An exquisite little novel in which not much happens until the end, and yet, due to storms of all kinds, the whole world of each protagonist changes irrevocably. Flux, Transition, Contrast, Stagnation"Reality seemed to have lost its accustomed hold, just as the day wavered uncertainly between night and morning."Everyone lives between land and water, but each is also caught in some other dichotomy: childhood or adulthood; togetherness or separation; comfort or poverty; in or out of love; life or death; artistry or manual labour; dreams or cold reality. "Decision is torment for anyone with imagination" because "you multiply the things you might have done and now never can". But that can lead to paralysis.Parallels in my LifeI don't relate to the specific circumstances, but the paralysis of indecision, when torn between two thoughts or situations is something I often struggle with. Sometimes it leads to an impulsive decision (which I may or may not regret), other times I try to pass the decision to someone else, or just avoid making it altogether. I feel I should be able to learn from this beautiful book, but it suggests diagnosis (which I'd already worked out), but no prescription. And that's fine. Setting and AtmosphereIt is set in "the Reach", a small community of barge-dwellers in London, around 1962. The houseboats are permanently moored; their movement is limited to bobbing up and down on the tide.The residents are very much a community, and yet they have almost nothing in common, other than the fact they are all adrift (even the cat), living in a never-world between land and water - literally, and in a more profound, psychological sense."The barge-dwellers, creatures neither of firm land nor water would have liked to be more respectable than they were... but a certain failure, distressing to themselves, to be like other people, caused them to sink back, with so much else that drifted or was washed up."It vividly conjures the vicissitudes of the sights and sounds of the water and weather, aided by a splattering of boaty jargon. "The river's most elusive hours, when darkness lifts off darkness, and from one minute to another the shadows declare themselves as houses or craft at anchor."CharactersAll the characters are Characters. As are the five boats. In fact, tradition dictates that owners are addressed by the name of their boat, though that doesn't happen all the time, and one owner thwarts it by changing the name of his boat to match his own name. The main characters are Nenna (only 32, but with daughters Martha, 12, and Tilda, 6); Maurice, a young gay man making ends meet as a prostitute; Willis, an old marine painter, whose boat is in need of sprucing up; boat-proud Woodrow (Woodie); and Richard, a natural leader, ex-navy, now working in insurance, with the biggest, smartest boat. All have troubles of some sort, though Nenna's are most evident. She's depressed and probably has other mental health issues: when she's alone, her thoughts "took the form of a kind of perpetual magistrates' hearing", perpetually having to defend her action and inaction regarding her marriage. Meanwhile, she is over-reliant on her daughters, who no longer attend school. Her "character was faulty, but she had an instinct to see what made other people unhappy". "Was there not, on the whole of Battersea Reach, a couple, married or unmarried, living together in the ordinary way?" Tilda is perhaps the least convincing character, which is a shame, as it could be fixed by making her 10, rather than 6. Growing up in the Reach, she is understandably fascinated by and knowledgeable about the river; she "had the air of something aquatic, a demon from the depths", and "respected the water and knew that one could die within sight of the Embankment". But her language and insight don't always sound right: "Do you think Ma's mind is weakening?" "It's not the kind who inherit the earth... They get kicked in the teeth". In contrast, Martha is "armed at all points against the possible disappointments of her life, conscious of the responsibilities of protecting her mother and sister, worried a the gaps in her education... she had forgotten for some time the necessity for personal happiness."Plot Summary(view spoiler)[Nenna often chats long into the night with Maurice, but there is a frisson between her and Richard. Willis' barge (Dreadnaught) sinks, though he escapes, and is put up by Woodie. Eventually, Nenna plucks up courage to visit her husband, Edward. He's a wastrel, recently returned from a failed attempt to make money in South America, and won't come to the boat. (Meanwhile, Martha gets friendly with a 16-year old German, Heinrich, staying for 24 hours, as a friend of a friend of Nenna's sister.) She hoped to spend the night and win him back, but things don't go well, and she walks home, where Richard is waiting (his wife, Laura, has recently left him properly) and takes her out in a dinghy, before returning to the Reach. We later discover they did go into a cabin together. Meanwhile, Laura's wealthy sister is over from Canada, and wants to take her and the girls to start a new life there. But Richard is attacked by Harry, an acquaintance of Maurice (who uses Maurice's boat to store stolen goods) and is severely injured. His wife comes back to take care of him. Meanwhile, Edward comes looking for Nenna, but ends up drinking with Maurice, before trying to board Nenna's barge (she's not in, because of the storm) and possibly falling into the cold and turbulent waters. Then it ends! I like untidy, open endings, but this was SO open, I was aghast. Do Edward and Maurice survive? Does Richard stay with Laura? Do Nenna and the girls go to Canada, and if not, do she and Richard have a chance, or even she and Edward? Will Harry be caught, and if so, what are the implications for Maurice (if he lived)? What about the homeless and penniless Willis - he surely can't go on living with Woodie? (hide spoiler)]
