Tuesday 21 April 2009

Terrorist by John Updike (Review)


In her landmark treatise on modern capitalism and branding, 'No Logo', first published in 2000, the Canadian writer writer Naomi uses Starbucks as an example of the phenomenon known as 'clustering'. This is what she says: 'The bottom line is that clustering, like big-boxing, is a competitive retail strategy that is only an option for a large chain that can afford to take a beating on individual stores in order to reap a larger, long-term branding goal. It also explains why critics usually claim that companies like Starbucks are preying on small businesses, while the chains themselves deny it, admitting only that they are expanding and creating new markets for their products. Both are true. but the chains' aggressive strategy of market expansion has the added bonus of simultaneously taking out competitors'.

Save business model and outlook, a similar phenomenon has befallen the literary world in the aftermath of the attack on the Twin Towers, the Madrid and London bombings and the invasion of Iraq. There has been a 'clustering', led mainly by Western intellectuals, journalists, columnists and academics where hundreds of thousands if not millions of column inches have been produced with the rather unfortunate side effect that other equally important voices have been muted. The smoke was still billowing on Ground Zero and already print presses were working overtime to turn out books on the tragedy in New York. 9/11 and 7/7 became overnight the most played numbers in literature's lottery and it pains me to say it but there were many occasions on which I felt let down by the cliché-ridden and platitudinous essays, articles and short stories that were rushed out. This is not to say that all the works that resulted from these sad events were below par. There were brilliant analyses, but when you have Martin Amis' 'adumbrations' about the 'Muslim problem', you know that it's time to say enough is enough.

That's why I approached 'Terrorist', John Updike's novel published in 2006, with trepidation. I was already familiar with the American writer's oeuvre having read his 'Rabbit' books before. I had also read 'The Witches of Eastwick', turned into a film with Michelle Pfeiffer, Susan Sarandon, Cher and Jack Nicholson in the leading roles. I was acquainted with Updike's close observation of his native land. That was one of the reasons why I decided to try my luck with this novel. The result, alas, was not what I expected.

You know you are reading John Updike when the description of a night of insomnia takes up fourteen pages. But that's how we meet one of the leading characters in the novel. Jack Levy is a career counsellor at a local college (high school in the States) in New Jersey. He is sixty-three, a Jew who does not worship or believes in God anymore and a terrible sleeper. He is married to Beth, who is a an ex-Lutheran, overweight (Updike actually uses the word 'whale' to describe her, well, Jack does at any rate) and works at a library. These two characters are joined in the book by Ahmad, an eighteen-year-old student at the same college where Jack works. Ahmad is the result of the union between an Egyptian father - gone AWOL since his birth- and an Irish-American mother. Teresa Mulloy, Ahmad's mum, is forty years old, an artist who goes by the moniker of Terry and is puzzled at her teenage son's alleged lack of zest for life. On top of this, young Ahmad decided to become Muslim when he was younger and since then has attended weekly classes at the local mosque where a strict teacher guides him through the paths dictated by the Holy Qur'an.

Updike is deft at building up the atmosphere in the novel, although his obsession for describing situations to the minutest details had me yawning like a hungry hippo involuntarily sometimes. It is obvious, however, that he did a lot of research into Islam because of the passages he quotes and the references he uses. He is also quite dextrous at creating situations in which his characters can interact as in the relationship between counsellor and student. Jack is concerned about Ahmad, he sees a different quality in him to the one he sees in other young boys of his same age at college. In a sense, he believes that it is his job to save this poor soul from the abyss into which he will fall on account of his surroundings. The novel takes place in a rundown area full of council estates (projects), unemployement and people with low expectations in life. In the event Jack ends up sleeping with Terry, Ahmad's mother without the latter finding out until the very end. Ahmad has his own agenda, though. Indoctrinated by his own imam, he dreams of becoming a martyr to what both he and his master think it is the Islamic cause, the dismantling of the 'evil empire', i.e., the USA. Updike does produce wonders in guiding us through the character and personality of Ahmad. Through his eyes we see how religion (and by that I mean mainly the three Abrahamic faiths) can be utilised to brainwash and ultimately turn a human being into a lethal weapon.

What I believe fails terribly in the novel is John Updike's overall intention or lack of it thereof. I am still trying to figure out what that intention is/was. There's a lot of repetition and the relationship between Terry and Jack does not come across as a credible liaison, at least to me. Jack is twenty-three years Terry's senior, he has a beer-belly, he is not very attractive physically (according to the author's obsession for describing everything) and to cap it all he has not even got a great sense of humour. So, what led Teresa Mulloy into the hands of this non-practicing Jew? There's no rational explanation for it, which made think that here again we see the old adage of older man+younger woman (Woody Allen, anyone?), a fantasy that has played on many an older folk's mind since the world's been turning. The other reason why I think Updike tried to pair up Jack and Terry was in order to have a type of symbolism, the essence of which was lost on me, too. Secular Jew sleeps with non-practicing Catholic Irish-American woman behind his ex-Lutheran wife, whilst the Muslim son of the Irish woman is left out of the loop. Hello, Updike, are you there? No, you aren't anymore, sadly, you died earlier this year.

