Room, Emma Donoghue
Review by Brittany Buechett
Freedom, Jonathan Franzen
Review by Brittany Burchett
The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoevsky
Review by Brittany Burchett
Review By Brittany Burchett
Room, a novel by Irish writer Emma Donoghue, is based off a case in which a woman was imprisoned in a basement and raped for a period of years. (There are probably more cases like this in police files than any of us want to know about). During that period, she bore children, which were imprisoned with her.
A novel narrated by the victim in this case would likely be too horrible to read, and I suspect Donoghue knew that. Instead, she presents a fascinating take on the story. The novel is told by five-year-old Jack, who has lived his whole life trapped in Room (a soundproof shed, in the novel) with his mother. Jack does not know about rape, sex crimes, or kidnapping; he does not even know he is trapped. The Room is the whole world, he believes, as she answered all his questions by telling him that nothing he saw on TV, including other people, is real. He turns five at the beginning of the book, and she slowly begins to reveal the truth to him so that he can help her escape. Still, he isn’t sure what to believe is real except for the things he sees in Room. So when they succeed in escaping in the middle of the book, his Ma feels like she has her life back. Jack feels like his has been 
torn away.
In many ways it’s a heartbreaking read, but that is helped both by their escape halfway through the novel (if I had to wait to the end for them to get away, I don’t think I could have finished it) and by Jack’s charming innocence. He is never harmed by the man he calls Old Nick (I believe the name is an allusion to one of the devil’s nicknames, but Donoghue should have been more clear about that). His Ma says, “He gave me a reason for living,” and we see that in the world she has so carefully created. They build a snake out of eggshells and a fort out of cans. They have track meets running around the bed. He skateboards on the rocking chair and does karate with the pillows, which Ma calls “Phys Ed.” He can only watch one TV program but he loves to read. Ma is a great character; she is a believably heartbroken captive and an energetic mother providing a fun world for her young child. She is only twenty-seven, which makes her an even more admirable heroine.
Their escape changes the dynamic of the book when descriptions of life within Room are about to get redundant. Now we get to see this world of two enter the outside world, which Jack dislikes. Donoghue does a great job with child psychology and captures the many things Jack wouldn’t understand. He has trouble with personal boundaries, since he was always allowed to touch his mother. He wants to group everyone into “friends” or “enemies”. When in Room, they used to ask their captor for things they needed on Sundays; it was called “Sundaytreat”. Outside, Jack continues to ask his mother, “What’ll we ask for for Sundaytreat?” not grasping that that part of his lfie is over.
An action by Ma separates the two of them for a time. Donogue probably needed Jack to spend some time away from the person who understands him in order to better develop his relationships with his mother’s family and to show the troubles other adults have in dealing with him. But I find the action by Ma to be out of character for this strong woman, and I liked Ma so much that I didn’t want her taken out of the picture while Jack transitioned. I wanted to see her transition as well. Donoghue takes the easy way out, and that’s disappointing.
I didn’t see how the book could have a happy ending. Jack wants life in Room to resume as it was. It can’t, nor should it. But Donoghue finds the right note to end on, allowing Jack to connect with the past one last time before he moves into the future. It’s a hopeful ending, and these characters deserve one. You won’t regret reading Room.
Freedom
By Brittanny Burchett
Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom was perhaps the most talked-about book of 2010. President Obama and Oprah both said it was one of their favorite books of the year. Critics have called it a “modern classic” along the lines of War and Peace. It offers a view into the microcosm of suburban America: post-modern, global America, with its great weaknesses and its great heart.
It’s possible to view the characters as an extension of America (I won’t do so for this review, because I want to be sure people know that this book is for more than just politically vocal readers).
The characters, the Berglund family and their friends, should be among the freest people in the world. They are upper-class suburban Americans. They have political freedom, religious freedom, personal freedom (this last being particularly important in the book). Most of them are quite self-satisfied and believe they deserve to hold positions of power. Having so much has made them want a lot. Sometimes they doubt themselves, but even then they rarely change their course of action once they’ve chosen one.
This leads to an implicit battle most of the characters wage within themselves: that of being free vs. being good. Several characters express a desire to be good. That desire is not strong enough to change them from giving into temptation and their other, less ethical desires. After all, once you decide to adhere to a code of ethics, you’ve chosen to be bound to it, and being bound to something takes away a little of your freedom. The characters in Franzen’s novel are very proud of their freedom to do what they want and enjoy asserting it, even at others’ expense. But though they often succumb to temptation without putting up much of a fight, it doesn’t stop them from wishing they could be morally good. And so as a reader, I wanted to know, who succumbs to desire that we don’t expect, and who is willing to take on the binds of ethics and morals to become a better person?
