A big book for lovers of novels

A review of The Novel: A Biography by Michael Schmidt (Belknap Press, 2014, $39.95, 1,200 pages) 

Such a large book invites comparison to a doorstop. But you can avoid the weight by reading it electronically, as I did. The larger question: Is it worth the time it takes to wade through 1,200 pages? The short answer is yes; the water is fine, and there is much to enjoy, that is, if you love novels.

Schmidt calls his book “a biography,” thus treating the novel as having a life of its own, a life that spans almost eight centuries, beginning with “De proprietatibus rerum” (On the Properties of Things) by Bartholomeus Anglicus, around 1240.

While he touches on novels in other languages (translated into English), his focus is on novels written in English. He also chooses not to include comments by critics, unless those critics are themselves novelists. “This book … is told mainly by novelists and through novels.”

And while a 1,200-page book may seem exhaustive, there are simply too many novels written to cover them all, though Schmidt comes closer than anyone I know of. How then to choose which ones to include? He writes, “A sense of canon, though not a stable one, governs my approach.”

While it follows a chronological arc, The Novel is organized thematically, and within each theme are novelists from across the centuries. For example, under the chapter “Impersonation,” Schmidt joins Daniel Defoe with Truman Capote and J.M. Coetzee, and under “Braveries” he combines Robert Louis Stevenson with Bruce Chatwin.

Schmidt says he has tried to avoid an ordering that insists on geographical, ideological, cultural or sexual zoning. Instead he has followed a “committed curiosity.”

His assessments of writers and novels abound. For example, in a discussion of Jane Austen’s novels, he writes: “Of all the novels, ‘Emma’ is formally the most satisfactory.”

He writes this about Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”: “Her book is a dialogue between two dictions, the formal diction of a writer and the informal diction of her speech, an uneasy bilingualism that many modern writers practice as a result of ethnicity, class, location, intimacy.”

Sometimes Schmidt frustrates when he references a work, then fails to explain his point, as when he notes that Peter Carey’s Jack Maggs is “on the button” regarding his interpretation of Great Expectations but doesn’t say how.

He also offers general guidelines about what makes some works better than others. “Goodness is not much fun in fiction,” he writes, “its patience and resignation leave the reader impatient.”

While Schmidt covers a plethora of writers, including many popular ones (yes, Stephen King is here), he keeps that canon in the back of his mind. He notes that The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is “regarded by some as the, if not the great, American novel.” Later he calls Ragtime “the closest thing to that chimera ‘the great American novel’ that I have encountered.”

Schmidt calls the life of the novel in English “a complex and ragged story. It develops in contrary directions, it becomes almost impossible to hold the limbs together, each with its own impulses and intentions, struggling with the rest.” He notes trends, such as modernism and postmodernism, and places writers in those and other categories.

Keeping this historical development in mind, he writes that Hawthorne, among American writers, is the one “who first creates credible characters of both sexes, who can write children and old people, and who has developed a sense of good and evil.”

Schmidt’s breadth of knowledge is astounding. He not only seems to have read the thousands of works mentioned in this tome but to have studied them closely as well.

Nevertheless, most readers will have quibbles about his choices of who to mention and how much to write about a certain author. Like all of us, Schmidt has his favorites.

He gives more space to William Dean Howells than to Tolstoy or Dostoevsky. He gushes over Martin Amis but completely ignores Denis Johnson, Louise Erdrich or Alice McDermott, among others.

He also mentions many writers I’d never heard of and offers insights into others that make me want to explore their works.

The novel is an expansive and personal medium. It’s a place to explore new worlds, encounter new ideas and be challenged to change our lives.

Schmidt quotes Ford Maddox Ford: “With the novel you can do anything: you can inquire into every department of life, you can explore every department of the world of thought.”

Reading The Novel is a huge investment of time, but for those who love literature and wish to expand their acquaintance with it, that investment is well worthwhile. Schmidt’s “biography” is a major achievement, and we are in his debt.