This is a book of ambivalence, indecision, grayness and beauty, ebb and flow, of living in between. “That liminal uncertainty seeps through the whole book”, says her biographer Hermione Lee. The more you look, the more you find these examples of the liminal zones. They lived neither on land nor water. Nessa was neither Canadian nor English. To decide or not, for ”when you decide, you multiply the things you might have done and now never can.” Nessa is half in love with her husband, the daughter Martha is half child, half woman. At the beginning of an outing in a dinghy with Richard, Nenna thinks “…reality seemed to have lost its accustomed hold, just as the day wavered uncertainly between night and morning.” Later, “their sense of control wavered, ebbed, and changed places.”Hermione Lee’s recent biography Penelope Fitzgerald: A Life provides a wealth of background and insight into the book. Reading that chapter right after I finished this book greatly enhanced my appreciation and understanding of it.Fitzgerald herself, back in the early 60’s, lived for two years on a houseboat called Grace (the subject of the Dedication: “For Grace / and all who sailed in her”), in the same place as the boats in the story, on Chelsea Reach. And like the houseboats in that story, the crafts of her neighbours (which also included a former minesweeper) were linked by a rickety and unsafe series of gangplanks. One of her neighbours was a young male model who was the basis for the character Maurice. On seeing Fitzgerald being ‘down in the dumps’, he took her out for a day of fun and frivolity; only a few days later, he walked into the sea and drowned himself. When she put him in her book, she couldn’t bear to let him commit suicide though. It “would have meant that he had failed in life, whereas, really, his kindness made him the very symbol of success in my eyes.”The everyday life of Fitzgerald with her husband and children on Grace sounds remarkably similar to that of their fictional counterparts, Nenna and her children. Many of the characters are based on family and friends of Fitzgerald’s. Her marriage was fragile, and her husband was an alcoholic lawyer who was disbarred for forgery, while they were living on the houseboat. Like Edward in the book, he regarded the lowly job he eventually took as “only clerical”. Their boat sank in the same way as the Dreadnought in the story, but the Fitzgeralds were rendered homeless, forced to live in homeless shelters for months, living on welfare assistance. The book is positively sunny compared with the bleak life of the author on which it is based. That such dire circumstances can beget such art is a marvel.
What do You think about Offshore (2003)?
I had a really hard time getting into this book. I didn't understand some of the language used to describe things and I didn't "get" what it was about. Then I saw in another review that Fitzgerald intended that this was a novel about "liminality". What, you say?!! I saw that it was a stage in a situatin where old forms have dissolved, but new forms have not yet taken shape. From Wikipedia:During the liminal stage, normally accepted differences between the participants, such as social class, are often de-emphasized or ignored. A social structure of communitas forms: one based on common humanity and quality rather than recognized hierarchy. '"Communitas"...has positive values associated with it; good fellowship, spontaneity, warm contact...unhierarchised, undifferentiated social relations'.Seeing this made me really appreciate this very slim novel of the people living on 5 mostly rickety barges, moored on Battersea Reach during the heyday of Swinging London. The people are from various walks of life and social classes, and the commonality this odd assortment has is the day-to-day life, trials, tribulations and hoped for triumphs of living neither here nor there, neither on land or sea, neither in the old societal structure or the new. It seems like this community might go on indefinitely or be short lived - which will it be? Fitzgerald won the Booker Prize for this novella; some have called it the "perfect novel". I ended up enjoying these peoples' stories, especially that of Nenna who emerges somewhat as the main character, and her free-range children Martha and Tilda. We learn about the others mainly through their eyes. This book and Nenna are in part autobiographical for Fitzgerald who lived on a barge in Battersea Reach for a couple of years. Coincidentally, this is the second partly autobiographical novella I read this past week in succession, the other being A Month in the Country by J.L. Carr. Interestingly, that book was shortlisted for the Booker Prize the year after Offshore. In the forward to Offshore, it was noted how much Fitzgerald admired Carr. I think they were both one-of-a-kind authors, sort of fringe players who were critically well-received, but never very popular with the general populace.I am eager to read more of Fitgerald starting with The Bookshop and to learn more about her in the recent biography Penelope Fitzgerald: A Life.
—Suzy
If your a woman drifted and damped by a man either have or not have children. You may read this book. The setting occur at the Thames river where I illustrated as like a squatters area or a haven of 'temporariness'. The story surprises me of how characters intertwine with each other. It talks not the usual family-broken theme but a story of how absurd the feeling of living in a 'barge in unsettling tidal. The story has a love story of hope and mysteriousness. It may 'flawless' for some reviewers but the flawlessness I didn't appreciate being a contemporary reader. But it leaves me of a scene of unexpectedness and appreciated how Fitzgerald say each word like actually like a youth and old in different characters.Some quotations:"Everything you learn is useful. Didn't you know that everything you learn and everything you suffer, will come in useful at some time in your life?""I shall not allow sex to dominate my life, I shall have a place for it.. But my dear, we are here to talk about you.""Decision is torment to everyone with imagination. When you decide, you multiply the things you might have done and now never can. If there's one person who might hurt you, make up your mind or it will be too late, but if it's too late, we should be grateful."HAPPY READING! :))
—Anthony
When I first read this book, I wrote, "It is a delicious book. I am in love with it. I savor the words, the characters, the descriptions. I do not want it to end."When I finished it, I wrote, "Ah yes- I stand by what I said earlier; an enchanting book.The characters are marvelous- from the very proper ex-navy man Richard, to Maurice-by occupation a male prostitute, by happenstance a receiver of stolen goods, to the very bemused Nenna- trying to sort our her life, to her youngest daughter Tilda who "cared nothing for the future, and had, as a result, a great capacity for happiness." I read my husband the description of Stripy the cat and her triaging of rats.I loved how the folks are called after their boats, and vice versa. I loved the description of a life on the fringe, the quirky dialogue, and even the ambiguous ending."It is the book that introduced me to Penelope Fitzgerald.
—bookczuk
