March 2006    

October Light Author: John Gardner Publisher: New Directions $14.95 Paper (399 p.) ISBN: 0811216373 B&T         YBP Reviewed by Jen Legier, Customer Service Bibliographer During my few visits to the horse track I sealed my fate as a bad gambler; I chose my horses based on their names, the color of the jockey's silks, or just because they looked good. Seasoned visitors bent over their forms, calculating the odds of a win through complex strings of equations while I reacted to any horse whose shining, perfect coat reminded me of The Black Stallion. When I picked up the recent reprint of John Gardner's October Light, I used the same method; I liked it at first because of the cover art, a muted photograph of a weathered front door, in the half light one might associate with late afternoon in October. Just as I was almost always surprised by the results of my race track bets, October Light was an unpredictable read, its pages a whirlwind of ideas skillfully swept together, the quiet of the cover art appearing only for a few fitting reprieves. As might have happened with a racehorse, I found that my choice was already quite well known by those 'in the know'. The book is a reprint of the 1976 edition. The introduction by author Tom Bissell tells me (after I've read the book of course, always after) that John Gardner was an American Writer, capitals for both words, and that "he is sometimes said to be the greatest teacher of writing that ever lived". If John Gardner had been a racehorse, he would have caused some upsets in his day, he would have run on his own terms, and he would have found himself in the winner's circle more than once. October Light was the winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award and publisher New Directions plans to reprint three more of his fictional titles. Even not knowing anything about John Gardner before October Light, I enjoyed it immensely as "a plain old novel". James and Sally Page, an ageing Vermont brother and sister are the main characters and the story revolves around the events that are set in motion when James takes a shotgun to Sally's television set, chases her up the stairs, and locks her in her room. What may have continued as a study in opposites and Yankee sensibilities becomes the epicenter of a storm of characters reaching far and wide. As the struggle between the two stubborn siblings continues and escalates, they are almost but never quite eclipsed by neighbors, friends, family members, memories, and the cast of the "book within the book" that Sally discovers in her bedroom. It seems quite an achievement to me to weave so many changes in setting and time and place (even the book Sally reads has missing pages) into a cohesive whole. I marveled at the way characters' lives and thoughts began to connect. There were the obvious, outward connection shared by the family members, but also an underlying, quietly growing web being spun, encompassing everyone. Gardner subtly highlights things left unsaid; amidst all the physical chaos of so many characters and the scheming rivals, these unspoken words are like the quiet picture on the cover. Driven to action by the thoughts he had no words for, James Page not only put in motion the tempest that overtook his home, but also recognized the quiet on the other side of the storm. One of my favorite pieces of prose comes from James Page as he sits looking out his window contemplating that limbo between fall and winter - that time of unrest when it is impossible to define the season. "It was the light perhaps that made the leaves seem half-rotted, but if the rot hadn't really set in yet today, it would be there for sure tomorrow or the next day, and the gap of drab weather, no life but in the sky, would drag on and on, the days growing shorter, more uncomfortable, more unhealthy, no pleasure but a few butternuts the squirrels had missed - perhaps a glimpse of a fox - until getting out of bed was the hardest of his chores, and getting back into it at night was unconditional surrender. The gap might last for weeks - gray pastures, gray skies, even the crows in the birches looking up - and then when he began to believe he would never get through it alive, there suddenly, one morning, would be the world transformed, knee deep in snow, and even if the sky was gray, the farm would be beautiful." Published by YBP Library Services 999 Maple St., Contoocook, NH 03229 USA v: 800.258.3774   f: 603.746.5628 w: www.ybp.com   e: academia@ybp.com All rights reserved.