Is Donna Tartt's THE GOLDFINCH a great novel?

[Clopin]

Bump.

hahahahahahaha, cute.

[Tyrion Cheddar]

You were Judy Poovey, weren't you? ;-)

<raises hand> I confess. :-0 'Hampden College' of the novel is funny to me not only because of its obvious basis in the Bennington College of that day, but also of Hampshire College, from whom Bennington inhaled a number of classmates of mine. So you see, let me just point out, 'Hampden' is kind of a blending of the two names, is my point, is the thing I'm trying to say.

[ajvenigalla]

So I just started on the novel. The first two chapters feel really elaborate. It feels something out of Great Expectations, but I was strangely engrossed in the otherwise elaborate and somewhat excessive chapters.

Perhaps I may very well like, perhaps even love, the novel

[Pompey Bum]

Good luck with it AJ! Take your time and just read to enjoy. Stay with it, though. Let us know how it goes!

[chrisvia]

Calidore nailed it. If you haven't read it, don't seek to learn everyone else's opinion of the text, not even those of famous critics. Not only should you be the judge of whether a book is great; doing what you're doing is a good way to bring all kinds of unnecessary baggage to the experience.

Act on your interest and be confident in your abilities to experience the text for yourself! Don't let the jaded opinions of others diminish it before it even starts.

But since you asked: Along with All the Light We Cannot See, The Goldfinch perpetuated my dwindling flame of hope in contemporary fiction.

[ajvenigalla]

^ ah, I loved ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE, which was one of my favorite reads in recent times

[Pompey Bum]

Act on your interest and be confident in your abilities to experience the text for yourself! Don't let the jaded opinions of others diminish it before it even starts.

Wise advice for this or any other book.

[ajvenigalla]

I just finished the first three chapters.

It's slow and elaborately written (in a way it recalls Charles Dickens's GREAT EXPECTATIONS in terms of elaborate style and 19th-century tone transplanted to the 21st century). However, it was engrossing in its own way. I felt like I wanted to keep reading.

[Pompey Bum]

I'm glad you're enjoying it so far. The book makes nods at a number of classic novels, including Great Expectations. Tartt is a little playful about that sort of thing in The Goldfinch. Notice the times she uses some version of the name Pip as the story unfolds: Pippa for the novel's Estella; Popper/Popchik for the puppy that is a symbol of Theo's underlying damaged innocence during his adventures with Boris and time on the road. Mr. Barbour seemed to me to be a kind of lampoon of Mr. Jarndyce from Bleak House, or perhaps of a general type of "older benefactor" character from Dickens. Boris obviously has something to do with the Artful Dodger from Oliver Twist, although he is even more like character of Rogozhin from Dostoyevsky's The Idiot (and note how many times that novel is referred to as you or discussed in The Goldfinch). I forget exactly how much has happened by the third chapter, and I don't want to give any of the plot away, but I'm glad you're enjoying it so far. Stay at it!

[ajvenigalla]

^thanks man.

I can already pick up the shades of Charles Dickens

[Calidore]

Calidore nailed it. If you haven't read it, don't seek to learn everyone else's opinion of the text, not even those of famous critics. Not only should you be the judge of whether a book is great; doing what you're doing is a good way to bring all kinds of unnecessary baggage to the experience.

Act on your interest and be confident in your abilities to experience the text for yourself! Don't let the jaded opinions of others diminish it before it even starts.

But since you asked: Along with All the Light We Cannot See, The Goldfinch perpetuated my dwindling flame of hope in contemporary fiction.

I like your opening sentence very much, but I should clarify that I wasn't telling him not to seek others' opinions; rather, since he'd already found a good balance of opinions that didn't convince him either way, to go ahead and check the book out for himself.

I think it's perfectly fine to read criticism in order to avoid wasting time on a book you wouldn't like. Doesn't always work--I'd very much like back the time I spent on War and Peace--but life is short and books are many.

[Pompey Bum]

I disagree a little, Calidore. I love to read reviews of books I have already read, but I pointedly avoid them before starting, just so I can have my own experience of a book without the need for some critic or lit critter's approval. I find Pulitzer and Booker nominations a helpful way to beat the odds without actually reading a review. I occasionally run into books I wish I hadn't started, although it's pretty rare (and I finish them just the same--even the really long ones). I also loved War and Peace.

[chrisvia]

Luckily, in this case, the extratextual exposure resulted in a zero-sum game, but I am a big advocate of "going in cold" as they say. Although, if we really break this down, we will realize that, along the way in our reader's journey, we establish a sort of immanent rubric by which we measure a work before we begin. In my opinion, the best way to experience a text that we deem of worth is:

1. Read the text (at least the first 50pp to determine whether to continue).
2. Read reviews, opinions, criticism, and any supplementary text within the work itself (e.g. introduction, afterword, etc.).
3. Read the text again.

This is, of course, to say that there is only one way to read a book and that is to re-read the work. On the second reading, you will be able to temper your own and evaluate others' findings, which is all quite fun!

Calidore has asserted another great point, like Hippocrates well before him: Ὁ βίος βραχύς, ἡ δὲ τέχνη μακρή (life is short, art is long). Over time, as you continue to reinforce your personal immanent rubric, you will by necessity get both more selective and more intuitive--but I still advocate at least the first 50pp of a book of interest over letting others instill predispositions.

Parting thought:
O how many times have I abandoned a book only to find it and savour it later in life!

[Pompey Bum]

I find the "look Inside" function at Amazon helpful. It almost always tells me if I am going to find a writer's style annoying, which something I am especially wary of. I may or may not like a book once I'm done, but an irritating style can make for a hellish slog.

[Calidore]

I disagree a little, Calidore. I love to read reviews of books I have already read, but I pointedly avoid them before starting, just so I can have my own experience of a book without the need for some critic or lit critter's approval.

I'm not sure where approval enters into it; I'm just seeking another's opinion, same as asking friends. A good reviewer will go into detail about aspects he likes or doesn't like about the book, and I can decide which I care about and which I don't.

I find Pulitzer and Booker nominations a helpful way to beat the odds without actually reading a review.

They can help, but an award is like a plain star rating--not a lot of info by itself. When I picked up A Confederacy of Dunces, I knew it had won the Pulitzer but didn't know why. 100 pages later, I still didn't know why, but I knew I'd read about 99 pages more than I needed to. The Pulitzer's credibility has been forever tarnished for me because of that book.

I also loved War and Peace.

Yeah, I'm definitely in the minority there. The 1960s Russian and 1970s BBC TV adaptations are very much worth watching, though.

To address chrisvia's other point: Just reading the first 50 pages is something, but some books may not get going until later after the groundwork is laid. Can't think of one offhand now, but a good movie example would be The Wages of Fear. It's going on a hour before the actual plot kicks in, but that's deliberate on the part of the director--he took his time showing us life in the squalid little dead-end town so we'd understand why these men were willing to risk their lives just for a chance to get out. The boredom was an ingredient of the filmmaking rather than a side effect. Someone going into the movie blind wouldn't necessarily have gotten that, and if he left he'd have missed the second half of a killer suspense film. Someone who read a review, however, will know what to expect and be prepared. I personally like to be prepared.