Sight

There's an awful lot here about motherhood and being pregnant, and the gap between a parent and child. And whilst I don't think that I have to identify with a character to enjoy a book, I felt quite shut out by this one. I was reminded of Rachel Cusk (the slightly blurred I narrative, the focus on personal experience). I did enjoy the sections about the history of medicine: the problem was I didn't want to go back to the navel gazing mother narrative. Fascinating stuff about discovering the anatomy of pregnancy, and Freud and his daughter Anna

‘It strikes me as extraordinary, now, that we should be so hidden from ourselves, our bodies and minds so inaccessible, in such large part uncharted.’

In my reading of the shortlist for the James Tait Black prize for 2019 I come to Jessie Greengrass’ debut novel, and I’ll admit that, having read some of the rave reviews, and knowing that it was also shortlisted for the 2018 Women’s Prize for Fiction, I wasn’t quite prepared for what I read. I will be as analytical as I can, and will give the balance I can, but I was very disappointed.

The positives: the ambition of the novel is admirable. As the opening quote shows, this is a book about what lies beneath, both physically and emotionally. Weaving the story of our (nameless) show more narrator, as she is expecting her second child with her husband Johannes, and the stories of the origins of x-rays, psychiatry and anatomy, Greengrass explores the connections between mothers and daughters, and between the scientific and the emotional worlds in which we surround ourselves. The narrative explores the central character’s relationships with her mother and her grandmother (known as Doctor K, an eminent psychiatrist), and there are some touching, intimate family moments between them, and between the central narrator and her own daughter and husband. Where the prose is simple, pared back and concentrates on one thing, then Greengrass proves herself a subtle, careful writer.

However, there are too many flaws to the novel for me to ignore. Firstly, where was the editor in all of this? Greengrass launches into epic, flowery, seemingly never-ending sentences that just try and throw everything at the reader. For example:
‘In that narrow passage-way left over from an earlier iteration of the familiar city I felt that I could breathe again, and as Haggerston gave onto London Fields and the sharp striations of gentility and grime above the towpath began to meld into a kind of uniform grubbiness, when darkness was beginning to spread through the evening air like ink, I felt at last a brief alleviation of my disconnection from myself and for a quarter of an hour, before I reached the steps which led back up to road level and the entrance to my building, everything else fell away, and for that short stretch I felt only what I was: young, adrift, bereft.’

Jeepers! I pretty much chose that at random, because every page is filled with these interminable sentences. Something just can’t be, it has to be like something, and then like something else. And as I read on, I noticed something very odd: everything comes in 3’s. It feels like the author has been to a creative writing class and was told that descriptions should be vivid, come in pairs or 3’s to make an impact. Here’s another random example:
‘She filled the house with the almost-audible sound of pen on paper until we felt ourselves become periphery, ousted from our own comfort and routine, forced to deviate from those paths which habit trod for us across the carpet of the living room.’

The book is relatively short, coming in at just under 200 pages, but really it could be 150 pages or less. It just needed a strong editor wielding a pen to score through all the excess linguistic baggage and then it wouldn’t have annoyed me. Because it did, and every time I started one of these sentences, I got quite irritated. And, on a side point, no-one – I mean absolutely no-one – talks like that. The whole narrative voice is just unrealistic; it reads like a character from a literary novel, not like real life, and this is a major distraction.

In the passages – mini-essays, almost – where the focus is on Wilhelm Rontgen’s discovery of x-rays, or Freud’s developing psychoanalysis and his relationship with his daughter Anna, or on the development of the study of anatomy by John and William Hunter, the narrative style is much less intrusive. But again, when the two narratives merge and the central character starts to draw parallels and inferences from these historical moments to her own life, and human relations in general, then it becomes more of a clash than a subtle merging. The styles just jar, and it feels like there are two completely different books going on at the same time.

And what are we, the reader, to make of the anonymity of the main female characters? Our narrator, her mother and grandmother, and her daughter all remain nameless – is this to suggest the universality of the female experience? It almost feels like the individual has been written out of the novel – which would be fine if this was the intent, but as I say, no-one in real life speaks like the narrative ‘I’ of the book, which causes a problem of emotional connection.

