(An alternative title for this post could be “how can I write about one of my final A Century of Books titles when I don’t want to write a review of it”.)
Back in October, Lizzy’s Literary Life ran an NYRB Classics fortnight – and I started reading Raymond Kennedy’s Ride a Cockhorse (1991), which I bought in America a few years ago. Naturally, I didn’t finish it in time – and, indeed, finished somewhere in the middle of December. And that was grudgingly, in order to finish a 1991 book for A Century of Books – because I rather hated it.
It started off promisingly, albeit bizarrely – in the sudden change of Mrs Frankie Fitzgibbons. Having been a mild-mannered bank employee for many years, she has a sudden lust for power and vitality and, well, lust. Specifically with the teenage member of a marching band, who is the first victim (though a willing one) of her personality transformation. Having sated herself with him, we don’t hear from him again – Frankie turns her attention to the bank.
And then most of the book sees her meteoric and ruthless rise to power at the bank – firing loyal employees, threatening turncoats, and wilfully destroying the lives of anybody who says a word against her. It is all rather grandiose and over the top, but had a thread of believability at the centre – that is, if somebody did turn this monstrously ambitious, would anybody be able to stand in their way? (The NYRB Classics edition’s claim that it presages the rise of Sarah Palin is rather a stretch…)
I could see what Kennedy was doing, I think. It was supposed to be black humour, as well (perhaps) as showing how women are treated differently from men when it comes to ruthlessness or ambition. And I recognise that Frankie isn’t supposed to be likeable. But… I hated it.
One of the things I really can’t stand (in books or in real life) is selfishness that is wildly out of balance. I can just about understand the motivation of a character who ruins another’s life for enormous gain, even if wouldn’t be pleasant to read – but those who do it on a whim make me sad and angry. Not a scholarly response, but I’ll put it on the list of traits that blackball a book for me…
So, I did make it to the end of Ride a Cockhorse, but I rather wish I hadn’t and my copy has already gone to the charity shop.
Are there traits that have the same effect for you? Is there anything that’s a long way below murder etc that still puts a character beyond the pale for you? Join my ire!
(The remaining two books for my A Century of Books are much more up my street.)
“Those who do it on a whim make me sad and angry”. It reminded me of Iris Murdoch’s A Fairly Honourable Defeat, which I coudn’t even finish. I wonder what your own response to that novel would be ? The main character is Julius King, a satanic figure who is out to destroy the relationship of a loving homosexual couple. As always with Murdoch, it’s a novel of ideas (snores)…Tallis is that Christlike figure who is supposed to stop the proliferation of evil (really ? more snores)…I might give it another chance one day though, since some critics have seen “a comic masterpiece” in it, and this aspect totally eluded me at the time…
Animal cruelty will usually do it for me anytime – and in fact also if I find a character intolerable for other reasons. I abandoned my first attempts at Angela Thirkell because of the hunting element, and also because I found the bullying of his mother by the character of young Tony so irritating that I couldn’t carry on. I might have reacted differently if it was what you might call a more serious work but as Thirkell is supposed to be entertaining, and I wasn’t being entertained, I abandoned it and I’ve never gone back to her.
Tony is pretty annoying at first. He gets better in later books. I don’t remember any hunting in Thirkell (I may not have read that particular book yet) but she does make the occasional anti-Semitic remark which is definitely off-putting. I’ve read about seven or eight and thankfully it’s been absent for the last few. I have really been enjoying them though the plots and characters all seem to be running together lately.
I read all of Thirkell one summer. There are some very unattractive attitudes typical of her time and class, but they don’t become really troublesome until the later books. The books set during WWII are best; she becomes a very angry and reactionary Conservative by the end of her run. Don’t get her started on the NHS.
I can’t do with animals being put in just to die as a plot device and I’ve been struggling with adulterers since getting married (with no adultery before or since the marriage: no idea why I suddenly could not bear, but I could not – I can manage a bit of that now).
Cruelty to animals, women and children does it for me — it seems so prolific in thrillers that I don’t even read them any more. And I definitely have gotten more selective of my reading later in life, if I dislike or am bored by a book I just find something else. I have too many books on the TBR to suffer through something I’m not enjoying.
Extreme violence is a big turn off for me. I tried David Baldacci’s Robie Series and was repulsed.. I also thought they were an invitation to teen angers to become interested in guns and the military in general.
…sorry, should read teenagers.
…sorry, should read teenagers
I ditched a book this autumn about 3/4 of the way through because I just got so tired and bored with the main protagonist’s self-centredness and egocentricity. So I’m with you about this, Thomas. Also loathe cruelty to animals or animals dying in the story–Old Yeller left me permanently scarred as a child, as did Black Beauty.
It’s gratuitousness – be it violence, cruelty and especially squelchy sex that puts me off reading. I can cope with protagonists that I hate, provided their traits advance the plot!
I can’t bear heavily plot driven narratives that seem overly hectic with lots of things happening one after the other. Modern thrillers are the worst for this. I also hate overt sexism, gratuitous violence to women or cruelty to children and animal cruelty. If an animal dies off camera or of old age fine, but I don’t want anything upsetting.
I would have given up on this well before the end……
Even the possibility of cruelty to animals will make me avoid a book; if there’s a picture of a dog on the cover, I’m going to need a written assurance that the dog will not die before I crack it open. Oddly, I can read truly grim mysteries about serial killers without a qualm. Not sure I want to know what that says about me.
Negativity or tone of voice can be off-putting for me. Also a rhythmic prose that seems unrhythmic and therefore difficult to read. So much of my reading is serious that my personal reading time becomes too precious to wade through pages that are not enjoyable!
Happy New Year to you and yours, Simon!
🥳
del.
Cruelty! I just couldn’t read “We need to talk about Kevin”.
Hmmmm interesting! I find I can really dislike a character (anyone who harms a dog is on my Shit List), BUT still really enjoy the book – I think it comes down to basic writing craft. It sounds like Kennedy put so much effort into writing an unlikable character (to Make A Point) that basic character motivations were overlooked, and that’s really frustrating for a reader. I think we can forgive (or at the very least understand) all manner of sins if there’s some quasi-relatable reason for the behaviour.