-crawling sensation when merging into traffic.  Is this just part of George's irritability with the world and does it saw something about his coping mechanisms?  Is his dissatisfaction with the changes in the world related to his concerns about mortality?  Why is he unhappy with the world he finds himself living in?

9.)  George concocts a scenario in his mind where he is destroying buildings, kidnapping newspaper people and torturing them, terrorizing the populace and holding executions.  Why do you think he is fantasizing about this?  Does it relate to Jim's death?  To quote the book: 'Does George really hate all these people?' and 'What is George's hate, then?'  What do you make of this passage in the book - is George losing his mind?

10.) I can't read this book without being amazed by the beauty of the text - for example: 'What he sees there isn't so much a face as the expression of a predicament.'  What are your favorite passages in this first part of the book and why do you like them?

[dejavu]

1.)  The opening of this book is quite unusual and breathtaking - the description of a person coming to consciousness, moving from 'it' to 'he', reflecting on mortality and finally identifying itself as 'George.'  What is your opening of the opening of the novel?  Is it unique or does it remind you of other books or authors?  How did the passage affect you - does it draw you in or put you off?  Please share your thoughts on this interesting passage.

I was drawn in, not put off, by the opening of the novel.  We don’t learn anything of who George really is; all we know is that “it” is a person, male, age 58, who thinks that he is overweight (“a bit over 150 pounds despite all that toiling at the gym”), and whose name is George.  But this is enough information to get started with; I supposed that things like feelings, relationships, social position and occupation would be filled in for us later in the book.  I will add that I came to the book knowing that the main character of the book was gay, but did not find any indication of this, either, in the opening section.

In this opening section, “it” is described in terms of the bare-bones characteristics of a person: the vagus nerve, the cortex, the bladder, the face in the mirror with nose and cheeks.  There is a suggestion of the previous stages of this “creature’s” life:  it has been a child, a boy, a young man, a not-so-young man. But there are no details given as to what kind of life this creature lived during those various stages (where, when, with whom).  So you might say that this “it” is like a universal representative of the human race at this point.

Although this is an unusual approach to modern fiction, there is something vaguely familiar about some of the opening lines, such as I am, I am now, here.  I may be completely off the mark here, and someone with a better knowledge of literature may be able to correct me, but this first few lines reminded me a little of some sort of “existentialist” novel which we read in high school.   

[tfferg]

Here are the questions for the first section of 'A Single Man' for pages  1 - 41:

1.)  The opening of this book is quite unusual and breathtaking - the description of a person coming to consciousness, moving from 'it' to 'he', reflecting on mortality and finally identifying itself as 'George.'  What is your opening of the opening of the novel?  Is it unique or does it remind you of other books or authors?  How did the passage affect you - does it draw you in or put you off?  Please share your thoughts on this interesting passage.

I find the opening passage striking but not off-putting. It is not morbid. It moves along fairly smartly and holds this reader’s interest. By the seventh paragraph, the narrator has moved from the rather alienated objective description to the personal ‘we’ and ‘us’ – his younger faces  - and in the eighth paragraph, he moves to ‘I” – ‘I’m  afraid of being rushed’ in italics, which reads as if he has gained a personal insight into himself.

The description of bodily processes and symptoms shows that the narrator is struggling with the effects of ageing, degeneration, pain and loss. He doesn’t want to wake up too soon, but his body and parts of his mind and his social role (‘that which has awoken’) rouse him in spite of his wishes.

The narrator is dissociating himself from his personality and his ordinary identity until his cortex takes over and makes him prepare for his working day with other people. This makes him acknowledge his individuality as George. He is afraid of having to feel again that he is the grieving individual person who is bereft by the loss of Jim.

[tfferg]

[quote author=dejavu link=topic=39056.msg1842372#msg1842372 date=1270477964

...So you might say that this “it” is like a universal representative of the human race at this point.

[/quote]

Yes. his individual idnetity is too painful to bear when 'that which is awoken' is woken up.

[Cally]

1.)I wonder if I hadn’t seen the film whether I should have found the opening off-putting? No, I don’t think so; and as it is - having some idea of who is developing form the ‘it’ - I find it fascinating, and to some extent a description of a state of mind I can recognise: those few seconds on waking with one’s mind blank and innocent, the dawning physical and mental awareness, the ominous “It will come”; then the shock of remembrance, “Fear tweaks the vagus nerve….” , being able to make the day begin only by following routine – brilliantly done.

