Beatrice and Virgil
Release date: 2010 / 197 pages
Synopsis (from the back cover): When Henry receives a letter from an elderly taxidermist, it poses a puzzle that he cannot resist. As he is pulled further into the world of this strange and calculating man, Henry becomes increasingly involved with the lives of a donkey and a howler monkey — named Beatrice and Virgil — and the epic journey they undertake together…
First Sentence: Henry’s second novel, written, like his first, under a pen name, had done well.
Review: I agreed to read Martel’s latest novel since I had really enjoyed The Life of Pi quite a bit and hoped for another quirky, philosophical, mind-bending tale. Unfortunately, I did not enjoy Beatrice and Virgil as much as I had hoped, despite early promise.
What I can commend is a very likeable lead character — Henry — who appears to share many similarities with Martel himself (a recently acclaimed novel that has brought financial freedom, a son named Theo, an open curiosity toward life). I enjoyed following Henry’s adventures as he tried to overcome writer’s block and create a meaningful life after his recent success.
In the first few pages, I had flagged a few passages that I particularly enjoyed:
Henry continued to live what was essentially a normal, anonymous life. Writers seldom become public figures. It’s their books that rightly hog all the publicity… When he was recognized, Henry didn’t mind. In his experience, the encounter with a reader was a pleasure. After all, they’d read his book and it had an impact, otherwise why would they come up to him? The meeting had an intimate quality; two strangers were coming together, but to discuss an external matter, a faith object that had moved them both, so all barriers fell…
…Readers walked away, their faces lit up because they’d met him, while his was lit up because he’d met them. Henry had written a novel because there was a hole in him that needed filling, a question that needed answering, a patch of canvas that needed painting — that blend of anxiety, curiosity and joy that is at the origin of art — and he had filled the hole, answered the questions, splashed colour on the canvas, all done for himself, because he had to. Then complete strangers told him that his book had filled a hole in them, had answered a question, had brought colour to their lives….
…’Fiction and nonfiction are not so easily divided. Fiction may not be real, but it’s true; it goes beyond the garland of facts to get to emotional and psychological truths. As for nonfiction, for history, it may be real, but its truth is slippery, hard to access, with no fixed meaning bolted to it.’
Colonialism is a terrible bane for a people upon whom it is imposed, but a blessing for a language. English’s drive to exploit the new and the alien, its zeal in robbing words from other languages, its incapacity to feel qualms over the matter, its museum-size overabundance of vocabulary, its shoulder-shrug approach to spelling, its don’t-worry-be-happy concern for grammar — the result was a language whose colour and wealth Henry loved. In his entirely personal experience of them, English was jazz music, German was classical music, French was ecclesiastical music, and Spanish was the music from the streets.
But when the second primary character entered the novel — the taxidermist — I quickly lost interest. As likeable as Henry was, the taxidermist was not — intentionally so. I actually have a particular liking for unlikeable characters in fiction, so this was not initially a problem. However, the taxidermist was, quite honestly, not terribly interesting… even a bit boring. And Martel devotes much of the narrative to Henry’s fascination with this character and his play, so I was quickly dismayed.
I do believe I understood the taxidermist’s role — I enjoyed the interplay of Henry’s second, ill-fated novel and the actual narrative of Beatrice and Virgil, but I just couldn’t keep myself invested. But, the beauty of a book tour is the variety of opinions available, so I hope you will explore the list of reviews below.
Interested in winning a free copy? Drop me a comment below and I will choose a lucky winner by the weekend!
Monday, February 21st: Book Addiction
Tuesday, February 22nd: Nonsuch Book
Wednesday, February 23rd: Rundpinne
Thursday, February 24th: Book Hooked Blog
Friday, February 25th: Musings of an All Purpose Monkey
Monday, February 28th: Man of La Book
Tuesday, March 1st: Suko’s Notebook
Wednesday, March 2nd: Book Club Classics!
Thursday, March 3rd: Lit and Life
Monday, March 7th: In the Next Room
Wednesday, March 9th: Luxury Reading
Monday, March 14th: The Brain Lair
Ahhh.. I’m sorry this one didn’t work for you so well. I really like the quotes you chose to highlight and glad that there were certain things you enjoyed! Thanks so much for being on the tour. We so appreciate it!
My daughter read Life of Pi and loved it. So I’d like to give this book a try. Thanks for the giveaway.
I’d like to give this book a try. Thanks for having the giveaway.