One Squiggle Too Many

Greta Garbo used a pseudonym if she ever signed an autograph. She called herself Harriet Brown if you must know. The point is, why must one ...

Greta Garbo used a pseudonym if she ever signed an autograph. She called herself Harriet Brown if you must know. The point is, why must one know this? That also brings us to a crucial question, whether we should at all get to know Alex-Li Tandem.

Zadie Smith gives us a number of reasons to want to know Alex. He is young, weird in a funny way and thinks knowing autographs is like chasing women or fearing God. Also, he is Zadie Smith8217;s creation. And who are we to suspect her craft when Salman Rushdie himself thinks she8217;s among the best of their tribe to have graced our bookshelves.

About her craft, there are hardly any reasons for suspicion. She drags you into Alex8217;s world with the full force of her description. His worldview sucks you into moments of deep depression and, without warning, pulls you out into sudden, refreshing upliftments.

The Autograph Man
By Zadie Smith
Hamish Hamilton
Price: 16.99 pounds

The narrative meanders around Alex8217;s life like a powerful thread, pulling, dragging and breaking with loud snaps. It8217;s repulsive at times. Making your skin crawl at the sensation of Alex8217;s girlfriend Esther8217;s two aborted foetuses. She thinks they are embedded in her thighs, one in each: 8220;and she could see their fingers, pressing to get out.8221; Did you say 8220;ugh8221;? Well, that8217;s precisely the reaction Smith would have wanted.

So, all right. Smith has you wrapped around her little finger. And then? You liked the way she wrote. But did you get a hang of what she wrote about? A tale? Story, maybe. And it8217;s not as if linearity of thought is what one expects all the time or a book always has to have a story in it. But didn8217;t she start by telling us one?

I mean, Alex did begin by being driven off to watch a wrestling match with his pals. His father did have frequent splitting headaches that ended in him getting a brain tumour. And here again, the sheer brilliance of prose kept dazzling you off and on 8212; 8220;his death is like the soft down on the back of your hand, passing unnoticed in the firmest of handshakes, though the slightest breeze makes every damn one of the tiny hairs stand on end8221;. Hypnotic. Well, almost.

Alex8217;s life could8217;ve been three-dimensional or episodic which is probably what Smith has tried to achieve. But aren8217;t the characters a bit too weird. Not that one has anything against weirdos. They8217;re possibly the best thing that ever happened to humanity. But have you ever heard of the weird, or let8217;s say the other, being stretched a little too far? All I can say is, powerful prose can be engaging only to a point. Beyond that, there are only good or, may I say, unpretentious stories.