In my short life I have learned that short novels need to be read for as long as they can be. Then the good ones should be reread. This is a challenge. These short novels masquerade themselves as something that you can appreciate in a few hours of reading. Yes, you can read The Lover in an afternoon, or The Hour of the Star in a few hours on a park bench with a good coffee in hand, or you can sit with The Crying of Lot 49 one Tuesday evening and get through it all. If you have the ability to handle the cruelty, almost anything by Coetzee can be easily consumed in a single sitting with Glenn Gould's two recordings of the Goldberg Variations playing in the background. Yes, you can even enjoy them in that time. This is true. But I must give myself some space to contradict myself here. None of these books can be read in a few hours. Short novels are the hardest novels to write, they need space to breathe between rapturous reading sessions. They deserve time to become themselves in the same way that larger novels do. The good ones count among some of the best works of written words - give them life by giving them more time than they need. I haven't done this yet with Anne Carson's Autobiography of Red, though I did give it more than a week to grow and become something that lived with me for a while. That's a long time for a book that is only 150 pages long, and in poetry-ish form, and so those pages aren't all that full. I'll read it again though. This is a beautiful book, short story, poem, that deserves that extra time and extra effort. And it will reveal itself all the more.Some reviews on GoodReads have gone to the trouble of capturing a perfect excerpt of writing from Red's story. I haven't done that - I've never done that for any of my reviews, though I have written some of these lines in a notebook I've reserved for wonderful writing from books which range from good to bad. Go read some of these excerpts. They won't make sense to you now. But come back after having finished the story, book, poem, and you will recall that moment perfectly. It will likely have a stronger impact than it did when you first read it, or when you read through the poem chapter a second time to make sense of whatever emotion it was that you felt in that flicker. Something about this prose drills into your brain. Which is interesting in the best way possible.This is a simple coming-of-age story, where the life of the protagonist, Geryon, is placed in relation with that of Herakles. If you know your ancient Greek poetry these names might mean something to you. They didn't to me. Well, Herakles did, but only because of childhood stories and Disney movies and painted Greek pottery and silly adult erotic fantasies I've acquired about perfect hulking male bodies. Regardless, this simple coming-of-age story, taking for its inspiration ancient Greek epic poems, is as far as possible from being either Ancient or Greek or simple as can be imagined. It is set in the modern day, in South America and America-ish. It is set in both the real and unreal world, and the line between the two is ubiquitous and invisible.It is highly original in form and shape and approach.It is beautifully written. Shockingly well-written. Remarkably well-written.It is heart-breaking and honest and at times its vulnerability is nothing short of disruptive.It has profound things to say about relationships and adequacy.It is humanity and human and monstrous. All of this is important in this poem, short story, novel, but you must figure out why on your own.I don't cry why I read, because I'm a man and I think that means I can only cry in shower or something like that. And so saying that this book made me cry would be a lie and I don't like to misrepresent either myself or the ways in which twenty-first century masculinity in Saskatchewan has profoundly damaged my ability to be my natural self, but there is a moment in this book that has left me profoundly sad. I related to it far too well. It is captured in one word - which those who have read the poem, short story, novel will recall.Degrading.Good lord that word has so much weight. What a monster this book has unleashed! And the most horrible thing is that the intimacy which makes that word so ugly in this book is a result of those very same silly adult erotic fantasies I've acquired about perfect hulking male bodies. Monstrosity turns me on. Dammit.The Autobiography of Red is worth a week's worth of reading, deserves a spot on your shelf, and is more than worthy of the second reading that it will certainly end up getting after you set it down and let it breathe and unsettle you. If this isn't a book that is taking up some space in your home, I suggest you go out and pick it up.
