Great voice missing a great story

3.5

Ei Zadie Smithin Nimikirjoitusmiehelle voi antaa tähtiä. Välillä on nollaa ja välillä kaikkea ykkösestä vitoseen ja ylikin. Päädyin samaan epätaajuuteen kuin Swing Timeä lukiessa.

Smith on kielensä kanssa uskomattoman taitava. Taitaisin jäädä kakkoseksi, jos joutuisin (tai pääsisin) mukaan Alex-Li Tandemin ja kavereiden dialogeihin.

Nimikirjoitusmies on ihan reaaliaikaista kerrontaa ja vauhtia piisaa. Kun päähenkilöitäkin on vain yksi, kiinalais-juutalainen Alex-Li Tandem, tulee herra nimikirjoitusmieheen pakosti luotua jonkinlainen kiintymyssuhde.

Vaikka en lainkaan ymmärtänyt häntä lapsena - ehkä hän ei sellainen koskaan ollutkaan.

Ongelmia tuotti myös juutalainen nuorisokulttuuri raamatullisine nimineen, kabbaloineen ja rabbikavereineen. Sekä nimikirjoituselämä julkkislistoineen, näyttelijätärpakkomielteineen ja etenkin showpaini, josta se kaikkia alkoi. Ja hyvin paljon tapahtui erilaisten aineiden vaikutuksen alaisena ja muistikatkojen itsesäälissä rypien. Ilmankos Alex-Li Tandemilla oli "taito kuvitella itsensä pikku episodiksi muiden elämässä".

Nimikirjoitusmies oli ilkikurinen, ei mitenkään vakava - eikä siten niin vaikuttava kuin olisin toivonut. Tai sitten olen taipuvainen kolmen kirjan perusteella epäilemään, että Zadie Smithin aura on hänen kirjojaan vaikuttavampi.

The Autograph Man is the 2nd book written by Zadie Smith, the first being White Teeth. She writes well and often offers a knife edge between reality and fantasy in the life of the title character. For me the shenanigans of drunkenness are not entertaining; but for a young drinking crowd of men, this story might be fun to read.

Probably a bad place to start reading Zadie Smith, I admit - but this convinced me that she must have been a bully in high school.

This book is comprised of two parts, each divided into ten chapters which do not entirely cohere until the reader begins drawing conclusions and connecting dots.

More than once, characters muse on "ten holy spheres" of Kabbalistic significance, each a facet of the universal divine spirit which does not entirely cohere until humans do some independent work to put the parts together.

Meta!

It's intriguing but it's pushy, and things don't really take off til Part 2. For anyone but Zadie Smith I'd throw around words like "clumsy" or "ham-handed" but that's not the case here—she is ever deft with her words, penning some sections of near-angelic prose that left me reeling. Still, nobody likes being being bludgeoned over the head with the "Do You Get It Yet??" stick and there's a lot of bludgeoning here.

4 stars. At least it's bludgeoning by something soft and cushiony.

Not Zadie Smith at her finest - but nonetheless a very accomplished, intriguing and of course brilliantly written novel as well as an interesting insight into the bizarre world of celebrity obsession and autograph trading.

Occasionally I read books that I am enjoying more-or-less until there is some shift in the narrative that either destroys my enjoyment of the book or ratchets it up wildly, but its rare that I read something where that happens at least a dozen times. The Autograph Man was that rare book where I went from loving to loathing to loving over and over, sometimes within a single chapter.

I did not check reviews before reading this, but I could not help noticing the VERY low average rating - a 3.16. Low ratings don't bother me, I find on the whole I am more likely to like a book rated 3.2 than one rated 4.2, but it surprised me for this book. This is not a literary book likely to be picked up by those who like page turners or who like their tragedy to come with tear-jerky wallowing rather than wry observation. Though this was Zadie Smith's second novel she was already a known quantity appealing to a particular type of reader who liked White Teeth, and those readers I figured probably shared my tastes to some degree. Still I dove in.

I started reading the preface, and thought "what is wrong with people, this is genius." And that rather lengthy preface does not falter. Its so good! Sadly, the book does not deliver on the preface's promise. There are parts of the book I might have liked more if I had not been set up by the preface to expect a wonderful rollicking read. In fact the part of the book I liked least was the 50 or so pages immediately following the preface. The story crashes to earth immediately after the preface. I sorta kinda hated that section where we spend time with Alex before he leaves London for NYC. I almost abandoned the book, and if that section had gone on another 10 pages I likely would have done. The book though does pick up in the NYC section, regardless of how improbable the story becomes. I loved the book's end, which made absolute sense though there is no resolution, just the merest whiff of growth and change which given the protagonist's stuntedness is a seismic shift.