The characters themselves – Patty and Walter Berglund, their friend Richard, and their children Joey and Jessica – make the book riveting. They’re unique, odd, and yet completely believable. I thought to myself, “I don’t know anyone like this,” but I bet I do. I’m seeing what some of my neighbors look like before they step out of the house and put their best face forward. Franzen makes two brilliant point-of-view choices to highlight this. The first section is narrated by the neighbors, who gossip about the Berglunds. As a result, we first see what Berglunds look like to the outside world. And to the outside world, the Berglunds present as a blissfully happy, moderately prosperous young suburban couple.
Franzen makes the second section Patty’s autobiography, and this is a great choice as well. In later sections, after the autobiography, we will see from a third-person view what goes on inside the house and the marriage. At that point, Patty will come off as a bitter, heartless shrew. The autobiography is a great insertion to help us remember all of the pain and damage Patty has suffered, and the love that she is still hoping someone will give her.
The book’s length creates many of its problems. Walter Berglund is a mouthpiece for Franzen’s real-life overzealousness about the environment, and the whole subplot created there becomes tiring. Secondly, even though the book is about family, we don’t really need to dive three generations deep into the family tree of the main characters. It draws us out of the action and slows down the pace.
Freedom is so thick that I’m afraid many people will be scared off. That’s sad, because its depiction of suburban America is spot-on. Whether describing real-life tragedy, real-life humor or anything in between, Franzen’s prose is as pointed and precise as Robin Hood’s arrow.
Brittany Burchett is a graduate of the English department at North Carolina State and a freelance writer for Boom! She is working on her second novel.
Interested in this review? Check out the review for The Brothers Karamazov, and the similarities drawn between it and Freedom.
Freedom
By Brittanny Burchett
Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom was perhaps the most talked-about book of 2010. President Obama and Oprah both said it was one of their favorite books of the year. Critics have called it a “modern classic” along the lines of War and Peace. It offers a view into the microcosm of suburban America: post-modern, global America, with its great weaknesses and its great heart.
It’s possible to view the characters as an extension of America (I won’t do so for this review, because I want to be sure people know that this book is for more than just politically vocal readers).
The characters, the Berglund family and their friends, should be among the freest people in the world. They are upper-class suburban Americans. They have political freedom, religious freedom, personal freedom (this last being particularly important in the book). Most of them are quite self-satisfied and believe they deserve to hold positions of power. Having so much has made them want a lot. Sometimes they doubt themselves, but even then they rarely change their course of action once they’ve chosen one.
This leads to an implicit battle most of the characters wage within themselves: that of being free vs. being good. Several characters express a desire to be good. That desire is not strong enough to change them from giving into temptation and their other, less ethical desires. After all, once you decide to adhere to a code of ethics, you’ve chosen to be bound to it, and being bound to something takes away a little of your freedom. The characters in Franzen’s novel are very proud of their freedom to do what they want and enjoy asserting it, even at others’ expense. But though they often succumb to temptation without putting up much of a fight, it doesn’t stop them from wishing they could be morally good. And so as a reader, I wanted to know, who succumbs to desire that we don’t expect, and who is willing to take on the binds of ethics and morals to become a better person?
The characters themselves – Patty and Walter Berglund, their friend Richard, and their children Joey and Jessica – make the book riveting. They’re unique, odd, and yet completely believable. I thought to myself, “I don’t know anyone like this,” but I bet I do. I’m seeing what some of my neighbors look like before they step out of the house and put their best face forward. Franzen makes two brilliant point-of-view choices to highlight this. The first section is narrated by the neighbors, who gossip about the Berglunds. As a result, we first see what Berglunds look like to the outside world. And to the outside world, the Berglunds present as a blissfully happy, moderately prosperous young suburban couple.
Franzen makes the second section Patty’s autobiography, and this is a great choice as well. In later sections, after the autobiography, we will see from a third-person view what goes on inside the house and the marriage. At that point, Patty will come off as a bitter, heartless shrew. The autobiography is a great insertion to help us remember all of the pain and damage Patty has suffered, and the love that she is still hoping someone will give her.
The book’s length creates many of its problems. Walter Berglund is a mouthpiece for Franzen’s real-life overzealousness about the environment, and the whole subplot created there becomes tiring. Secondly, even though the book is about family, we don’t really need to dive three generations deep into the family tree of the main characters. It draws us out of the action and slows down the pace.
Freedom is so thick that I’m afraid many people will be scared off. That’s sad, because its depiction of suburban America is spot-on. Whether describing real-life tragedy, real-life humor or anything in between, Franzen’s prose is as pointed and precise as Robin Hood’s arrow.
