This is my fifth book from Styron. The last four were read recently, within the last few months or weeks. The first one was quite some time ago, in the mid-80s when I read his Sophie's Choice. This one, unless I'm mistaken, was his first.

It has a Recollection, which looks like a forward from someone who met Styron soon after he published this book. It seems to be written by his wife, Rose. She met him, Bill, and Truman Capote at the same time in Rome. Truman Capote told her that Lie Down in Darkness was a terrific book. Heh! She got the book from a library, began reading, and decided, "oh dear, he's cute but he can't write. What am I going to do?" HA HA HA HA HA!

Oops, the librarian had given her another book by another author with the same title. We're safe.

The title comes from Sir Thomas Brown's Urne Burial. And it relates to something I just read in Styron's Darkness Visible, the philosophical question... something to do with, is life worth living? If I find the exact phrasing (I can, will I look?)... I'll place it here. Okay, I looked, and it is from Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus, "There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy." The quote from Brown and this from Camus seem related... zip it up and file it away.

There's another quote from Finnegans Wake: "Carry me along, taddy, like you done through the toy fair."

The story begins with the train riding down to Port Warwick from Richmond, picking up speed on the outskirts of the city. It passes the tobacco factories with the ever-present haze of acrid, sweetish dust and the rows of uniformly brown clapboard houses that stretch down the hilly streets for miles. The hundreds of rooftops all reflect the pale light of dawn.

Onward and upward.

Update: Okay, so starting out we have present tense as well as second person. How often does one see that? Not often and it does not last. It does set the mood, however, and sets up a character who at 7% has not arrived yet. It's a man, I believe, coming in on the train, with possibly a body as a hearse and a limo have pulled up at the port... train station? To wait, the old man, Milton Loftis, goes into the restaurant nearby to be sick. He takes a stool, pulls out a letter from a daughter (Peyton, I think... a daughter who has committed suicide). She addresses him as Bunny. Another daughter, Maudie, is also dead. Helen, the mother for 23 years, is a mother no longer and she and Milton are separated.

This is an interesting read, having just read Darkness Visible, a memoir of depression. Some of the very things Styron writes about in that one are displayed herein.

Okay, back at it or smoke em if you got em.

Update: Finished, Sunday evening, 9:03 p.m. e.s.t.

Having read his Darkness Visible prior to this, and having read his words in that work about depression and his realization years after he wrote this one that in here he was dealing with depression, I think we are lazy and do harm when we use expressions like "dysfunctional family". At least one description uses the phrase to talk about this story. If depression is a disease, then any analogy would work, telling the man with a broken leg to get up and run the hundred... that, or he is lazy.

The frustrating matter with this story is that so much is unsaid, left to be read between the lines perhaps. Maudie wears a brace, and she has other health problems, but it is never revealed just what they are, nor is the brace ever explained.

If that's not enough, the marriage of Milton and Helen Loftis is a mystery as neither one communicates the way they should with the other. So the reader is left wondering so often just what is going on. The reader is given to understand that Helen is... a nag, to put it simply... and more, definitely more... and yet, Milton is as unfaithful as our president, William Jefferson Clinton. His daughter, Peyton, seems to know what is going on there, between her old man, Milton, and Dolly Bonner. There is a time when she tries to go into a room where there is a party happening, but the door is locked. Her old man and Dolly are in there.

But the reader is not given to know what she makes of that.

This story has an interesting narrative line, like some of Styron's other stories. For example, in Set This House on Fire, the climax has happened, the event that usually ends with all dead in Act 5 has already happened and the story works its way backward and forward to that event. In this case, it's Peyton's suicide... death.

The parallels between Helen, the mother, and Peyton, the daughter, are... there. I need time to think about what has happened. Honestly, I feel wrung out and hung up to dry. Blow wind blow.

