Anthem is, to put it mildly, rather a strange book. It is, perhaps, the book that 2022 deserves: quirky; darkly cynical; very funny in places but desperately sad in others; simultaneously deeply pessimistic but finally (perhaps unrealistically) optimistic.
The book is set in an America of the very near future with several incidental characters who are named real people and key figures who are given fictional names but who are clearly identifiable. It must have given the lawyers pause.
Hawley likes to take down the fourth wall from time to time and talk directly to his readers. Thus we know that he does not intend to take sides. There are two parties in the USA: the party of Truth and the Party of Lies and they are, he says, interchangeable.
… Right now, the Party of Truth is in power. Before that the Party of Truth was in power. (Except it was the other party.) You can see how this is going to go. For short, let’s call one side Truthers and the other side Liars. Which is which depends on you.
Let’s not kid ourselves though. Hawley is a fully paid up member of the Liberal Elite and this book was never going to view Trump (referred to throughout as the god king) in a positive light. In fact, one of the funniest passages of the book is a random, rambling Trumpian monologue which catches his tone exactly and which, sadly, is too long to include here. It includes the line:
“But the omelet comes and the sausage – can I just tell you – the size of my pinkie, okay. Or smaller, ‘cause I got pretty big hands.”
It’s fair to say that this is not a book to appeal to mid-Western Republicans.
But, I hear you cry (because this demolishing the fourth wall is catching), what is the book ABOUT?
Good question, but arguably irrelevant. Is the Lord of the Rings about a couple of midgets trying to throw a ring into a volcano, or is it an epic metaphor about good and evil and the struggle for civilisation? Is Anthem a story about mass suicide amongst the youth of the world (although, frankly, this is so US-centric that “the world” is purely background colour) or is it an extended riff on the failure of modern politics, our refusal to deal properly with climate change and the general unpleasantness of human beings to each other? (That’s a rhetorical question, by the way.)
My personal politics hover somewhere between the Party of Truth and the Party of Lies, which means that I quite often read the Guardian but find that its painful insistence on being continually shocked by the basic unfairness of the world can irritate. Anthem is like reading the Guardian steadily for 427 pages. Fortunately, Hawley is a seriously good writer and his prose carries you along, even when you are losing patience with his remorselessly metrosexual, comfortable, all-American view of life and its woes. After all, the starting point of the book is that we are supposed to feel sympathetic and concerned about all the dear little children of privilege who are killing themselves because – well, we never discover exactly why. Teenage angst gone mad, mainly. It was difficult to care that much before the teenagers of Ukraine found themselves taking up weapons in a doomed attempt to save their homeland but, now that the news is full of young people with real troubles, I find myself struggling to tune up the world’s tiniest violin.
Hawley built his reputation in screen-writing and this is reflected in the style of his novel. While it does take itself seriously as a novel of ideas, it is happy too lurch off into action-packed sequences which show a Hollywood-inspired lack of attention to plot detail. People meet when the plot needs them to meet; escape deadly traps with implausible ease; and, when required, return from apparent death. When all the author’s attempts to get people to the right place at the right time fail, he resorts to having them guided directly by god, who speaks to them via a teen savant who calls himself the Prophet.
There is a figure called the Wizard (not a real wizard and bearing remarkable similarities to Jeffrey Epstein) and another called the Witch (probably a real witch). (You may notice that several characters seem unduly attracted to Capital Letters.)
The Witch appears, with no backstory and little attempt at narrative coherence and tortures a major character over an extended period. She is then apparently killed (more than once) but remorselessly continues, evil incarnate, to pursue our young hero until she doesn’t any more. She vanishes from the storyline as inexplicably as she arrived in it.
The messages from god, the improbable coincidences, characters like the Witch – all these are things that we have grown used to in a screenplay. The sort of thing where you wake after a fun night at the cinema (or on Netflix – this is 2022) and say, “But how did he know that she would be at the nightclub?” Only pedantic people allow this to spoil their pleasure in a good action movie, but one of the things that distinguishes books from film is that the plot of books should try to avoid this sort of thing while Anthem positively embraces it. I’m not going to give examples because even I am not quite that pedantic and, in any case, it would involve massive spoilers, but once you start looking you will see a lot of them.