Brittany Burchett is a graduate of the English department at North Carolina State and a freelance writer for Boom! She is working on her second novel.
Interested in this review? Check out the review for The Brothers Karamazov, and the similarities drawn between it and Freedom.
The Brothers Karamazov
BY Brittany Burchett
The Brothers Karamazov was written in 1880 by Russian author and philosopher Fyodor Dostoevsky. Many critics have called it his “best work,” even more impressive than the more well-known Crime and Punishment. In The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoevsky doesn’t address the social and political turmoil in Russia at the time. He writes of events happening at the microcosm, or more personal, level, much like Jonathan Franzen in Freedom. His novel deals with the smallest unit in the human structure – the family.
(A quick note: Russian novels have not retained their popularity in the US for a reason. They can be difficult. So in addition to a review, I’m going to offer a few tips.)
The family consists of Fyodor Pavlovitch and his four sons (by three different mothers): Dimitri, Ivan, Alexei (also called Alyosha), and Smerdyakov, who is his illegitimate child and servant. (A couple of notes on Russian names: The easiest way to deal with them is to make up nicknames for the characters yourself. They can be funny, silly, even nonsensical – anything that will help you remember who they are. But you should also know that each character gets referred to, at different parts of the book, by three names – his first name, his last name, and a nickname. So you at least need to know that all three names refer to the same person). Fyodor disrespects his sons’ mothers. He cheats them, taunts them, doesn’t even acknowledge one of them. So it’s no surprise when Fyodor turns up a corpse. But which son killed him?
The first few chapters are slow going, and it’s hard to imagine waiting until page 400 for the murder to occur. But it’s a wise choice on Dostoevsky’s part: by the time we have a murder, we have insights deep into the character of each suspect. They are all fully realized men, and all of them, except Alyosha, are broken.
This book was meant to be a trilogy, with Alyosha as the hero and the scenes with him and a group of younger, poorer boys who idolize him setting up the action for the next book. Since Dostoevsky died before any more could be written, these scenes seem to be a bit of a non sequitor to the murder plot. And while we are left admiring Alyosha and his unremitting goodness, Dimitri is the one to capture our heart. He has both his father’s overflowing passion and love for life and Alyosha’s love of humanity. He is less of a sinner than his father, but not a saint like Alyosha, and so he is the most interesting.
Dimitri’s transformative moment comes in prison, which is an interesting statement on freedom and goodness. Here I will return briefly to the “freedom vs. goodness” conflict that I discussed in my review of Freedom. In The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoevsky claims that one does not need total freedom (as the Berglund family in Freedom had) to be good. In fact, it is only when one is deprived of certain freedoms that one can overcome temptation and become good. Ivan argues in a famous speech that God should have given man less freedom; Ivan and Smerdyakov are proud atheists and anarchists. They both come to embody evil in one way or another, and their ends are not pretty. Meanwhile, Dimitri’s sluttish lover Grushenka is transformed by Dimitri and by his love. These two and their love story make a great “sinful” center of interest because we so want to see them redeemed, and because unlike Fyodor, redemption becomes theirs when they submit to power greater than themselves.
The novel soars and stumbles at various points dealing with the aftermath of the murder. In the days before the trial of the one accused, there is a long, slow reveal that will keep you eagerly turning pages. Plus, Dostoevsky manages to link two of the brothers in guilt. With a passage that hearkens back to the Biblical question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Dostoevsky purports that yes, we are all responsible for each other, and brothers most of all. In this way, the guilt for Fyodor’s death gets a little more evenly spread.
But the trial, like most of the book and like most books over 600 pages, suffers from pacing problems. The trial scene itself is a twice-told tale, because the chapters before revealed to us the real culprit and circumstances. The trial scenes serve only to let Dostoevsky exercise his logic and philosophy skills, and to say that that’s a dry read is an understatement.
Ultimately, I think that for the average reader, this book is like a trip through the Sahara. The powerful and resonant passages – and there are many of them - are like little gems, or a dream you want to get lost in. But the in-between is just so much dry sand. So, my recommendation? Skip from oasis to oasis. If it feels like sand, move forward in the book to the next interesting part. The wordy speeches don’t advance the plot, so you probably won’t be confused. Besides, no one will judge you. They’ll just be impressed that you actually read The Brothers Karamazov.
Looking for a more modern novel that addresses some of these themes? Look at my review of Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom!
Brittany Burchett is a recent graduate of the North Carolina State English program. She is a freelance writer for Boom! She is currently working on her second novel.