English language
Published Feb. 11, 2001 by University of Minnesota Press.
A Single Man is a 1964 novel by Christopher Isherwood. Set in Southern California during 1962, it depicts one day in the life of George, a middle-aged Englishman who is a professor at a Los Angeles university. The university might reflect CSULA, where Christopher Isherwood taught for some time. In 2009, fashion designer Tom Ford directed a film adaptation of the novel, with additions made to the original plot in the screenplay by David Scearce and Ford.
Good lord the first and last portions of this one are brutal
Lot of weird complicated feelings on this one. Had a lot of stuff you could call “of its time” that doesn’t make it excusable. But the overall vibe resonates hard, and that feeling of social, emotional, and physical isolation hits with ferocity.
"Who says I have to be brave? George asks. Who depends on me now? Who cares?"
I'd seen this movie years ago, and honestly forgot most of the details, but reading this book was like a pile driver to the chest. Isherwood is a master at exploring the extreme complexities of grief, solitude, and identity through an extremely vivid narration. The setting was so crisp and the emotions were so powerful. Spending the day with George, Charlotte, and Kenny made me grow to love them each in the span of a short 175 pages.
Aside from being a queer story, which made me appreciate it even more, it was so plainly human.
"What is left out of the picture is Jim, lying opposite him at the other end of the couch, also reading; the two of them absorbed in their books yet so completely aware of each other's presence."
The …
"Who says I have to be brave? George asks. Who depends on me now? Who cares?"
I'd seen this movie years ago, and honestly forgot most of the details, but reading this book was like a pile driver to the chest. Isherwood is a master at exploring the extreme complexities of grief, solitude, and identity through an extremely vivid narration. The setting was so crisp and the emotions were so powerful. Spending the day with George, Charlotte, and Kenny made me grow to love them each in the span of a short 175 pages.
Aside from being a queer story, which made me appreciate it even more, it was so plainly human.
"What is left out of the picture is Jim, lying opposite him at the other end of the couch, also reading; the two of them absorbed in their books yet so completely aware of each other's presence."
The way that time is unfair transcends identity or era, but that has never been an unexplored concept. This perspective from a queer man and a queer author is one that is unique and carries with it a novel set of complicated emotions. I personally resonated with George's "Uncle George" fantasy, which explored how George was not even allowed to grieve openly, and he wishes he could exact punishment on the whole of society that prevented him from doing so.
The ending pains me. I think it is a very "of the time" ending where poetic irony ran wild. I think the book would have been better without it, but it still holds up as a deeply personal and impactful contemporary classic. I'll leave you with one of my favorite quotes from Charlotte on being British.
"Do you think masochism's our way of being patriotic?"
a touching portrait
