Book Review: Gone to the Forest by Katie Kitamura

‘The country was in turmoil. And there was besides: sickness and growing and dying. How could they do anything but give in, to what was obvious, rather than what was good? In the face of that accumulation.’

Katie Kitamura’s debut novel, The Longshot, was one of the unexpected delights that come along only too rarely. The story of the final fight by a not-quite brilliant Mixed Martial Arts fighter, it managed to recreate the computer game feeling of having an opponent reach into my chest, pluck my heart out, and holding it aloft, gently squeezing it, from first sentence to final image. It revealed Kitamura as a brilliant writer in her own right; and an air to the minimalist legacy of Hemingway, McCarthy and Coertzee.

Gone to the Forest (The Clerkenwell Press, 2013) confirms such comparisons as entirely appropriate. With sharp, slashing prose and perfectly balanced storytelling, Kitamura explores the death throes of colonialism in a nameless nation.

Tom and his father live on a large rural farm. Ever since he came to the country, the old man has bent everything to him. His unremitting desire, big personality, and ruthless control ensure the farm has been successful, all those around him reliant on him for their safe orbit. But now disruption and native rebellion in the country threatens all he has built, and ill health begins to catch up with him. Tom, cowering in his father’s shadow, has eyes only for the land. It is all he has known. Other farmers circle, danger looms. And when a woman named Carine arrives, the future – whatever it holds – begins to bear down upon them.

In a chapter of pounding intensity, Kitamura brings these man-made tensions together in the midst of a massive volcanic eruption. Fire and brimstone filling the sky. Blocking out the sun. Then covering the land in ash that falls relentlessly. Sending animals wild and driving people to recklessness. It’s a powerful metaphor, the earth purging itself of colonial rule. The cataclysm that births a new age. Identities are questioned, relationships strained.

There’s much Coetzee here, a sort of mix of the wild frontiers of Waiting for the Barbarians and the search for peace away from troubled times of Life and Times ofMichael K. What is particularly clever is the way that Kitamura subtly questions notions of affinity with a landscape. Where much literature associates native peoples with affinity for the land, here it the character of Tom – slow, passive, uncertain; Michael K with privilege – who longs for nothing other than to escape people and live in peace with the landscape. But he is less resourceful than Michael K. Where Coetzee’s character bends a spoon to a natural well and drinks a thimble full at a time – ‘in that way, one can live’ – one does not have the feeling Tom would survive long. And his father’s health is rapidly failing.

On the other hand, the natives here ‘do not believe in property until it is theirs’, at which point they subject it entirely to their will. Cut it up into little pieces. This is the story of the colonialists, but that is not to say that this is a pro-colonial book. It is not pro-anything. Merely presents a series of characters in a fresh light, and the tragedies of upheaval.

Gone to the Forest is a tense, expertly controlled novel. One to read in one sitting. It is short, and the prose races along at a pace not even change can keep up with. Katie Kitamura is one of the most exciting voices in contemporary writing, and this is a marvellous addition to the already heaving realms of colonial/post colonial literature. If writers made swords, Kitamura would be the sort fabled in a Tarantino film. You will not find sharper, finer minimalist prose anywhere. 

Book Review: The Absolutist by John Boyne

The Magistrate, protagonist of JM Coetzee’s finest novel, Waiting for the Barbarians, is one of my favourite characters in literature. Idealistic, yet in an untested sort of way, solitary and in search of a peaceful, easy life, he reminds me a little bit of me. He is a flawed character forced by circumstance into an act of quixotic rebellion for which he pays a high price. But it is his idealism that I return to time and time again. Early on, almost guiltily and without embellishment or drama, he offers a statement that increasingly resonates with me. “I believe in peace, perhaps even peace at any price.”

Many in this world believe in peace as an ultimate aim. But peace at any price? Peace is a means as well as an end? Peace if it costs you everything? It is this idea, that physical force is never in our long term interests, either as individuals or humanity as a whole, that forms the backdrop of John Boyne’s seventh novel, The Absolutist. It is an emotionally caustic and visceral exploration of the extreme actions to which war drives people, and an intimate portrayal of the lives these actions leave behind.

