Solomon Gursky Was Here

by Mordecai Richler

[clementine]

This is my first foray into Mordecai Richler's adult fiction. I'm not sure why, but I wasn't expecting to enjoy it - perhaps because being assigned a nearly 600-page novel in the last few weeks of my degree is a bit of a bitter pill to swallow. However, I ended up actually quite enjoying it, mostly for the reason that people seem to dislike it: I'm a huge fan of multiple interlocking narratives, most especially if they aren't presented chronologically. Others have found the book difficult to follow, but I don't think it was too bad. There are a lot of characters to keep track of, especially in the Gursky family tree - it took me awhile to really get a grasp on how everyone was related to one another. But I don't generally have a hard time keeping track of complex, non-chronological narratives.

I also loved the revisionist approach to Canadian history, another criticism of the book. I believe Margaret Atwood called it sacrilegious (blasphemous? something quite damning) to have Ephraim Gursky on the Franklin Expedition - but then, Atwood used the expedition very differently in her 1991 short story "The Age of Lead". Regardless, I thought it was like a delightful game of Where's Waldo? to spot Ephraim and Solomon all across history.

I liked the writing style as well - acerbic, direct. Not that I'd expect any differently of a Montreal writer. I know I mentioned just the other day that I prefer texts with characters who I can relate to, but I thoroughly enjoyed Solomon Gursky despite the fact that there really isn't a single likeable character in the whole thing. I suppose a good, well-told tale can triumph for me once in awhile.