So is this a terrible book? No, definitely not. It positively bowls along and the prose is a pleasure to read. And it does make some sharp and worthwhile points about the world we live in. But it is not the Great American Novel that some reviewers (and maybe even the author) think it is. It may well be the Great American Novel That Defines 2022, but that’s a bit like being the most cheerful Russian novel about the Gulag: there’s not that much competition and even the best of the field (take a bow The First Circle) is still pretty depressing.
Writing a review of Anthem and trying to say intelligent things about it, all the irritating quirks of the book become much more noticeable, but (though I was vaguely uneasy about some of it) while I was reading I was turning pages at speed and generally enjoying the experience. It’s a long book, but it was a relatively quick read. If you are not a mid-Western Republican and you can get through the Guardian without balling it up and throwing it at the wall, then you will probably find more to enjoy than to hate. Read it and form your own opinion.
I did wonder whether to post these diary entries this week. During lockdown, when people moaned about the restrictions on their lives, there were a lot of comments about how they should shut up because it wasn’t as if they were being asked to make the sacrifices that people make in war. And now we are all too aware of the sacrifices that actual wars call for. It puts all our concerns about lockdown in perspective.
As so often when I can’t make my mind up about something, I asked Twitter and Twitter said, ‘Don’t be silly. Life goes on. Run the post.’
So here we are with another visit to my wife’s journal from two years ago. (The last one was last Friday.)There’s no lockdown officially, but people are beginning to make their own decisions to shut down normal life.
Thursday 5 March 2020:
My first Thursday off. Officially I retire at the end of the month. So am I thinking seriously about the rest of my life? Like hell. Everything is in a stage of dislocation and disorientation, where we make half plans, not knowing if they will happen. My [birthday] party on 1 April? Taking the students to Parliament, now arranged for 22 April? Our ski holiday? I have a train and hotel booked for Exeter for Monday – but not for the following week.
I’ve been reading accounts of how a sophisticated multi-billion online advertising industry is deliberately making us distracted – on a daily and deeper level. I keep going to my phone to get the latest infection figures (now at over 80). But all the website actually does is tell us that something nasty is on its way and we should all wash our hands. Must buy more hand cream as my hands are getting dry and raw with all this washing.
Friday 6 March 2020:
To dance or not to dance [tango]? This is the big issue on Tom’s Facebook feed. Warren is closing his Mayfair milonga – followed by news that Mariposa is closing and (more of a shock) Carablanca. Only Martin from Tango Terra stands out. I don’t think it would occur to Martin that anyone would actually prefer a dance-free half-life to going out in a burst of glory, to music in a close embrace.
I sounded goody two-shoes by announcing that I was following Government advice, which was to carry on with normal activities. So on Thursday we went to Terra as normal – not as crowded as I’ve seen it, but pleasantly full. There was some hand gel on the bar, and I washed my hands before, but otherwise had a good time as usual.
We’ve just been to Aldi – postponed from 3 weeks ago when the car didn’t start. We got to Aldi early, and it was already full: the till queues went almost to the back of the shop. Tom and I persevered and filled our large trolley with an astonishing amount of food for £95. 12 tins of chickpeas, jam, mixed nuts. Peanut butter and rice cakes to put it on, so we won’t be reduced to eating it with a spoon. Aldi had a special offer on 24 roll packs of premium toilet roll, which was simply too good to resist. [At the time we were beginning to see photos of empty shelves of toilet paper and you could have taken such a picture in Aldi. What the photo would not have shown was the other side of the aisle which was filled with packs of toilet rolls that weren’t on promotion. Over the weeks ahead we would continually get contradictory stories about shortages. Some of them were true, others were not.]
“If we both die of coronavirus, you will appreciate this inheritance”, I explained to Mike on the phone. He didn’t sound impressed.