Smith takes on some big themes here, themes I would think were very present for her as a young writer who achieved literary It Girl status with her first book. The emptiness of celebrity, and its utter disconnection from craft or art is overarching. I liked that she did not simply dismiss celebrity as silly and shallow, or ignore what appears to be a real human need for iconography. People need things like heroes and faith, which remain unchanged and unchangeable when things and people around us change and disappear at the moments we most need constancy. Smith was much less successful examining the distinctions between faith and tribal identification. I understand why she chose Jewish characters for this meditation, I don't think there are any other major religions or sects where that distinction between faith and tribe is more troubling and profound. Alex's relationship (or lack) to Judaism and to Jews and to Jewish culture is a great set up for that discussion, but I don't think Smith pulls it off.

I know non-Jewish writers who write great Jewish characters, but most don't, and Smith falls into the latter group. Alex-Li and his freinds did not resonate with me, they did not feel familiar or recognizable in any way. They really felt like constructs to illustrate things about what it means to be Jewish. And maybe that was the problem, their Jewishness was so central to everything they did, and that really felt off. And that clunky characterization was not limited to the Jews. I think the weakest most poorly written character in the book is a black buddhist woman, which is how Zadie Smith identifies. So much here is tone deaf which is not usually something I say about Zadie Smith.

In the end there were a lot of poorly drawn characters, a weird conflation of defining oneself and defining one's faith (I know faith is a part of how we define ourselves, but trust me that it would not have been this big a part for Alex, who identifies pretty comfortably as Atheist and who already acknowledges and accepts his tribal connection.), a lot of digressions, and serious structural problems. Still there were swaths of genius that gave me real pleasure and so I am calling the whole a 3. Its easier to afford the optimistic 3 rather than the disappointed 2 when I am reading back-catalogue. When dealing with a new writer I never know if a first brilliant book might have been an aberration. A lot of writers never deliver on the promise of a great first novel so I remain cautious, but I know Zadie Smith gave the world a great next novel (not to mention some spectacular essays) so I can see the way in which this not great novel made later great work possible.

Nope. This isn’t it. I don’t even know what this IS.
Obviously it’s an exploration of identity (and racism too.) This book is missing the Zadie Smith heart and soul - her commentary of events, politics, the arts and the wider world. Yep, this had Leonard Cohen and Virginia Woolf but... meh. The story didn’t grab me, the characters didn’t grab me. I sat there questioning my own intelligence and pondering my ignorance because I just did NOT get it. Sorry, Zadie.

This book gives the international gesture of 1 finger down your throat.
Appalling, I deserve a medal or an insanity check for finishing this.

Ο συλλέκτης αυτογράφων είναι ένα βιβλίο που τελειώνοντάς το, μου άφησε μια αίσθηση γλυκύτητας. Έχει μια ιδιαίτερα φρέσκια και ενδιαφέρουσα αφηγηματική απόδοση της ιστορίας με πολύ ζωντανούς και καθημερινούς διαλόγους. Με γραφή που υμνεί την φιλοδοξία, την επιμονή, το πέρασμα στην πρακτική ενηλικίωση (παρά την διατήρηση του έφηβου ήρωα μέσα στο ενήλικο σώμα του) μα κυρίως το θεωρώ ένα βιβλίο αφιερωμένο στην φιλία. Απέφυγε έντεχνα τις ύβρεις που συναντώνται στους καθημερινούς διαλόγους, ξεδιπλώνοντας ταυτόχρονα ένα ωραιότατο λεξιλόγιο που εξυπηρετεί την ιστορία της, καθόλου πομπώδες ή επιτηδευμένο.
Ίσως να έδινα και μισό αστεράκι ακόμη αν η - κατά τα άλλα - ταλαντούχα Smith εμβάθυνε λίγο περισσότερο στους χαρακτήρες της που σε σημεία μοιάζουν λίγο επιφανειακοί. Σίγουρα θα αναζητήσω κι άλλα δείγματα γραφής της.

After a great read with White Teeth I did not finish this one. Too Jewish ? Too goyish ? Probably both. I was bored and not interested at all by the story. I loved the 40 first pages of the prologue though.