A Single Man (original 1964; edition 2001)

A Single Man is a short book that takes place in a single day. George, the protagonist, is a gay Englishman in late middle age, living and teaching in California in 1962 and mourning the sudden death of his longtime lover, Jim. It’s a seemingly normal day: George commutes into work, teaches a class, goes to the gym, visits an old friend, goes to the bar and has a drink with a student. But under his placid surface is a momentous grief, and a terrible rage against the inhumanity he sees in the world. This is a protest novel as powerful as any I’ve read, and a spare meditation on aging and loss. It was recently made into a film starring Colin Firth, who I love, and it’s a testament to the power of Isherwood’s writing that I have no desire at all to see the movie: George’s voice in my head is everything I need it to be. ( )

"Now a major motion picture" the cover of this edition proclaims and, this being one of the few times when I've seen the film before I've read the book, it was naturally narrated in my head by Colin Firth. The film was beautiful, but I loved the novel even more. It's very intimate, sad in places, of course, but at other points it is simply joyous - giddy with happiness - and very funny.

"just plain happiness - das Glueck, le bonheur, la felicidad - they have given it all three genders but one has to admit, however grudgingly, that the Spanish are right, it is usually feminine, that's to say, woman-created." How could a linguist not love a passage like that?

I've rented the movie and borrowed the book from the library, but I'm going to have to go shopping and buy a copy of the book (if not both). I'm going to want to revisit George again. ( )

4 stars or just under. apart from saying i was floored (why?) by the ending, i'm not sure i can say much about this other than - so poignant. beautiful little snippets of truth and such honesty written in a way like i've never seen before, which makes it worthwhile all by itself. it went too fast, this is one you want to read slowly. ( )

I so preferred this to the movie (not that I didn't love the movie too). With the movie, it's so pretty and so glossy it almost acts as a barrier to George's grief, which I suppose I appreciated because Firth's portrayal is so tempered I was almost too afraid of George's grief bleeding through the screen and leaving me in tears.

The book is without that glossy barrier. You get a sense of George's emotions, all of them so very obviously curled over at the edges with loss as he navigates the every dayness of life during one particular day, almost an outsider to himself. I wasn't too thrilled by the last Isherwood I read, but this one had me one page in. The language, the narrative style, the unexpected humour mixed in with the sadness - it's just absolutely perfect writing.

Adored this. Heartily recced. ( )

George is a middle-aged literature professor at a California University. Having lost his partner Jim in a terrible car accident, the aftermath of which, due to stigma against gay men in the 1960s, he could play no part, he is stumbling through daily life trying desperately to cope with his grief. Although I’m a staunch book before film girl, the resurgence that Isherwood’s beautiful novella has experienced since Tom Ford’s 2009 creation means I am absolutely busting to run and shake the man’s hand.

Once I had managed to surmount the impossible situation of there being absolutely no chapters (exactly where am I supposed to close up for the night!?) I could sit back and lose myself in Isherwood’s wonderful meditation on a changing world. Using a desperately vulnerable man as the key witness to wild preoccupations such as war, love, education, grief and discrimination lends this book an immediacy and rawness that is incredibly moving.

Both of Isherwood’s novels I have experienced so far have been a perfect Relish-reading experience Well written, emotive and amusing; full of original, fascinating characters clinging desperately to the good left in life….in George’s case, even when those you love are gone…..

A beautiful book, 5 stars.

http://relishreads.wordpress.com/2012/12/10/a-single-man/ ( )