Saturday 7 March 2020
Last week in Exeter I obviously reacted badly to reading accounts of how new technology is subverting our lives. I managed to crack my laptop screen. And then tried to take a photo of the quay side in the cold. Fumbled and dropped my phone. So I have just taken it to the screen repair shop. Twickenham has its usual Rugby crowds (England v Wales), so no sign that people are lurking at home.
The phone shop has a big sign saying “face masks sold here”. But no suggestion they are selling any, or that anyone is wearing one.
A few things are disappearing from shelves. When I went to Waitrose, fruit and veg were looking as bounteous as ever. But towards the back – no liquid soap, no paracetamol, no tissues and a distinct shortage of toilet rolls. No couscous. No pasta. Good thing we bought all that stuff yesterday.
Friday 13 March 2020, 4pm
I don’t quite know what happened to Wednesday. Somehow it disappeared in a welter of distraction and uncertainty. My plan had been clear enough. Do some minor work. Pack for ski trip. Get toenails painted. Meet Mike [our son] for supper and see “Magic Goes Wrong” at the Vaudeville Theatre. Oh – it’s a hard life being almost retired.
Instead, I followed Guardian Live obsessively, full of university closures. Italy was in lockdown. Still, priorities: I did get my toenails done. “But no-one will see them” Tom said. Decided I would see them. And then, at 5.15 we got the train to Waterloo to meet Mike at Bella Pasta before the theatre.
Mike looked stressed – but more by ordinary life than Covid-19. When we suggested that Macron would close the borders, he just shrugged and said he hadn’t been following it. He worried that Gilly [his wife] might have to extend her stay in Northern Ireland. “The stuff I’m doing though, isn’t at all important. No-one would notice if we just send everyone home.”
The show was roll around funny. We laughed a lot, at all the obvious gags: the lady who gets sawn in half (buckets of blood); the guy who gets drowned in a tank. Brilliant staging and a lot of verve.
On Thursday, Tom decided that he wasn’t going dancing, so I rearranged to meet D for lunch rather than supper. Went to our usual café, which wasn’t full exactly, but giving the impression of normality. We vowed to keep meeting as long as we could – and asked the café owner for his phone number “so we could check if he is still open”. The owner looked bemused, and then worried. He is still carrying on by momentum and had not contemplated closure.
I called in at work, to chat to C and A about how things were going and picked up at lot of paper to read at home. J is in Geneva, but her big family reunion in the Turks and Cacaos is looking stuffed. Must ring her.
Then got a call from Tom. Martin is offering a free concert with no dancing: “but let’s get together anyhow”. Arranged to meet Tom there, which gave me time to do some last minute shopping. Went to the Algerian Coffee shop, where I lingered as long as possible, smelling the coffee. Then bought a dress from Urban Outfitters. An act of faith in my future life.
I met Tom at 7pm, back in Bella Pasta, where he had a two for one offer. The girl next to us, Charity, had come from Nashville to a Country music festival at the O2, which had just been cancelled. She asked about stuff to see. “If you are at loose end tonight, why don’t you come to a free tango concert,” Tom said. So we took her along.
[I remember walking with her through Covent Garden, usually buzzing early on a Thursday evening. It was eerily quiet. I think that was when we realised quite how much things were changing.]
The atmosphere at Terra was weird. I put on my new dress, and the shoes I just happened to have in my bag. Martin hadn’t moved the tables, as there wasn’t meant to be dancing – so we danced around the tables – with A and K and other regular partners.
“This is a mirage. I thought I could see dancing, but it is clearly a dream” Martin said. We felt we were dancing in the face of doom. As A said, “I’m over 70 and am told that I’m at risk, but you just have to keep going”. But lots of worries too. K played her violin and said all her work had dried up. V was stuck in London, while her father was sick in Italy. Old people die – that happens. But they shouldn’t have to die alone, frightened and isolated away from their families.
It was a night to remember. Dancing as an act of rebellion, as we challenged the fates to do their worst. And as an act of community, as we all embraced. But it will be the last for a while. I wonder what Charity from Nashville made of it.
More next week.
We can keep this up for two years (though I’ll have to start running my normal posts too). Let me know what you think of it.
I’m continuing with the serialisation of my wife’s journal, reminding us of the last two extraordinary years as we already begin to forget it.
