Have you ever read a book and loved it so much that you wanted to read slower? You know, make it last?
I can usually whip out a book in a couple of days if I’m really interested. But this past two weeks I have *slowly* been reading The Golden Gate, by Vikram Seth. My daughter gave me this book a while ago. It was required reading in her World Lit class, and she had really enjoyed it. Well, my bedside stack of books is quite high, so it took me a while to get to this book. But, oh, it was so worth it.
The entire book is written in verse.
Each sonnet is rhymed in an a-b-a-b-c-c-d-d-e-f-f-e-g-g pattern. And each sentence required such a high quality of thought process, that you must appreciate the talent it took to create such a masterpiece. I normally love poetry in the traditional way. This was the first time I’ve ever read an entire book, 307 pages, of verse in story format. And it was very modern, which is what made it so intriguing.
It’s about four California yuppies and their loves and losses. These are my two favorite stanzas. The first involves John, a silicon valley executive, who had realized how lonely he had become, and in desperation confides in his friend/ex-lover. She in turn puts an ad in the singles section of the newspaper for him. Through the ad he finds Liz. This is the first morning after he and Liz have moved in together, and he is surveying his new life and love. The second stanza immediately follows the first and shows you that his newfound happiness is not going to last.
John looks about him with enjoyment.
What a man needs, he thinks, is health;
Well-paid, congenial employment;
A house; a modicum of wealth;
Some sunlight; coffee and the papers;
Artichoke hearts adorned with capers;
A Burberry trench coat; a Peugeot;
And in the evening, some Rameau
Or Couperin; a home-cooked dinner;
A Stilton, and a little port;
And so to a duvet. In short,
In life’s brief game to be a winner
A man must have… oh yes, above
All else, of course, someone to love.
*
Ah, John, don’t take it all for granted.
Perhaps you think Liz loves you best.
The snooker table has been slanted.
A cuckoo’s bomb lies in the nest.
Be warned. Be warned. Just as in poker
The wildness of that card, the joker,
Disturbs the best-laid plans of men,
So too it happens, now and then,
That a furred beast with feral features
(Little imagined in the days
When, cute and twee, the kitten plays),
Of that familiar brood of creatures
The world denominates a cat,
Enters the game, and knocks it flat.
Last night, after finishing this book, I found myself thinking in the bouncy pattern of rhyme. And I couldn’t stop thinking about the ending, which didn’t end at all the way I thought it would. Please don’t let the fact that the entire book is in verse stop you from reading this masterpiece. I’m fairly picky and this book went straight to my top ten list.
