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TOURNAMENT OF BOOKS: The Lost Dog VS Gilgamesh

Anna Krien, Ben Pobjie, Jess Mcguire September 19

VS

When it comes to describing Michelle de Kretser’s novel The Lost Dog, it is the chicken and the egg dilemma – which came first, the book or the exegesis? The thesis or the plot? The characters or their symbolic missions? The tale of a lost dog, a wooden academic and an eccentric bohemian artist, the latter both spliced with ‘otherness’ (which is university-speak for ‘half-Asian’) seems tacked on, as if the concept of a storyline is subordinate to themes. At times, characters appear to be vehicles for de Kretser’s own political maladies, be it Tom Loxley’s sympathy for asylum seekers, his fear of becoming a ‘human commodity’ where he would ‘find himself competing with thousands of identical products, all waiting to be chosen’ or Nelly Zhang’s retort to an accusation she is pretending to be more Chinese than she actually is. ‘You think I should pretend I’m Australion?’ she replies. Australion? A typo, or is Nelly Zhang poking fun at the Aussie drawl?

Needless to say, it gets a bit boring.

Stereotypes are acknowledged, never smashed and bizarrely reinforced. The average Australian is oafish and over-confident; football fans are ‘giant toddlers’ ‘wrapped in shapeless fleecy garments’, whilst Asians are predictably sensitive and introverted. What, you don’t have bogans in Asia, de Kretser?

Unlike Zadie Smith’s On Beauty which deftly throws punches like a champion featherweight at the bloated ‘cultural studies’ egos of universities, de Kretser’s The Lost Dog while at times, quite beautifully, takes the piss out of the academic world and its sentinels, ultimately becomes the butt of its own teasing. It is top-shelf ‘Academic Creative Writing’. A worthy place perhaps, but I (cue ‘it’s not you, it’s me’) am Raymond Carver kind of reader – no, amend that, a Gordon Lish gal, Lish being the famous editor who cut the fat off Carver’s stories and made them so damn good, brittle and honest as bones. I like a story that trusts me to glean its unsaid wisdom, to spy the thread of gold throughout, and while de Kretser does have her moments, for example;

A glass-fronted cabinet held a harlequin, a corsair, a ballerina, a drummer boy, a Bo Peep with a crook wreathed in flowers and a lilac dress bunched up over a sprigged underskirt. Once a week Audrey murmured to small porcelain people of love while holding them face down in soapy water.

Perfectly sculpted images and moments such as this sadly become lost amid the shiny, overwritten and over-explained sentences in her pages.

Gilgamesh, on the other hand, by Joan London, is sparse.

London is like a wartime seamstress. Gilgamesh reads like a series of rations, a strange combination of treasure and drab. She stitches together a weathered story that is unfettered with adverbial. Set on the precipice of World War Two, the protagonist, Edith, sets out to find the father of her child. She leaves the bush block she grew up on in West Australia and travels with her baby on a cargo ship to England, then onwards to Armenia. However, like many literary journeys, this far-reaching adventure seems designed to lasso Edith homeward. Ultimately it serves as a trope to reveal the internal and external homecoming of a young woman, determined to find her place in the world. Carefully crafted, London’s scenes and sense of place is cinematic, seared in my mind, her account of Edith’s brief foray into petty theft to fund the adventure is quite wonderful. For its craft and precision, Gilgamesh is the obvious winner.

But I worry for its onward journey in this mistressful tournament of books – as I read through its bookclub study notes, one pointed conversation starter seems to sum up my overall lackluster response to both novels.

Are all Australian novels about finding a home? Discuss.

Please, excuse me while I take a nap.

WINNER: GILGAMESH

Ben: It always seemed like a risk for De Kretser to go in this match with such a heavy focus on themes. Anyone who’s been following the formlines of this pair would know that London loves it when you throw themes at her, she eats themes for breakfast, and it was as clear as day that if De Kretser went in with themes, she’d hit a brick wall in the form of London’s rock-solid sparse narrative style. It’s nothing flashy, but it gets the job done, and De Kretser will be rueing her decision to play it safe with themes and not throw in a few more explosions. In particular, I thought the dog failed to pull its weight – it may have been carrying an injury. First rule of novels: never go into a big game with an injured dog.

Jess: Sensationally observed, Mister Pobjie. Yes, after reading Anna Krien’s descriptions of both Michele De Kretser’s The Lost Dog and Joan London’s Gilgamesh, I can’t help but suspect that De Kretser, much like the last few seasons of Australian Idol, was somewhat heavy-handed when it came to jamming as many themes as possible into her product.

All that said, while it seems clear that Gilgamesh is the hands down winner in this particular battle of the books, Krien does warn that it’s not going to be an easy ride to ultimate victory. While its sparseness may appeal this time over the “symbolic missions” that we’ve been reliably informed weigh down The Lost Dog, it may not be enough to withstand a second blast from the Australian lady literary canon. (Do you see what I did there, Ben?)

Ben: That was an almost balletic display of punnage, Jess, and I think what was most disappointing about this match was that neither author did put in the hard yards with regard to puns. I think you can really smell Krien’s disappointment with this same aspect, and while it’s too late for The Lost Dog, which’ll be heading to the showers now, you’d hope that Gilgamesh can pick up its game and throw in a few more puns next round, or even a bit of slapstick or a knock-knock joke – although I concede that this might be a bit unlikely since it is a book and Joan London probably won’t be rewriting it any time soon. Her loss, I say.

 

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