After last week’s introduction to the year, with the optimism of New Year’s Eve and plans for the months ahead, we move on to exactly two years ago. Things are beginning to look rather different. For the first time, we see mention of coronavirus. Less than a week later, it’s the main thing being discussed.
Friday 28 February 2020 [Dates are the dates T writes on. The events described are in the days just before that]
Well – 7 Exeter weeks done. [She works two days a week lecturing at Exeter University.] Turned up – on time – did all that was asked. And 4 weeks to go. Will our intrepid traveller brave storms, floods, strikes and plague to complete the course? [Previous entries had discussed storms, floods and strikes, but this is the first mention of plague]. It’s looking dodgy. The question of the day: should I buy (cheap) tickets to Exeter for the last 2 weeks of March, or will the University close, in the grip of world panic?
I had a meeting with DfT officials yesterday. I was expecting them to gossip about Covid-19 turning up at a [meeting they had all been at] in Westminster. Would everyone moan about tracing and testing DfT staff? In fact, coronavirus wasn’t mentioned – mainly because everyone looked so ill. [X] and [Y] were at home, and took part by Skype, looking terrible. [Z], sitting next to me, coughed and spluttered her way through the meeting. Referring to Covid-19 seemed indiscrete in the circumstances.
J returned from Japan, looking happy and healthy and bouncy. Had a great time. Her family in Milan has worried about her going to Japan, but in fact coronavirus turned up at their door. J said a lot about the Italian Government exploiting the outbreak for their own ends.
It struck me that people find coronavirus where they look for it. The Japanese don’t believe they will suffer the same fate as Wuhan because they see themselves as “much cleaner”. J described, in awed tones, the array of buttons in Japanese loos. But the Koreans always suspected Christian sects – and found disease. The Italians are restricting 6 small Lombardy towns, because they can. And not looking too hard at Milan, which is more difficult.
My decision for Thursday was whether to trust the world, and leave my civil service computer at work, ready for when I appear next Wednesday. Or should I lug the laptop home, just in case the MOJ building closes, and the tube stops, and we all have to work from home? In the end I brought the laptop home.
Tuesday 3 March 2020:
To our astonishment, Sunday was dry and we went to Hyde Park for a skate. [We do a lot of street skating.] The wild flower areas now run to daisies and violets. We skated in various squiggles around Chelsea.
The last normal Sunday
So how was everyone? Studiously unworried about the virus. P said a lot about how she wasn’t worried about dying. And no-one was too concerned about future restrictions on their movements. Seemed to think that not going into work was OK.
So that was two years ago. Join us next week to see how things developed.
I’ve mentioned a few times that I’m going to be blogging my beloved’s diary of the covid years. She keeps a regular journal (like the heroine of one of the 19th century novels she loves) and these blog posts are based on her entries made at the time. I think they are worth a look because we have already forgotten what the rules were at any given time (they kept changing), let alone how we felt about them. It’s probably important that we remember. Partly because we need to avoid being gaslighted by a Prime Minister who presents his partial recollections as being a truth we were all aware of at the time, but also because I think that, although we got many things right, we did make many mistakes. Some were foolish, some (with the wisdom of hindsight) didn’t work, and some were, I think, dangerous and wrong. We gave up, in an instant of panic, rights that we have spent our lifetimes claiming define the British and we did huge damage to whole sections of society (notably the young and the old) by what we did. And, like all societies that wake from a period of doing foolish and bad things, we now try to forget they ever happened.
Well, they did.
This is not an unexpurgated diary. Personal stuff (and stuff that may embarrass individuals) has been edited out and here and there bits have been added just to clarify what is being written about. (It wasn’t written for publication.) But it hasn’t been changed with the wisdom of hindsight. It is there to remind us what one person in London felt at the time and how they saw the changes in the world around them.
What is interesting about the opening pages of the journal entries of 2020 is how, at a time that we now know the world was about to change radically, everything seemed so normal. Our friends were looking forward to the year with high hopes of good times ahead.