The novel's middle section finds Ahmad preparing himself for jihad. He begins to work as a lorry driver in a nearby furniture company and strikes up a good friendship with the owner's son. One day after he delivers a heavy sofa to a house where some Arab men live, in the outskirts of New Jersey, he notices something strange. Mindful that someone might be spying on him, he drives his truck around the corner and retraces his own steps to the house he has just left. He sees how the sofa he has just dropped off at this house is full of dollar notes inside. The next day he puts his doubts forward to his colleague Charlie whilst they are driving and the latter asks him in return whether he would be willing to die for Islam. Ahmad realises that there's a plan being concocted and he wants to be part of it. As soon as the plotters' top hierarchy confirms Ahmad's involvement in their diabolical machinations, he knows that there will be only one outcome for him: martyrdom.

The last part made me wonder whether Updike had tired of writing this novel and wanted to end it as soon as possible. In what I can only consider as a mad rush, we have Ahmad being visited by his mentor, Shaikh, Rashid, scarcely twelve hours before being sent on a suicide mission in the tunnel that joins New Jersey and New York. The next morning, on what is supposed to be his last day, several things go wrong and Ahmad has to improvise as he goes along. Then, as if by magic, Jack Levy intercepts the truck he is driving near the interchange of Route 80 and Tilden Avenue. The non-believing Jew manages to climb into the seat next to the would-be Muslim assassin. What follows thereafter would have been slapstick comedy had it not had the undertone of actual events ringing in my ears. I kept asking myself, where are Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson when you really need them as a pair? To say that the last fifteen to twenty pages of this book are corny, over-sentimental and kitsch would be the understatement of the century. Let us just say (spoiler ahead) that Ahmad suddenly has an epiphany from the same holy book that he had used to convince himself that it was OK to maim and murder innocent people and that in this act of conversion or re-conversion to humankind, decides not to detonate the bomb. I could almost imagine the cinematic version of this book with Jack Levy and Ahmad driving back to New Jersey after the latter's change of heart, with a truck full of explosives, cracking jokes as the camera zooms out and up, their voces fade out and the credits roll up. OK, Updike, I hold my hands up, you convinced me, now, where's that tree to hug? And hey, brother/sister, won't you join me in a rendition of John Lennon's 'Imagine' or 'Give Peace a Chance'?

By all means, read this book if you are interested in finding out more about modern US society. Updike excells at that and taking into account that this novel came out in 2006, its ideas are quite prescient. His description of boarded up shops and broken down communities is, to me, one of the gems of this novel. The scene where Joryleen, Ahmad's love interest at Central High (although he strongly denies it), performs oral sex on him in the same furniture shop where Ahmad works, is sad beyond description. The only reason Joryleen acquiesces to carry out this act, which is by the way facilitated by Ahmad's pal and work colleague, Charlie (as in he pays Joryleen), is because her boyfriend has asked her to do some 'favours' for him. Of a sexual nature, of course. The passage where Ahmad, twenty four hours before he sets off to kill, saves a beetle from dying is wonderfully written. But Updike's characters, bar Ahmad and Jack, are one-sided and on occasions, caricaturesque. Beth's sister, Hermione, and her boss at the Pentagon are two grotesque figures that seem to have come out straight from The Wall, Pink Floyd's cinematic version of their best-selling album.

As I mentioned at the begining of this review, 'clustering' more often than not prevents truly innovative and original works from seeing the light. And 'Terrorist' sadly proves my theory.

Copyright 2009

30 comments:

  1. Oh, I was so hoping you were going to say it was a worthy read. Thanks for the warning. Never a good sign when you see cheezy movie scenes while reading a novel...

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  2. Excellent review. Think I'll pass.

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  3. Thanks for the great synopsis; I now feel like I've read it.

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  4. Although I have never read Updike I read your review hoping you had found a treat - alas...
    It was a good review nevertheless.

    Interestingly many Starbucks outlets in Au have closed. It appears as if Australians have more of a European taste for real coffee...
    when I am in Hawaii I order a 3x shot strength at starbucks just so I can get an inkling of the taste of coffee...
    and all the while I hanker for a decent 'flat white'...

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  5. Thank you for the review, very thorough. I will pass as well. I have no idea why Starbucks is still around, it is one of the worst coffee chains around.

    Laughing at your line: "You know you are reading John Updike when the description of a night of insomnia takes up fourteen pages."

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  6. Thanks to eveyone for your kind comments.

    Greetings from London.

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  7. I was a great fan of Updike for a while, but he did pale after a bit. I began to get the feeling that atmosphere and description were his main concerns. I have not read Terrorist, and I must say that your review rather persuades me not to. Thanks for that, so many reviews these days are bland and sitting on the fence.

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  8. As expected, an excellent book review.

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  9. me encanta la portada!! buena elección el que la diseñó... y tiene buena pinta el libro!!

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  10. What a great place this is. Thank you for making it known to me.

