Talk to me about 'Netherland'

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I'm giving it its own thread because:
- it's cropping up quite a lot elsewhere;
- it feels a bit like an 'event' novel, and I can't remember one of those for a while;
- I'm halfway through it at the moment, not sure I'm really getting it, and would like a bit of help to fill in the gaps.

I'll be back when I'm done.

the excerpts of this that i read in the nyrb review made it sound remarkably tedious tbh

that said if anyone can vouch then i guess i'm down

hm. from the way this has been cropping up i expected it to be way more than 247 pages.

Yes, it's a nice slender thing, but there are masses of different events, characters and themes thus far, and loads of leaps in time and space, so it feels far weightier than it looks. So much so that I'm struggling to see how it all hangs together, and the fact that none of the components is particularly difficult in itself only adds to the feeling of oddness.

I need to recollect my thoughts on it, but I loved it. One thing I really did like is that, for me, it seemed to capture what it must have felt like to be in NY during/after the September 11 attacks, in a way that many books by actual American writers have failed to do. Plus I found it gripping, even though I don't care about cricket or any other sport in any way.

Right, finished. Still not a clue what to make of it. It was kind of the opposite of gripping for me in that nothing really happened, at least in real time - and yet there were loads of events that might have compiled themselves into an interesting story had it been done differently. Which is not to say that I wasn't intrigued - I was certainly carried along and enjoyed the digressions, and a lot of the images were really nice - just that I can't really say why. It feels like something quite new has been done here, but I'm not sure what.

As for what it's about, it seems to be on a fairly unhidden theme of cultural transplantation and the rootlessness (or rootedness) of one's identity in the process. I'm not totally confident of going beyond that because I do remember that a lot of the diversions and images seemed perplexing at the time, but it has coalesced into a whole for me there at least. I don't feel like it's going for any 'big message' thematically, just presenting one fellow's (somewhat synthetic) experience as emblematic of modern times.

I will say, though, that the voice is quite exceptional - I wasn't conscious of the story having been created at all, I felt like I was hearing this guy's autobiography*. There was so much inner life in there, and it felt real in a way that say White Noise, the most recent first-person narrative that I've taken on, felt sometimes like an exercise. I feel like these two books are quite close cousins, actually, although I wouldn't fancy myself to explain why. But Netherland is the more human.

* rendered perhaps a little impressive by a quick bit of research revealing that the author is Irish and grew up in The Hague. I had thought he was an established American writer, and that (coupled with my audiobook being read in American) meant that I was continually amazed at what he was pulling off - especially, but not only, the cricket bits.

It feels like something quite new has been done here, but I'm not sure what.

...

I will say, though, that the voice is quite exceptional - I wasn't conscious of the story having been created at all, I felt like I was hearing this guy's autobiography*. There was so much inner life in there, and it felt real in a way that say White Noise, the most recent first-person narrative that I've taken on, felt sometimes like an exercise.

OTM. I had a strong identification with Hans and his situations, but my appreciation for the book went well beyond that and I'm struggling to explain why also. I've read quite a few books published after 2001, but this was the first one that dealt with what that that date means. Maybe that's just a gap in my reading, but it felt more real than anything else I've read for a really long time.

the bits about cricket are really excellent and have a wonderfully intuitive feel for the game. the rest is unremarkable, aside from some illuminating segments of bourgie introspection. chuck is a good character, cricket incarnate if you will. 8/10, zadie smith mostly otm about it and remainder

my edition ended with a load of bonus featurettes and interviews with the author, felt appropriate in a faintly dismal, obsequious way. note to authors: please never fucking do this, because I'll read it and then forget whatever magic you wove

I'm sure the author thought there was some connection between a troubled marriage and cricket but I didn't see it. the book was a jumble of things that sometimes connected to each other but usually didn't.

I agree with Imago about the cricket stuff, the rest was over-freighted I thought. I'm reading some Le Carre at the moment who has a similar problem- for novels that are supposed to be disillusioned and downbeat, there really is some florid prose going on.

I was sure I'd posted this on here already, but evidently not, so:

the genius of this thing and what makes it the proper 9/11 novel for me (ugh) is the collisions between the various unlikely characters and places. In the first half of the book these are delightful - crazy taxi driver restaurants, unlikely couplings, motley first XIs - but in the second half it all stops and the characters are all repatriated, or enclaved, or have their wings plucked off. Except poor Chuck, who couldn't do any of these things.

That kind of retreat or entrenchment was what post-9/11 felt like to me, unhealthily. We've mostly got past it now, I reckon, but the book captured something there I feel.

the lead character being as it were twice removed- as a cricket-loving Dutchman in New York- made him a good representative for other displaced characters, though obviously him being white and middle class insulated him from more malign forces. Perhaps that was one of the points the author was trying to make.

i didn't like this book much, one of the things that annoyed me about it was the endless parade of 'interesting' minor characters. everyone was so bloody 'interesting.'

i did like the cricket stuff tho