The City of Falling Angels by John Berendt
I picked up this book because I love Italy, have never been to Venice and didn’t know anything about the Fenice opera house that sadly burnt down in 1999. Well, I still love Italy, I still haven’t been to Venice and I still don’t know anything about the Fenice opera house. The best I can say about this book is that the edition I read had a lovely cover.
Other than that, I have to say it was a dreadfully written, stupid book. “Portrait of Venice” my ass. We barely see Venice at all. Mostly, it’s about the author. Who appears to be tiresome, mean and personality-free.
Here’s a whirlwind tour of why I didn’t like this book.
The author is all about quirk-hunting. Look at all the funny wackos I found! I hope he is forever shunned in Venice (and everywhere else) for using people’s real names and exposing private details to public ridicule. He talks to people, pretends to be sympathetic and then makes them look ridiculous. It’s that ignorant school of pseudo-travel writing that portrays people of other cultures as cute/charming/quirky cartoon characters. This is disrespectful, of course, and does nothing but display the insecurity, shallowness and ignorance of the author. I suppose it makes him feel better than everybody else. Here’s a guy I’d like to punch.
With three or so exceptions, women mentioned in the book are reduced to their hair color: blonde, brunette, redhead… they have no past or future, no personality, no thoughts, no life. Sometimes they are allowed to be wives, mothers or girlfriends, but the description stops there.
Frankly, I think the author is a talentless hack. A not very good reporter trying to write a book. One of the many indications of this, is the endless cataloguing of dates, times and locations. “At 5:32 am Paulo got out of bed to get a glass of water.” A cross between a cheap mystery-thriller and a CNN update. As if temporal precision makes good writing. Another pretentious tick he has is never using contractions, making everyone sound unnaturally formal and stilted.
And finally, the author is embarrassingly celebrity/fame/money obsessed. The name-dropping is out of control. He’s amazed by every two-bit socialite — you can just see him wringing his hands like Peter Lorre at his most obsequious. The author craves the attention of the rich and titled. He slobbers dutifully over the memory of famous authors and artists, repeating their names like mantras. When invited to a house where Henry James once stayed, he reads a novel merely to be able say “I’m standing where this character stood.” Over and over the great man’s name is repeated as the author of this book scuttles about: sitting at a desk where HJ once sat, looking out over the water where HJ may once have stood, etc. Now, I have no objection to a bit of literary tourism, but this fellow never once gives any indication of appreciating the novels, or even being particularly fond oo otherwise of HJ’s work. So why is he going on about him? Because HJ is a famous author. Because everyone knows he’s supposed to be one of the great authors. Because he’s famous. Reminds me of a line attributed to Kipling:
“He wrapped himself in quotations- as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.”
And one final hallmark of a bad writer: superlatives and extremes. No one merely says something. Nay, they must shriek. And wildly, too. It’s a veritable pyrotechnic display of things glittering, soaring and aglow with malfeasance — brilliantly transformed into an endlessly dazzling display of “twinkling in the multitudinous candles.” And that’s just the doorknob. His poor thesaurus must be in tatters.
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