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  11. Your review reaffirms two things for me, CiL. I have sat down with an Updike book two or three times and never lasted more than an hour or two before putting it aside. Too tedious for me, and I am a relatively patient man. Next, that you are a master book reviewer. As others have said here, I now feel as though I actually have read this novel and have met its characters.

    I did read "Ivan Denisovich" once upon a time. I am fairly confident you will come out appreciating it more than you did the "Terrorist." We shall see.

    Thank you, for a great review.

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  12. You're right on target. I used to wince in my writers workshops when people tried "thematic" criticism, believing that it's the writer's prerogative to choose subject matter. Then I was summarily trashed at the university for loving Hemingway (who had fallen into ugly disfavor by feminist critics) and I was told to change my student reading list. No matter that it already included Virginia W. and Atwood and Marquez, and Alvarez. But in your commentary, you drew a beautiful arc in wondering what the literary effect was, not the subject matter, which is always my main concern. I do agree that topicality can be a buzz killer for certain since the immediate past offers little perspective. Updike never really landed whole for me, as his world seemed so distant from mine. Yet, there is nothing in my life like a small village in Venezuela either, and yet I believe true prose from the heart constructed with great skill can make me a temporary Venezuelan! Bravo!

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  13. interesting stuff...they way we do things should always be analyzed and put up for change...

    and regarding your comment...I'm not sure what it was referring to, haha...care to explain?

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  14. Well, it could be me, but this seems to be a satire. I take your review to be a screenplay proposal, maybe the Woody type guy played by Jack Nicholson. I especially want to see him in the Indiana Jones scene, sidling up to Ahmad to save the world. Funny about old guy's fantasies, isn't it?
    Thanks for your always trustworthy writing!

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  15. Many thanks to you all for your kind comments.

    Greetings from London.

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  16. I was thinking of reading that so thanks for the heads up. I'm going to pass on that one.....
    Hey Cuban, Bruce Willis is at my house listening to Pink Floyd. Be jealous........

    Steady On
    Reggie Girl

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  17. Fantastically written review, Cubano. I have never been a big fan of Updike, and I think I will give this one a miss... the corny ending really put me off!

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  18. Cuban, gracias por tus comentarios en mi blog. Por la tarde paso a leer esto con calma, como se merece. Cuando tengas un chance vete a Chez Isabella a recoger un premio que te está esperando. Saludines desde Montréal.

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  19. This is a great review and it sounds like this book is a great challenge but you convinced me give it a go. Thanks!

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  20. Fantastic review. Now I don't have to worry about whether or not to read it.

    My (very unpopular) opinion is that it's too easy these days to write books, too easy to get them published. I don't remember when the typewriter was invented, but it hasn't been that long since people had to write books by hand. You have to really be motivated to write under those circumstances.

    Now you can flip open your computer and crank out a epic collections of pure crap, and have them published. I say save a tree, publish fewer books.

    We use a term here in the U.S. to describe a whole bunch of nothing: clusterf**k. Oh yeah.

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  21. that just may be a problem with human existence...haha

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  22. Many thanks to you all for your kind comments.

    Greetings from London.

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  23. Yes, there it sits forlornly on my bedside table. There is no chance now that it will ever be opened. I’ve been an avid fan of Updike since my late teens, having started out with Couples – a book so startling (for a naïve 19 year old) and so well written as to make the mind boggle. Then it was on to Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom and his hugely entertaining, stumbling journey through life. But then I tried to read Toward the End of Time. It sounds horribly like The Terrorist may be just as clunky and self-indulgent.

    Your book reviews are remarkable, Cuban. I always take note of the book you are currently reading on your sidebar when I visit and look forward with great anticipation to your evaluation of it. Crisp and erudite, each review is an outstanding introduction and précis of the work. Thank you!

    Can’t wait to hear what you think of Ivan Denisovich…..

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  24. Many thanks, Tessa, I have just finished 'One in the life of Ivan Denisovich' and like Primo Levi's memoir, it left me devastated. Despite the fact that it was a work of fiction.

    Thanks for your kind comment.

    Greetings from London.

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  25. You are such a brainiac. Thank you so much for saving me the torture of reading that book.

    Great post.

    Love Renee xo

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  26. Many thanks to you, Renee.

    Greetings from London.

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  27. ACIL, yay, I’ve been waiting for this post and it lives up to high expectations. Your review makes me feel relieved that I gave up on Terrorist. I’m so glad that you didn’t as it was interesting to read your interpretation. Updike writes well, but I hate the way he sees women. As a writer, it is hard to ignore 9/11, but I agree that a lot of it gets tedious with all the clichés. Your theory of clustering makes me rethink the novels I’ve read or heard about recently.

    I also enjoyed art, Shakespeare and music in the more current posts. You offer so much on your blog.

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  28. Thanks a lot, Sarah.

    Greetings from London.

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  29. great review - i'll probably read it anyway just because i feel i HAVE to. Updike is from my town. Some of my family and friends grew up with him but he moved away before i was born. i met him and he's very shy, endearing. i am glad to have discovered your blog!

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  30. Thank you very much, Adrienne.

    Greetings from London.

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