Paperback, 338 pages
English language
Published July 15, 2005 by Scribner.
The Master is a novel by Irish writer Colm Tóibín. It is his fifth novel and it was shortlisted for the 2004 Booker Prize and received the International Dublin Literary Award, the Stonewall Book Award, the Lambda Literary Award, the Los Angeles Times Novel of the Year Award and, in France, Le prix du meilleur livre étranger in 2005.
I gave this fictionalized biography (is that a genre, I don’t know) of Henry James three stars. Not because I didn’t enjoy it (I did), but because - much like Henry James - this book isn’t for everyone. There is no plot, but a beautiful understanding of human longing and sadness and resolve and all the feels. I always enjoyed that type of exploration, but I’m a bit of a weirdo.
This is more an issue of taste than of talent. Colm Tóibín is undoubtedly an in-depth researcher and a good writer, but the story of Henry James is just missing anything of any interest for me. The character of his sister, who seemed by all accounts to be a fascinating character, is unfortunately left aside for a foray into Henry James himself, a remembered but moderate writer unloved but unhated in his time. The book unfortunately suffers from James' own fairly uninteresting story.
A slow moving book of repressed tension. Toibin seems to truly inhabit and humanize his chosen grand subject of Henry James, while demonstrating the same restrained respect and tact that James would exhibit himself. I think he did a remarkable job of bringing a difficult and reclusive character to life. There were certainly many moments when I felt that the poor guy was repressed to the point of absurdity, but I enjoyed the author's ability to find a way of balancing and slowly releasing tensions.
