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Boring and dull, I was bitter and annoyed the entire time I read.
I liked the idea of watching the girl fall to the cult through her boyfriend's view. The rape scene was, in my eyes, entirely unnecessary. Phoebe was already too deep in the cult for her to come back to reality so easily, it's framed that her sexual assault is what drives the nail in the coffin sealing her fate in the cult
She was already in the cult at that point, she would have just continued to be sucked in further. I find it frustrating that that scene is framed in such a manner.
I was torn about this book. A lot of the claims that it's “trauma porn” and one of those “gay torture” books threw me from reading it for a long time. I waited until I felt a bit more comfortable reading it and was surprised to find that I really only considered one aspect of this book to be belonging in the “indulgent trauma pity party” and that is the cutting. Jude has many many many scenes of him cutting and the are sometimes too long. This is really the only thing that irked me about this book.
The way this book is talked about I was prepared to read rape scenes, but this is spared from the reader. While there are lots and lots of mention and talk of rape, sexual violence and abuse it is not forthright with the descriptions, often it's factual and short. There is also a ladder that we climb as we read, the higher we go the more the skyline of Judes past makes sense and begins to fit together.
For those who say that Judes abuse is too “spectacular” fuck you. For those who say that his friends and loved ones made the wrong decisions regarding his health, yes they did but have you ever been put into that position? It's a very terrible position to be in. My one true gripe with these characters, for how smart and talented they are all supposed to be, is why none of them ever tried to get Jude to meet other sexual abuse victims?
One of my favorite scenes is where Harold is speaking to JB in the kitchen, JB is straightforward (as he always is) and tells Harold that him, Malcolm and Willem suspect that Jude was subjected to sexual abuse as a child. I expected this to really shift Jude's perspective or have him contemplate why his friends suspected, no, knew, this so easily of him. For him to realize that he must not be alone in his struggles.
Of course my favorite relationship in this book are Jude's three closest friends. Willem, JB and Malcolm. How it stretches and changes over time, the elastic bond of titanium that some people have to each other.
But most stunning is the language, the prose, and the overall writing. It's a novel meticulously strung together. My favorite bits, that were annoying at first, are the way characters are mentioned, but they come back. Most every name dropped circles around and around making a full web of life that our main cast inhabits. It's quite an impressive feat of character.
I got this as a birthday present when I was in 7th grade. Like any book I am obsessed with it will never leave my side. I would spend some recesses reading this, and I loved when my classmates would leaf through it and be amazed at how absurd it looked.
I have two copies now. The first one having been devoured by time. Throughout high school, when I was in a particular dark place I would just hold the book to my chest during class, re-read my favorite passages I had marked. The first copy doesn't even have a cover anymore, it's been lent out to so many of my friends.
The second copy has a hardcover and remains mostly untouched. I have it incase the first one is out of office. My point is this book is beautiful (a word which I hardly use and dislike) and it helped me out a lot.
This took me longer to get through because the content is so gross. This is lessened by the style of writing, the craft here is incredible.
Looking through the reviews, and by other comments Ive heard, there is a lot of talk of “feeling sympathy for a pedophile” as I've read the book now, I can say I never felt this.
When are we supposed to feel sorry for him? I never do or did while reading. At anytime he was put in danger, or felt loss, even in his recollection of childhood, I simply did not care for such a characters well being.
It is strange reading about such a grotesque character. Who does irredeemable acts upon a child. Which is not even his only flaw. He is classist, he is racist, he is so so many terrible things. He is unaware of himself through the entire book while us the reader can see him in his pathetic totality.
I do not suggest this book to anyone who is weary of it. Its masterfully put together, its crafted so well, it does, after so many years, still have something worth hearing within its pages. Its about Dolores. I wanted to know her so desperately, who she was away from him. Her favorite candies and her secrets amongst friends. I wanted to know that she still had a shiny little marble of herself tucked away from this vile evil man.
Of course we only get glimpses of her through his eyes as he does not care about Dolores person. He does not see her as a person, he's come up with a terrible name for girls her age and deprives them of any humanly respect.
What made me decide to read Lolita finally was seeing that Nabokov had asked for the cover to not be of a girl. Not have any resemblance of a girl on the cover. His request had not been heeded.
