This started as a letter to my ex then became just a space for my thoughts on the novel. By the end I realized the words I was saying were advising me not to send it. So perhaps it will solely be catharsis.
I just finished reading The Secret History. From the beginning, I found it difficult to divorce you from the pages so I stopped trying. There were sections where I could sense you in the book viscerally. I found myself going back and rereading through your eyes. I don’t know if it is because you are the one who recommended it to me or because themes of academia and cold northern Winters (like Henry, hah!) away at school remind me so much of you.
It is beautifully written. The way Tartt describes a scene is so immersive, I wish my brain would interpret everything I see in such an alluring manner. The reader immediately feels drawn to Hampden and its eccentric characters as intensely as the narrator. Early on, I found myself achingly in love with all of the Greek students, falling for them alongside Richard. Especially Henry. Ironic given he sort of becomes the villain of the tale. Intelligent people are never what they seem. Tartt has such an incredible grasp of the rollercoaster of attachment you feel for someone new. From the intrigue of a first meeting, to obsessively getting to know them, to falling in love, all the way through to being sick at the thought of them.
What makes this story and these characters so great is their potent faults, their inclination towards blindly following their impulses without any regard for consequences. And the way that aligns so vividly with the theme of beauty containing hidden harsh angles. The picturesque, the aesthetic, vanity all crumbling under too much scrutiny. The desire to only see the beauty in people but to inevitably come face to face with their stains. Everything about Henry, Francis, Bunny, and the twins at first seems so glamorous; their dedication to literature and Greek studies, their infatuation with the ancient to the point of rejecting modern culture, their money, their clothes, their cigarettes. Tartt even makes insomnia seem enviable. The story itself is so sad and invigorating and incredibly human. I wonder what you believe she is trying to say about academia? To me (admittedly an outsider to that world) it seems like she critiques the search for meaning when it begins to border the obsessive, as if the ability to overanalyze something is also the ability to blacken it. Makes me think about therapy culture and whether too much time trying to define and optimize ourselves is as healthy and productive as some claim. I think when it comes to the elite in any group whether you are referring to academic pursuits, or economic ones, or political ones, it is difficult to diagnose corruption because it often aligns with the pursuit of the BEST thing. While that seems like a natural yearning it is still wanting at the end of the day. A rejection of being grateful for what you have. But maybe that is what being interesting is, someone unhappy and searching and unable to accept things the way they are.
And to try and combat that, the beauty inherent in self flagellation, in self denial. Like Richard during his winter term, depriving himself of all his comforts. Was this just him being too prideful to ask for help or did he really want to see what could come out of being pushed to your physical limits, to prove to himself he could get by without his comforts or vices.
Julian looks over them, Godlike. We never really get to know him as a character but we are extremely aware of the effect he has over all the kids. Like them all, he seems perfect in the beginning only to be proven cold and selfish and aloof. Julian is so oblivious to these extreme, world shifting events that take place in their lives and at first it seems charming. As if he is so wrapped up in his Ancient Greek dream world that he cannot be bothered to come down to Earth. But we see he is willfully wearing rose colored glasses. Because he too wants everything to be beautiful, to sparkle pretty and make life seem elegant and refined. Richard mentions his “own fatal tendency to make interesting people good” in reference to Julian. I relate so much to this line it felt like ice cold water to the face when I read it. If people I come across are (to even the smallest degree) unique and intelligent, the type to find the status quo unsavory, I tend to latch onto them obsessively. And then later I feel hurt and betrayed when I find out their chasmic hamartias, as if they ever claimed to be beacons of moral fiber.
The way Tartt brings to light the depth of the complex, incestuous relationship with the twins is so brilliant because she makes you feel as if you kind of knew it all along in the back of your mind just like Richard. The transformation of the students warm, comfortable regard for one another into something paranoid and repugnant is heartbreaking. I found myself clinging to their early days, needing them to stay friends, for everything to stay exactly as it was. But of course that is impossible, and the triumph of the book is when everything falls apart.
Change is the only constant. Beauty is harsh. Consummatum est.
theartofmadeline
titsay
baratheonpilled
gummygunk
origamiaround
amandla