As She Climbed Across the Table

Read this on audio. It was a random pick when I was searching thru Libby for a new audiobook. I like Lethem a lot, and this was one I hadn't heard of before. Its a short (under 6 hours) but weird tale that is essentially a love triangle story where Philip is in love with his physicist girlfriend Alice, but he is losing her, not to another man, but to nothing. Actually nothing, an anomaly in a lab, a hole, or perhaps a doorway, that they call "Lack". Is it sentient, or is there someone on the other side? Philip doesn't know and he's very concerned for Alice. One of his early works. Third, after Gun, with Occasional Music and Amnesia Moon. A very odd, but enjoyable read

I love Jonathan Lethem's voice. The style he writes in is so casual, so sly you feel like you need to reread the words to make sure you haven't missed something important or at least clever. As She Climbed Across the Table is told from the perspective of Anthropology professor Philip. The story he tells you is at once heartbreaking and humorous. His girlfriend and colleague, particle physicist Alice Coombs has fallen in love with a void, a tiny black hole. The only problem with this? The void, named Lack for obvious reasons, has refused Alice's attempts to lose herself in his depths. This "lack" of affection on Lack's part only makes Alice desire him more. Why? Because it seems as if he (because it has to be a he for Alice to love) has show more a personality capable of rejection. He will devour car keys and other items of significance, but not Alice. show less

Narrator, Philip Engstrand, is a professor and in a relationship with particle physicist Alice Coombs. The short novel basically explores their relationship as allegory/interpretation of a specific experiment in advanced physics. The physics part is obviously not realistic as this novel is obviously a parody/spoof of some of the more wretched parts of academia.

There are some very witty and amusing parts – but none of it is “hysterical,” as one reads here and there about this novel. The funny parts are because the narrator has a bit of dry humor sarcasm, the author has a decent insight into situations and characters, and because the novel is also asking us to ruefully laugh at ourselves. In my experience, that latter is a very show more difficult thing for people to do – the laughter usually stops when it gets to that point.

At no point is Lethem trying to play scientist. He does write academics fairly well. In fact there are a lot of the characters that are written spot-on and then, like a good caricature artist, he enlarges their humorous aspects. show less

Philip loves Alice, but Alice has forsaken Philip and fallen in love with a hole in the universe created when her physics experiment went a tad awry; Philip wants Alice back - but how do you compete with Nothing?

A bizarre book. Weird but compelling. Amusing and peculiarly (in both senses of the word) entertaining. After I finished the book I couldn't decide whether or not I liked it, couldn't stop thinking about it, mentally gave it a firm prod and a thorough shake to see if I could make sense of it, and finally gave up all of the above and just let it percolate around my brain. A memorable read, but definitely odd.

Alice Coombs is the modern and adult version of Alice in Wonderland. But instead of falling down a rabbit hole, she becomes irresistibly attracted to a black hole that was created in her physics lab. This hole, anthropomorphized as Lack, exhibits a personality in the form of which objects it ('he') will consume and which are rejected. So Alice falls in love with this scientific curiosity, and it's making her boyfriend Philip understandably jealous. But as suspicions are aroused that they're 'leading the witness' by interpreting Lack's selectivity as personality, Alice becomes more and more enthralled with Lack. The only flaw in their romance is that he refuses to swallow her up. She's tried.

So As She Climbed Across the Table is a light show more academic satire, given that Alice becomes caught up in her work as near to literally as possible. The critique of academia questions the possibility of objectivity, and whether observers can possibly actually observe without bias. At one point, a literature professor steps in to offer the liberal arts reader response approach: "In this field we speak of the text, in this case Lack, as possessing an independent life, free of context. The idea is that any given text contains its own decryption kit, if we approach it free of bias." The absurdity of it all, studying and interpreting and falling in love with 'nothing,' skewers the liberal arts, soft sciences, and hard sciences in one fell swoop. Nice. show less

This is the first of Lethem’s novels that can be accurately described as one, rather than a stretched out short story or a crudely pasted together amalgamation of short stories. As She Climbed Across The Table concerns a love-lorn anthropologist, Phillip, whose physicist girlfriend Alice has become obsessed with a wormhole dubbed “Lack” which has been created in her physics department at a California university. Lack is notable for making certain random objects disappear, while others pass right through it. Phillip becomes increasingly concerned at Alice’s obsession with Lack, which he suspects is bordering on romantic infatuation.

I wouldn’t call this a satirical novel, as others have, though it certainly pokes a lot of fun at show more various academic pursuits, and academia and university life in general. This is the first of Lethem’s novels which is ostensibly set in the real world, but although the speculative element – a manufactured wormhole, not so different to what’s going on at CERN – is easy to swallow, it later develops into events which, while fascinating, made the book quite surreal. It’s a love story, and while I wasn’t particularly wrapped up in it, I never had trouble believing it.

That’s one of Lethem’s great qualities – he’s always totally in control of his prose, even if his story comes off the rails a bit. It reminds me quite a lot of the early novels of Michael Chabon, about which I said that Chabon was already a master writer, just not a master storyteller. Both writers have prose good enough that I’m willing to forgive the overall pointlessness of some of their novels. The closest word, I guess, is “readable,” though that implies shallowness and ease of reading, which isn’t quite what I mean.

Both authors are also adept at perfectly capturing human thoughts and emotions and discussions. Their characters are perpetually thinking things they aren’t saying, and analysing their train wreck conversations in real time while pretending everything is fine. I like it. It’s realistic. It reminds me of how I (and, I presume, everyone else) think about how I stumble through life without ever actually articulating it, even in my head.

Anyway. I’m enjoying reading through Lethem’s early novels, even if I wouldn’t necessarily recommend them. Next up is Girl in Landscape, followed by the first of his books that’s actually well-known, Motherless Brooklyn. show less

You know by now that I love Lethem, right? Who else could write a love triangle with a physicist, a social scientist, and nothing? Though it includes a blind Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern, Schrodinger's cat, and many other amusing features (some of which are surely physics jokes that I don't get), this is pretty much a love story. It's relatively simple, sometimes a little labored, but generally pleasant and fun to read. Turn on "Particle Man" and enjoy.