The ambition of the novel is bold, and Greengrass can clearly write very well. But going into this with expectations for a prize-shortlisted book, it felt very flawed. It read exactly as a first novel, based on personal biography, and as if the author was just trying to write too much, to be too literary. So, I’m conflicted – I want to praise the ambition, but I need to be honest in my reaction, so I give it 2 stars. Others have and will continue to praise this, so it just goes to show how varied readers can be. show less

The narrator of the book is currently expecting her second child, with her partner, Johannes. This second time around in her life is causing her to contemplate the relationships that she had with her late grandmother and her mother, as well as the effects of having a second child will have on the bond she has with her daughter. To better comprehend the complexity of being a parent and a child at the same time she spends time in the Wellcome Trust library reading various books. Whilst she is in the library she discovers and reads the works of Wilhelm Röntgen, and the X-Rays he discovered, and about Anna Freud, daughter of the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud’s and John Hunter, the pioneer of modern surgery.

There was a lot that I liked show more about this book; the recollection of her childhood with her grandmother and the time that she spent there and her looking after her mother at the end of her life and how she sees her kinship developing with her own children make for fascinating reading. She has a beautiful way of writing too, it is sparse and yet eloquent.
However, I thought that the wandering off into the realms of Freud and the other medical practitioners really didn't fit with the rest of the story for me. I get the psychoanalyst link to Freud with her grandmother, but it distracted from the story. Greengrass is definitely an author to watch though. show less

When is the best moment to have a child? Can you ever be ready to become a parent? And what does being a “good” parent actually mean? Jessie Greengrass unnamed narrator has to face these questions. Her husbands would like to have children, she is unsure. Her own childhood comes to her mind, her mother and grandmother, the way they treated her when she was a child, their complex family relationships and the fact that neither her mother not her grandmother is still alive. Yet, families and relationships are never easy, thus, Röntgen and Freud come to her mind as well as the beginnings of modern child birth.

Jessie Greengrass debut novel directly made it to the short list of the 2018 Women’s Prize for Fiction. It is an unexpected show more and uncommon combination of medical history, on the one hand, and a very personal reflection on the narrator’s own life and her feelings about motherhood. It starts with the narrator confronted with the essential question of becoming a mother or not when suddenly her rumination is interrupted by the report about Röntgen. Again and again, these two perspectives alternate which is interesting, but also difficult to follow since it often seems to lack a red thread. They are not isolated accounts, she cleverly combines the topics, e.g. her grandmother was a psychoanalyst like Freud, to give a reason for these interludes.

I can see why the novel made it to the Women’s Prize for Fiction’s short list. The topic tackles a core question of human beings and a deep wish we all share: knowing something for sure, being able to use medical precision for personal decisions and knowing that you do the right thing. Being able to look at something from a neutral and objective point of view, analysing and then making a decision – that’s what we often wish for, however, that’s not how life works.

Contradictory emotions, uncertainty – a lot of apparent opposites come together in the novel. Even though I found the narrator’s thoughts often easy to following and from a topical point of view most interesting, the novel as a whole did not completely convince me. I would have liked to stick with the narrator’s thoughts. Maybe it was all a bit too philosophical for my understanding. show less

Told in three sections, the nameless narrator explores being a daughter taking care of her dying mother, a granddaughter with her psychoanalyst grandmother, and a mother. Tied to these meditations are the stories of Roentgen’s discovery of the X-ray, Sigmund and Anna Freud’s work in psychoanalysis, and the beginnings of modern surgery and the study of babies in the uterus. This is not a plot driven novel, nor is it strong on character- we learn little about the narrator. It’s a kind of meditation on seeing ourselves- body and mind and how we change depending on our roles.

It was a slow read for only 200 pages. It seems like a book I’m supposed to like, but actually don’t. I suspect it’s too intellectual for me. I found it show more interesting but I was not drawn into it. Three stars. show less

Greengrass provides a thoughtful look at how being pregnant and becoming a mother is closely interwoven with the relationship one’s own mother. Filled with colorful descriptions, at time she provides examples overrun with emotions that are offset by the casual historic review of surgical procedures. A sense of helplessness and sadness causes the author to become an impartial observer to retain some sense of sanity.

This is one of the most beautiful novels I have read recently. The author has a wonderful ability to move lightly between the historical facts and the life of her heroism, from the Lumiere brothers to the life of Freud family then the surgeon William Hunter and the painter Jane Van Rymsdyk.
Greengrass tells the story of children, mothers and grandmothers in a passionate way full of human sense. I read it one session without interruption.