And then in the section “He crosses the front room...” to “Jim is dead. Is dead”, suddenly the objective, rather unemotional description becomes poignantly alive: the tiny domestic details of the house and his life with Jim.  In just two paragraphs we know both something of what they had had and what George has lost.

I can’t think of another book that is similar, but it's nagging at me… I hope someone else may have ideas.

[dejavu]

2.)  From the second paragraph of the book with the certainty 'it will come' to the notion of fear of being rushed to the awareness of Jim's death we are immersed in questions of mortality from the very outset of this book.  What do you think of Isherwood's addressing this topic so early in the book?  Is it heavy handed or morose - or do you feel that he is skillful enough as an author to make even fears that we would normally approach fiction to escape interesting?  Did the early introduction of issues of mortality put you off or did you find it compelling (or did it have another effect on you entirely)?

I'm probably biased here because I had seen the film and knew how it ended (or at least, how I thought it ended).  As we get around to discussing the end of the book, I’ll be wanting to discuss what really happened at the end of the book.  But I don’t want to get ahead of the discussion here.

I guess in one way it really doesn’t matter:  we all know, by the time we've reached our present ages, that we are going to die sometime in the future.   So for this “it” character who initially seems like a universal representation of humanity, it should be obvious enough to the reader that “it will come” (death) for “it” (George).   Mortality is a universal characteristic of humanity and the living biological world in general.

Regarding the fear of death, I think Isherwood handled this in an interesting manner.  What did seem a bit “morose” was the way he portrayed the current attitude of “it” as “it” looks in the mirror.  The reflection looking back is harassed, “that of a desperately tired swimmer or runner” who is, nevertheless, unable to stop swimming or running.  The creature will “struggle on until it drops” simply because it can imagine no alternative.  This creature does not appear, so far, to be experiencing any joy in life; life seems like a sentence that has to be suffered through until death comes.  But even so, when the creature thinks, I'm afraid of being rushed, I sensed that deep down, “it” was not ready to die yet.  Perhaps it was still looking for a reason to keep on living, and just didn’t recognize this yet.

I found it interesting how many ways death played into the book’s early pages.  Not only do we learn, in the next section, that George has lived with Jim (an apparent lover, by the way they bumped into each other sensually, in rage or love) and that Jim has died, we also see George killing the kitchen ants and pondering in a somewhat comical way about how life (George) was destroying life (the ants).  When he remembers his Nanny, he thinks about how Nanny and the child George were living in a “tiny doomed world.”  (Later we learn that this sense of doom stems from the rocket wars which were feared during the nuclear arms race, when the book was written.)

[tfferg]

2.)  From the second paragraph of the book with the certainty 'it will come' to the notion of fear of being rushed to the awareness of Jim's death we are immersed in questions of mortality from the very outset of this book.  What do you think of Isherwood's addressing this topic so early in the book?  Is it heavy handed or morose - or do you feel that he is skillful enough as an author to make even fears that we would normally approach fiction to escape interesting?  Did the early introduction of issues of mortality put you off or did you find it compelling (or did it have another effect on you entirely)?
[/quote]

Issues of degeneration and ageing are very much on my mind these days, so I didn’t find beginning the book with issues of mortality premature. Given that the title of the book is A Single Man, it is not too surprising either – the meaning of ‘single’ is not restricted to ‘unmarried’. Although I do pick up a novel as an escape from time to time, I don’t always resort to fiction to avoid my fears and worries. I also read fiction widen my experience or hopefully to increase my understanding of myself and others. It can also be reassuring to read something that may reflect my experience and concerns just as in a conversation with a friend.

[michaelflanagansf]

I'm probably biased here because I had seen the film and knew how it ended (or at least, how I thought it ended).

It's fascinating to try to put this sort of inner voice on pause, isn't it Deb?  When I was doing the questions I kept thinking 'but in the movie....'

I realize it's tough to answer some of these things with just the book in mind, but do appreciate the attempt to do this.

Oh...and welcome back Deb (and Tony).  And welcome Sara!