The Master

Rating:
Summary: James as James saw himself
Review: Most novels about the life of an author (or other artist) fall into the "Lust for Life" trap: they focus on the more sensational aspects of the author's life; and they portray artistic creation as a temporary madness, during which the author is taken out of him/herself into the exalted state in which a work of art is produced. James, by contrast, dealt in nuance and restraint, small gestures with enormous meaning, and unexpressed desires leading to endless regret. I felt that Toibin captured James' voice perfectly, both in his own writing style and in what he chooses to tell (and not tell) about the author. James was exquisitely sensitive and kind, but both his New England upbringing and his homosexuality (which, if expressed, could have had serious consequences, as the chapter about Wilde makes clear) combined to turn his warmer impulses inward. His personal life may appear to have been a series of (mostly) dead ends, but that's the tragedy that he turned into art. (And, having always thought of James as an effete man-about-town who happened to be a good novelist, I was surprised to learn how extremely hard-working a writer he was, generating a constant stream of essays, reviews, and stories.) The conversion of life into literature happens, not because of a visitation by the Muse, but by the continual gathering of small impressions and linking them together to form a coherent, compelling whole. James, an inveterate journal-and-notebook-keeper, gave his biographers a lot of material to work with, but this novel is far and away THE most convincing depiction of the creative process that I've ever read. A master as seen by a master.

Rating:
Summary: the work of a master
Review: o The Master is Colm Toibin's fictional account of five years in the life of author Henry James when he progressed from obscurity to an author of renown. The novel starts with the opening (and immediate closing) of James' play Guy Domville. The author then retreats to Ireland to hide his humiliation. The Master charters Henry james path back to the limelight. The book is a deeply poignant and meditative study on a classic author who saw much success in his own age. Toibin, while chronicling James' time, trials and tribulations, shows how the events that shaped his life inspired his writing. In `The Master', Toibin pays glowing tribute to his own spiritual master in the art of writing. The Master is a serious piece of literary erudition that is a work of an author coming of age. This is Toibin's best work so far, and one of the most enjoyable serious books of the year.

Rating:
Summary: A Quiet Book
Review: Of Henry James, some wag remarked that he chewed more than he bit off. Most James readers will know what this means -- the intricate digestion (and redigestion) of psychological insights about human interaction. This novel attempts to recreate something of what went into making such an extraordinary author. Toibin, who is among the major gay novelists now writing, and also one of the very few with a refined sense for the literary tradition of the modern gay novel, is thoroughly at home with the fin-de-siecle atmosphere of James' world; even Toibin's prose is shaped to reflect the elegance of that age. The story that Toibin tells is not exactly tragic, but it is very sad: an author whose highly developed powers of observation are plainly a compensation for his inability to commit to personal relationships (as in the flashbacks to his sister Alice and to the rather more threatening Constance Woolson).

There are many great moments in this book, but one that I shall always cherish is his encounter, toward the end of the book, with the formidable Baroness von Rabe, who remarks, of an earlier encounter with James: "We all liked you, and I suppose you liked us as well, but you were too busy gathering material to like anyone too much. You were charming, of course, but you were like a young banker collecting our savings. Or a priest listening to our sins. ... And I think that is what you are still doing. I don't think you have retired."

This novel is essential for its recreation of the living novelist.

Rating:
Summary: Well-written but not very compelling
Review: The Master is one of those books you just hate yourself for not liking more. There's the guilt of not enjoying a book about a "Great Writer", the guilt of not enjoying a book despite its beautiful writing, the guilt over not liking a "year's best" book, etc. But the truth is, The Master, while an enjoyable read, wasn't a particularly enjoyable story.
I love books where "nothing really happens", but in this case, it really felt like nothing was happening, in the book or in the reader's mind. I could appreciate the book on all sorts of intellectual levels: it is beautifully written in many places, the structure (an episodic tour of James' relationships that never became relationships) is well-paced and well-balanced, Toibin himself is a "master" at the small, quiet scenes of character and poignant action (or inaction). And I like the whole setup of revealing a man's character through a web of interactions with others, especially one whose interactions are so passive. But emotionally the book never had an impact. And the story never grabbed me, or even tugged at the sleeve. It was, admittedly, a struggle to finish it and I read several other books while doing so.
One needn't have read James' to follow the book, though certainly it adds a richness to the text if one has some familiarity. For those who do not, Toibin does a decent job of giving thumbnail sketches of stories and novels, though sometimes it feels a bit clumsy, especially in the repetitive pattern of James seeing something, than telling himself, "I will write a story about . . . " and the reader plays "I can guess that story in X words." There is also something a bit too mechanical and clinical in how James' creative process is presented.
If one hasn't read James and has little interest in him, then the book does work as a wonderfully surgical character study, focused on many quiet moments, a book filled with hints and implications and undertones and half-starts and no-starts. But it worked only as a character study for me and while I didn't need a car chase, I did need more than James' repeated pattern of hesitant passivity to keep me wanting to read on. If anything, the book slows even more at the end, when it begins to focus a bit more on his immediate family, all of whom captured my interest even less than James' non-familial relationships.
The Master is certainly not a bad book, it is in many respects an excellent book, but for me, it was not an interesting book, and so I just can't recommend it despite its writing strengths. More guilt to deal with.

Rating:
Summary: Overwrought
Review: Toibin is a wonderful writer. My favorite book of his is The South. Unfortunately I found this novel (about five years in the life of Henry James) to be a little overwrought and at times bordering on pretentious. It seems self-consciously literary. One can almost feel the writer straining at the bit. There are some wonderful moments -- an amazing scene where James throws a friend's dresses in a canal (based on a true story). What is also annoying is that Toibin's dialogue is not consistent -- after reading the novel I went to the five-volume biography to see where Toibin had gotten his images. At times Toibin uses the literal words of James', at other times (when the dialogue is best) it is invented. I feel that I have not sung Toibin enough. He, along with McCann and McGahern, is among the best of Irish writers. Anyone interested in craft and beauty should read his work.

Rating:
Summary: Mastering the Interior Life
Review: We all have interior lives, but how does it feel to have one that spins language out of life into great literature? THE MASTER'S brilliance lies in Toibin's ability to convey the sensation of lived experience, even when the "living" is as seemingly uneventful and snail-paced as Henry James's appears to have been. James's mind glows through Toibin's graceful prose. We get to witness the transformative power of memory as it infuses the solitude of a great mind. Toibin's writing feels effortless, even though he makes the terror and exhaustion attending literary creation almost palpable. This is one of the quietest "great" novels I've ever read.