Saturday 4 January 2020:
On Tuesday it was off to George’s New Year’s Eve party. Walked along the (much prettified) Millwall, to George’s new place – 8 floors up in a Canary Wharf development, with huge balcony and stunning views of London. The Shard was flashing lights at us, while George pointed to Tower Bridge and the Eye. The flat seemed to float it its own little bubble, suspended above the city.
Slowly, the old London Street Skater crowd arrived. What happened to the motley crew of free-wheeling souls who were told to “get a job” by taxi drivers? The talk was about horse riding in the Azores, and skiing in the Rockies and rides in private helicopters.
At almost midnight we were ushered onto the balcony, plied with Champagne and counted down to 2020. At which fireworks went off everywhere. We got a view of the Mayor’s display on the South Bank – and many others, along the Thames and right in front of us. I watched for well over 40 minutes, looking down at the celebrating city.
“Are you optimistic about 2020?” I asked R, who is a gold card carrying member of the capitalist classes.
“Yep. I’ve met Boris a couple of times, and he just wants to stay in power. He won’t try to bring down the system. This time next year we will be where we are now. Still bound by EU rules. Still trading.”
Possibly.
Monday 6 January 2020:
I’ve made a reasonably good fist of preparing for the first few weeks of teaching at Exeter [University]. The idea is to take the train first thing Monday and return late on Tuesday. I’ve booked the tickets and Premier Inn, read up about human rights, made changes to the first 6 hours of lectures, and even invented some seminar exercises, alongside a reading list. Not that it is 100% done, or anything creepy, but I should get through January.
So it’s two days teaching and three days [for the civil service] until I retire at the end of March.
And that was how we thought 2020 would be. Entries up to the end of February were about teaching, worries about the project she was working on for the Civil Service, trips to the theatre, evenings dancing and domestic trivia. There is no mention of disease or epidemics, let alone Covid, until about two years ago next week. Come back then to be reminded what happened next.
I wrote 64 blog posts altogether last year. Some, obviously, were about my books; some were reviews of other people’s books; some were serious essays on historical themes; some were mostly photos of Wales and one (which will come as no surprise to those who know me) was about tango. But what did people read?
Inevitable tango photo
Of the top ten blog posts, four were book reviews. But of the ten least read, three were book reviews. That suggests that a lot of my blogs were book reviews but of the 64 posts, only 11 were reviews. That’s quite a lot, but not nearly as many as made the top and bottom ten. Here’s a thought that might interest authors. (I just put it out there as a possibility.) My regular readers aren’t that interested in reviews (and I suspect that goes for readers of lots of blogs) but reviews get read if, besides my mentioning them on social media, the authors make a fuss too. If that’s true, step forward Gilli Allan, Jennie Ensor and C C Humphreys, shameless (and effective) self-publicists all.
Guest posts are popular too (anything to get away from stuff by me). Grateful thanks to Carol McGrath for her piece on Eleanor of Castile’s Property Portfolio and to Penny Hampson for her robust defence of Bridgerton against historical purists. Both posts made the 2021 Top Ten.
Two of the most popular posts of the year were historical pieces. One was about the history behind the film Edge of the World. I had hoped that Edge of the World would generate lots of interest in The White Rajah as both the book and the film are based on the life of James Brooke in Borneo. Sadly, Edge of the World was one of the many 2021 movies to go straight to DVD as cinemas around the world closed because of Covid and The White Rajah will have to wait for a place in the best seller lists. The other (and easily the most read blog post of the year) was about the sensitivities surrounding the words we use to describe the events of 1857 in India. Was the bloodshed that features in my book, Cawnpore, a mutiny, a rebellion or a war of independence?
Posts on Indian history have always been popular, so you can expect to see more in 2022. Other treats will include my wife’s ‘Journal of the Plague Years’ which will provide a handy reminder of exactly how limited our lives were on each day that our Prime Minister was having a party. It’s interesting to see, though, how it all looked at the time. For example, two years ago, with the country about to be plunged into crisis, there is no mention at all of any concerns about a potential plague. Let’s see how that unfolds.
What about you? What would you like to see me write about? Let me know. After all, as I was told as a child, “Those who don’t ask, don’t get.”