This book marks, without an ember of doubt, the first time I've ever felt burned by my lack of education in the classics. I approached this book ready to feel cowed and lost, so I was enthralled when that was not the case.I understand Geryon intimately, for I, too am a red creature.From a forgotten notebook of mine: "On my steady diet of nicotine and coffee, my thoughts grind (like bad teeth) into points. I am a sharp-shaped thing. A needle, an arrow, I cut. I can touch rage: rage that was the only sprig of life on the barren potato farm; rage tucked into the left work boot for the dark walk home from the plant; rage channeled into the line of a razor's making, at first invisible, then blessed red. We all know the color of rage. Red will unmake me."Geryon's red is a different hue, as has my own ripened with age. Passion. Shame. Love. The interior exposed and vulnerable. Heat. Longing. Did you know longing was red? Do you know how close you are to knowing that? Like the terrestrial crust of the earth which is proportionately ten times thinner than an eggshell, the skin of the soul is a miracle of mutual pressures.Fuck Herakles. That bitch and his arrogance, never seeing the deep red interior of his jailbait trick. Winning is blindness. Winning is empty. Winning is lonely, even with a joint in one hand and a cock in the other. It is through losing that we learn to make bread in the volcano's eye. It is through returning that we get wings.Anne Carson, thank you for making a hero of the vanquished, for turning a flat story over and finding the life growing beneath it. Geryon stood upright within the rayon planes of his brother's sports jacket. Sweat and desire ran down his body to pool in the crotch and behind the knees. He had been standing against the wall for three and a half hours in a casual pose. His eyes ached from the effort of trying to see everything without looking at it. Other boys stood beside him on the wall. The petals of their colognes rose about them in a light terror. Meanwhile music pounded across hearts opening every valve to the desperate drama of being a self in a song."What is time made of?" Geryon asks frequently. Fear of time came at him. Time was squeezing Geryon like the pleats of an accordion.And: ...A man moves through time. It means nothing except that, like a harpoon, once thrown he will arrive.What does this thoughtful young artist have against time? We might think it's his death -- we all know his demise is assured before reading the book, or at least once we find out he goes up against Herakles: on the other side of the world somewhere Herakles laughing drinking getting into a car and Geryon's whole body formed one arch of a cry -- upcast to that custom, the human custom of wrong love.But here Carson has turned the story around -- it's not death Geryon waits for, but heartbreak. And heartbreak, as we all can't help but know, is red like thunder.
What do You think about Autobiography Of Red (1999)?
This book is the perfect combination of story and philosophy. It conveys the immediacy of sensory and emotional experience while simultaneously asking serious intellectual questions about that experience. The main character, Geryon, is a version of a monster from Greek mythology. Carson turns his monstrosity into all that is both beautiful and difficult about being a creative and desiring person.The main part of the book is the story of a romance between Geryon and Herakles (In Greek mythology Herakles' tenth labor was to kill the monster Geryon. Carson provides enough context in her introductory sections for the reader to see what she is doing with the Greek sources.) I've seen Carson's Geryon referred to as "gay," which I guess is literally true, but I wouldn't call this a novel about a gay relationship. The story is so mythical and so centered on individual experience that there's almost no social context for Geryon's sexuality. Some readers may find it challenging to allow a male-male relationship to stand for all human desire, but I believe that is Carson's intention.
—Beth
Well, I finally finished this. I suppose I find the style intriguing (long lines, short lines)) as well as the concept (red-winged monster-person has his heart broken), but ultimately the book didn't do much for me. I know this book is much loved by many friends of mine, so I do kind of have that "what am I missing?" feeling. I guess here is why I didn't like it that much--what's the point of all that framing stuff in the introduction? And, more importantly, I found the love story very ordinary--Geryon is quiet, more introspective, and Herakles is the typical beautiful careless boy (made me think of that gorgeous guy in The Talented Mr. Rupley). Also, I could suspend my disbelief somewhat--ok, so no one notices that Geryon is red? And, alright, so Geryon's reality is some sort of hybrid between classical Greek times and today?--but I guess maybe Carson didn't go far enough for me in establishing this hybrid world--I wanted more details.My overall thought is this--it's cool to have this little winged red dude as the protagonist of this verse novel, but I found that both overall plot and the characters outside of Geryon lacked development.
—Leanna
In this tender but brutal book, Anne Carson writes an iron-fortified queer heart, a little red monster hiding his wings:"A healthy volcano is an exercise in the uses of pressure.----Geryon sat on his bed in the hotel room pondering the cracks and fissuresof his inner life. It may happenthe the exit of the volcanic vent is blocked by a plug of rock, forcing molten matter sideways alonglateral fissures called fire lips by volcanologists. Yet Geryon did not wantto become one of those peoplewho think nothing but their stores of pain. He bent over the book on his knees.Philosophic Problems."… I will never know how you see red and you will never know how I see it."Thinking about queer narratives that are neither proud nor sad: ones that are complicated and perhaps a little guilty. Ones that are embarrassed for their own hurt. Ones that develop in myth and fantasy or are retconned as such. Ones that are profoundly boring. Ones that lack such apparent narrative necessities as the closet or coming out. Ones we write.
—Zoe
