The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt - An Excellent Book

I have just finished reading The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. It has a massive 864 pages and is one of the longest books I’ve read apart from Dickens’ novels. Even several of Dickens’ novels don’t have as many as 800+ pages.

Maybe Donna Tartt went on a little too long. Because she doesn’t write many novels, maybe she thinks that when she does write, she should produce many pages. No matter, she writes brilliantly. It isn’t just me saying so - Donna Tartt won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2013 for The Goldfinch.  

The beginning of this book is heartbreaking and describes the profound loss and grief that a child feels on losing a parent. The boy in this book loses his mother in an explosion in an art gallery in New York. There is no good age to lose a parent but it seems to me that 12 is one of the worst ages. At age 12, a child is just coming up to adolescence, a difficult and confusing time. The adult world is on the cusp of opening up. To have someone who has loved you, and has known you since birth, is every child’s birthright. To have that person no longer with you must be very difficult to deal with. I very much hope that the love given before the death, can be drawn upon. Maybe that is just a fantasy.

When he was 16, my son had a girlfriend of the same age. The girl’s mum had died of epilepsy, when the girl was 9 years old. Her brother was 12 at the time. They barely spoke of their mum. I don’t think they had the words. I think about them even now, 8 years later, and not only do I feel compassion for the brother and sister, I also feel so sad for the mother who died and had to leave her children – thereby missing out on their lives, not being there to share the joys and difficulties life throws at us all.

The boy, Theo, in The Goldfinch, goes to stay with his friend’s family, but it is no substitute at all for the life he lived with his mum.   And the story continues. It is beautifully written. The characterization is superb, the descriptions evocative and the emotions so credibly conveyed.

After the explosion, the boy goes back to his apartment, certain that his mum will be there waiting for him. As he waits for her, he talks of how, when he was younger, his ‘greatest fear was that some day my mother might not come home from work.’ This is a fear that I can very well relate to. I had exactly the same fear. I can remember watching for my mum out of the window and dreading the light fading and it going dark. I believed that some disaster might befall her out there in the dark, without me to look after her. That comment might appear ridiculous, as I was 8 years old and would be pretty useless against a determined assailant. But that is how I felt and I can still feel that anxiety now, the strength of it, the choking sense of something having happened to my mum because I wasn’t by her side. Decades on from worrying about my mum, who is now 92 years old, I can still feel that sense of dread but now it is directed at those who are motherless and to the dead mothers who missed out on their children’s lives. That is a particularly cruel tragedy. So it’s no wonder then, that when my youngest child reached 21, I did a dance of joy and relief. 

Jeremy Corbyn and Company.

So much has been said about Jeremy Corbyn. Ever since he gained enough support to be placed on the Labour leadership ballot, it's not easy to think of anything new or original to add. Nevertheless, I am undeterred and will say something anyway.

My dad, born in 1918, was a staunch Labour man. It was because of him, initially, that I voted Labour. My dad was not perfect, but his loyalty to Labour and his belief in justice for all, redeemed him. So it was my dad who got me interested in politics. University deepened that interest. That said, I was friends with a girl who seemed to me to be very politically aware and very left wing. We attended the International Marxist Group meetings, the Socialist Worker Party meetings and the Militant Labour Party meetings. When I asked her who we were going to affiliate ourselves to, she said the IMG of course. I nodded sagely, as if I too thought this was the best option but did dare to ask why she thought so, exactly. 'It's obvious!' she said. Looking at her, puzzled, I asked why that was. 'Because the best looking men are in that group of course!' Just a different kind of politics then, I suppose.

There is no denying Jeremy Corbyn's resounding victory over Yvette Cooper, Andy Burnham and Liz Kendall. Of the three, I preferred Liz Kendall, despite her Blairite credentials. She was at least honest and consistent. The other two, I have no time for at all. Yvette Cooper barely said anything other than vague comments about 'rebuilding' and 'coming together' - not a word about how, and very little policy revelation. She would look at Corbyn, head to one side, a look of condescension and irritation on her face like a headmistress of a primary school, listening to the excuses of one of her most trying pupils.  Her finest hour was encouraging the government to take in more refugees, and the cynic in me cries out that she did that in order to enhance her own popularity, thereby increasing votes for her.

Andy Burnham became confused and forgot what he stood for. Witnessing the hourly increase of votes going Corbyn's way, Andy panicked and spoke of renationalising the railways, 'line by line' and leaned dramatically to the left in the hope that some Corbynistas might suddenly prefer him. It was not to be. They all three bleated that Corbyn was unelectable. But, hang on. The other three have been in opposition for some time, so why pick on Jeremy Corbyn as being unelectable, when the other three do not have much to shout about?

So, as expected, Jeremy Corbyn won, with almost 60% to the vote. Young people, people who had left Labour because of Iraq and people who had never had an interest in politics previously, all turned out to vote. At Corbyn's rallies people flooded in,  venues packed full to bursting. something was happening, something was changing and so the right wing Tory press started to stick the boot in. And how. The claims flew in.  Corbyn was best friends with Jerry Adams. Corbyn was in love with Osama Bin Laden. Corbyn was friends with every conceivable enemy of Britain, including Isis. He wants the queen out of Buckingham Palace and living in a tent. then he will guillotine the rest of the royal family, even the children.

Jeremy Corbyn is a calm, measured, kindly man, who cares greatly about inequality in Britain. He cares about the vulnerable, the disabled, the ground down and those exploited at work.He wants to tax the rich to help the poor. He wants to redistribute wealth, he wants rid of nuclear bombs and he doesn't want to start wars in the Middle East. He is a conviction politician, with a desire for the those who didn't receive a full hand of life cards, to be better cared for.

It is not respectful to sneer, call him a dinosaur, persistently refer to him as left wing, when we don't refer to Cameron as right wing or any of the casual insults thrown out to land at his door. It is a shame that those who attempt the hatchet job on decent, reasonable people pay little heed to how it may well come back and bite them.

What a fuss about someone not singing theNational Anthem! Corbyn has already said he may well sing it on some occasions. He is not a royalist. He is a republican. At the ceremony this week to commemorate those in the wars who gave their lives, Jeremy Corbyn was thinking about his mother and father,who played their part. Corbyn is a patriot. He loves this country.

As the old cliche goes, a week is a long time in politics. Five years is a very long time in politics. Anything could happen. Screams of, 'He's unelectable!' may well quieten down as the new leader takes charge. Some he will surprise, some he will annoy, some he will thrill, some he will make enormously grateful, because he has helped them in a way no other politician has.

Let's give him a chance. Lets see what he does, what policies he develops and if he can change the yah boo politics of The House of Commons. The Tories may be riding high at the moment but if a week is a long time in polities then that applies to the Tories as much as it does Labour. We'll see.