More about the story-line: Early on, I thought there was someone accompanying the body of Peyton, arriving via train back in Port Warwick. The story begins with a second-person "you" and it is present tense. For whatever reason (I misread it), I thought a brother (there is no brother) was coming on the train with Peyton. Perhaps the name itself, Peyton... I know no Peyton, save the quarterback all are concerned about. And what the one coach gets a pass by bullying? EEEE GAD! Where is our humanity!

Anyway, the story-line goes back and forth in time, more back than forward. Each forward march is another increment at the station, picking up Peyton's casket, problems with the hearse... the engine keeps overheating... it's all so troublesome. And... Dolly is there with Milton, Helen did not go. But mixed in with this fairly short undertaking (sheesh, a cheap pun) of picking up the casket and putting it in the ground, the storyline reflects the past, what brought them to this point.

Then, with 80% of the story told, there's a shift to Peyton's point-of-view. Again, here, the reader is left to puzzle out what is happening - who is this Tony guy? And gradually, as one progresses, the reader discovers, unearths what has happened.

The final 5% or less (read this on the Kindle, verily, hallelujah), we visit with Daddy Faith, a black preacher man, and the various black folk who were present - at least Ella Swan was - there at the body retrieval. The various black folk attend this strange gathering at the... river, I'll say... water anyway. Somewhat surreal... and of that... still trying to get my head around it all.

There are so many inflexible characters herein...

The characters presented in this book were indeed broken and unlikable. However, I was still drawn to their story, which I attribute to Styron's remarkable writing skills and his knack for creating complex and fascinating characters despite their flaws.

It is important to note, though, that the depth of the white characters stood in sharp contrast to the one-dimensional and racist portrayal of the Black characters. In fact, it would be more accurate to describe them as caricatures. The use of racist language was difficult to read and seemed extreme, even for the era in which this book was written.

Ratings:

Writing: 5
Story line: 4
Characters: 4
Impact: 4

Overall rating: 4.25

William Styron's first novel, "Lie Down in Darkness," is frequently overshadowed by his renowned "Sophie's Choice," which is undoubtedly his masterpiece.

However, the style he employs in "Lie Down in Darkness" is equally melancholy and powerful, just like in each of his subsequent works.

No reader can peruse these pages without being deeply moved by the profound suffering, both self-inflicted and resulting from external forces, endured by its main characters.

The family unit is teeming with hidden tensions and has no chance of functioning properly as the parents are overly preoccupied with their own issues.

I particularly disliked Helen. Her passive-aggressive martyrdom exacerbated her husband's neuroses and alcoholism, causing their relationship to become as dysfunctional as those in Faulkner's works.

Styron's well-publicized battles with depression clearly served as a source of inspiration for many of the insights into mental illness presented in the novel.

The pain experienced by these characters is palpable throughout the entire book, leaving a lasting impression on the reader.

She had envisaged the future as a pleasant, extended, and harmonious tea party. In this idyllic scenario, everyone would engage in light conversation, perhaps dance a little, and maintain impeccable manners. However, when she actually attended such a party, it turned out to be a disaster. Everyone misbehaved, and no one seemed to enjoy themselves.

Well, this is the real world for you. It often intrudes upon our ideals, sending the teacups flying out the window.

I have just spent the past 5 days delving deep into the minds of crazy people, and it has left me somewhat befuddled. Styron's first novel is a dark and brooding work, a southern gothic tale that revolves around a Tidewater Virginia family hell-bent on self-destruction. It vaguely reminds one of Faulkner's "The Sound and the Fury," even featuring a sibling who is severely handicapped with the mind of a 3-year-old. Love and hate are pushed to extremes within this family, resulting in tragic consequences. From the very beginning, when the opening scenes depict the suicide of a 21-year-old daughter, it is clear that this story is not going to have a happy ending. The Loftis family truly earns the title of the most dysfunctional family of the century.

Nevertheless, William Styron is an incredibly talented writer. I might return to this review at a later time to add new insights, as I have just completed reading and, as I mentioned earlier, I'm still a bit disoriented. For now, I need to distance myself from these characters and perhaps attend a few of those aforementioned tea parties with nice, congenial, and polite participants.