The novel opens as Tristan Sadler, damaged by war and with a guilty secret gnawing away at him, travels from London to Norwich to return some letters to Marian Bancroft, the sister of one of the men he fought alongside in the trenches. Will was Tristan’s best friend, but in 1917 he laid down his guns and declared himself an Absolutist – one not willing to play any part in the war effort -, and was shot as a deserter. As Tristan and Marian walk the streets of Norwich, seeking solace and understanding in each other, they discuss post-war England, their struggles, and the opportunities beginning to appear. Interspersed with this narrative, we relive Tristan’s experiences of the war, first at Aldershot Military Barracks, then the trenches of Northern France. The plot alternates between these two times, from one emotionally taut situation to another, with little to break the sombre mood.

That said, the narrative is led by dialogue and this, combined with the first person confessional style makes for a smooth read. There is an old fashioned feel to the formal language the characters use, and like a Beryl Bainbridge novel, one feels carried along with what happens even while not quite understanding how one has been so ensnared. It is well paced and there is always a sense of moving forward, of characters and situations unraveling towards something significant.

Tristan is a complex and sympathetic narrator: kicked out and ostracised by his father following an unfortunate incident aged sixteen, he joins the army a year later, already hardened by disappointments of life, and moves through the war as though in a daze, unable to believe his life is meant for anything else. This is starkly at odds with Will who, despite being the same age, seems younger, more innocent, and who responds with passion and fury to every situation. He’s a pacifist but a fighter for it, Tristan can’t see anything worth fighting for, except maybe that innate desire to preserve one’s own life. As Will says at one point: the irony is “that I am to be short as a coward while you get to live as one.”

The fact is, neither is a coward. One shows bravery and conviction of belief, the other at times seems brave simply to have got that far in life. Tristan’s homosexuality is a key theme, and one feels the difficulties that this causes Tristan, the sidelining effect it has on him. The Absolutist is certainly not the first book to feature homosexuality between serving soldiers, though it is more understated here than in Pat Barker’s Regeneration trilogy. Tristan’s narrative cuts away before intercourse takes place, reflecting perhaps the shame that society has nurtured in him over his young life. It is hard not to be moved by Tristan’s struggles; he is a tragic character, but one who faces his struggles with a stiff upper lip.

It would be easy to accuse John Boyne of wearing his heart too proudly on his sleeve, or that his direct approach to the subject is a little in your face. Personally I found this clarity of purpose refreshing and made it a rewarding read. The debate around pacifism is handled capably, with both sides explored and no sense of preaching one view or the other. There is a sense that perhaps his presentation of war adds little to our understanding thereof, but then it is difficult to be fresh on such a well explored subject. And because it is so intimately told, The Absolutist enables the reader to experience the war and post-war through one character’s eyes, and do so in an embodied way.

Many writers have meditated on the collision between conscientious individuals and monolithic regimes. Kafka did it in The Trial, Camus in The Outsider, Orwell in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Huxley in Brave New World, and the list goes on and on. If there is an identifiable twentieth century literary concern then it is probably this. However, despite there being a period in the aftermath of the industrial slaughter of World War One, where pacifism was widely popular, relatively little has been written about the conflict between individual conscience and conscription. Few records exist of conscripted soldiers turned conscientious objectors or Absolutists, few novels have featured them. Yet their treatment – usually execution as deserters – remains one of the many unobserved tragedies of the Great War. Names are still not permitted on memorials of the War dead, for instance. In this way The Absolutist both stands alongside the greats of twentieth century literature, and opens up another dimension to their concerns.

I was always likely to respond favourably to The Absolutist. I am incontinently idealistic when it comes to pacifism –I believe it above all else – and the Norwich setting is prominent and recognisable to all who know the city. Among the places we visit are Tombland, the Cathedral, Prince of Wales Road, Timber Hill, and The Murderers pub. The ubiquitous Norwich conversation about the insufferable frustrations of the London to Norwich train makes an appearance too. Interestingly though, these familiar details also allow the partial Norwich setting to be incidental, a mere backdrop to the dramatic and horrific events in the trenches where themes of loyalty, bravery and friendship dominate and the daily battles are against lice, rats and liquid mud as much as the German trenches.

The Absolutist is a tender and engaging novel. It is fraught with tension and tragedy but told in such a clear voice that it is a pleasurable read, and one that will remain with readers for a long time.

The Absolutist was published by Doubleday in May 2011. ISBN: 978035616041