Making History: A Novel (original 1996; edition 1999)

Hmmm well this was clever, and I love Stephen Fry's authorial voice, but somehow it ended up making me sad. Then again I wasn't in the best mood to start with so it may be I would have been more amused if I'd been in a better mood to begin with.

MINOR SPOILERS - Nothing you wouldn't get from reading the blurb.

I liked the premise quite a lot, that preventing the birth of Hitler might not produce a better world after all. Because yeah, Hitler was an evil man but he didn't invent and prosecute WWII all by himself.

But somehow the working out of the premise was a little bit flawed. There was a lot of time spent on the lead up to preventing the birth of Hitler. But once the protagonist finds himself in this new world where Hitler was never born, he just looks up some stuff in the library and says oh I don't like this, and races to get home again.

Which all falls together pretty fast - given that he's stranded in a strange world he sure figures out how to turn it around without much difficulty. It felt a bit uneven. Still, I liked it enough I'll probably read something else by Fry at some point. ( )

En humoristisk bok alternativ historia, om varför "Let's kill Hitler!" inte hade löst problemet med Nazityskland. Humoristiskt skriven med stort allvar under, ungefär som man kan förvänta sig av en person som Stephen Fry, i uttryckets mest positiva bemärkelse.

Making History is an alternative history novel. Michael Young, a PhD student at Cambridge, coincidentally meets a professor, Leo Zuckerman, as they happen to have adjacent pigeonholes. Zuckerman’s father was an SS doctor at Auschwitz and when Zuckerman sees that Michael is studying German history, he decides to trust him with his story. Together, they hatch a plan to change history so that the concentration camps never existed: by making sure that Adolf Hitler is never born. They manage to change history, but something goes wrong in the process. Michael wakes up at Princeton university in the US and freaks out the people around him by not knowing anything of this life in the US that he is supposed to have led. Added to this, he also finds out that the plan didn’t work completely: with Adolf Hitler no more, another man was allowed to rise to power in his place. Michael must find Zuckerman and try to put history back the way it was.

Fry has chosen an interesting subject and deals with it tactfully while still maintaining the sense of humour that makes him the comedian he is. Making History asks questions of us: if we could change the past, would we? More importantly, even if we can change the past, should we? We may think we are acting to change things for the better, but we cannot foresee all changes and this may lead to unexpected consequences. Ultimately, though, Fry ends on a note of hope: the world can be a better place, whether it is despite or because of our actions. ( )

A science-fiction, alternate history, comedy novel. I loved Pup, who was a very realistic student (I thought it was very funny how he got that nickname). The way history was changed by what he and Leo did was believable but there were places where the story dragged and I was waiting impatiently for something to happen. So it was good, but not as good as Fry's "The Liar". ( )

We all know what happens when characters in a novel mess with history, but try they must, especially when they have a chance to prevent Hitler from being born, and so they shall. This is what the protagonists of Making History think and who can argue with such an obvious course of action. Stephen Fry in his third novel comes up with a remarkable narrative construction, which is clever, endearing, smart, intelligent, amazing, and unfortunately grossly under appreciated. Us readers don't remember a novel for its clockwork plot precision, we remember it because we relate to people and the events happening to them.

Without giving too much away, the hero and his sidekick Darwnin-esque-action-professor manage to first screw up history big time and then put things back in place with many personal lessons learned concerning life, love and the pursuit of alternate realities.

Does it all work well together? Surely the novel is a great read and highly entertaining, but a there is also a persistent sense that Fry is trying to make a point he can't quite get across. Unfortunately the one obvious message can't be accurate since the reader might have to conclude at the end that we should be glad we had a Hitler because the most likely alternative would have been much worse. Certainly it is arguable that only one possible outcome is presented from a range of historical possibilities. However, other collaborating details, for example the personalities of the other soldiers waiting in the wings besides Hitler in the trenches of World War 1, can not give the reader any other options for seeing how things might have turned out for the better.

Although this novel is written much later than The Liar, it uses surprisingly more primitive narrative constructs, something I wasn't expecting. For example Stephen Fry uses a lot of lists and litanies to get a point across, which is something the Victorians loved to do but which has run its course. Even Helprin in his novel Freddy and Fredericka discovered it doesn't work anymore and has since abandoned it. Fry shows off not only his deep knowledge of World War 2 but also flaunts his linguistic skill by subtly playing with English-isms vs American-isms. A clearer case of temporal plot for occurs when the author clearly points out when we should remember something for later usage. A box of bright orange pills spills on the ground and the owner starts screaming that these are highly dangerous. Surely these pills must be useful for something later in the book. And they are.

It's hard not to like a Fry novel, the man is a really good writer and his plots are quite refreshing, not to mention that his stories are quite entertaining. Making History is an odd one however, it is a quick read of something that felt like it was meant to be something bigger. A recommended read but also pick up some of the author's other novels. ( )