This page represents only my own views, and not those of any university or other body.
Posted Saturday 28th January 2012 at 1.32pm
A little place of their own
I've been reading Alan Hollinghurst's "The Stranger's Child". His previous novel, "The Line of Beauty", is brilliant - a wonderfully written march through Thatcher's conservatism, class boundaries in the 1980s, and the rise of HIV and AIDS. The protagonist is a gay PhD student writing a thesis on the novels of Henry James: an easy subject for Hollinghurst, perhaps, but an enthralling story written in delightful prose renders any such complaints moot. I highly recommend it - it's uncomfortable reading at times, but the 1980s was an uncomfortable decade for many in Britain.
"The Stranger's Child", on the other hand, I found plain unrealistic - off the top of my head I count seven gay or bisexual men among the main characters, plus one alleged closet homosexual and one straight man (who dies in the war, early in the book). On the female side of things there's one gay woman, whose presence seems to serve no purpose other than to persuade us that Hollinghurst isn't sexist: in his world most people are gay, not just the men. This rather exaggerated sexuality ratio wouldn't be an issue if there was a point to it, or indeed if the story was up to scratch; but I found the book a less than thrilling read, placid if not quite dull.
"The Stranger's Child" isn't a complete dud by any means. Hollinghurst still writes beautifully at times, and there's plenty of humour, and some clever and subtle observations. But the story drifts for long periods, piling such a weight on the language that the book struggles to stay afloat. On this showing Hollinghurst might do better to step out of his comfort zone of writing about upper class gay male English literati; or, if he insists on sticking with this narrow backdrop, at least return to writing books that - like "The Line of Beauty" - explore themes relevant to his palette.
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