A Single Man

If he's seeking company with special ardor, it's because he's lost his male companion, Jim, to an auto accident, something the dreary late autumn approach to Christmas makes even harder to bear. The ghost of Jim flits in and out of so many of the novel's passages. George makes connections throughout his day, but we see one by one how they fall short of the intimacy he shared with Jim. His best friend Charlotte "Charley" and he have the kind of witty, boozy conversation longtime pals might have, but Charley's efforts to turn things romantic crash into George's homosexuality. George has friends on his school's faculty who kibbitz with him over lunch about their shared left-leaning politics, but these are hardly deep bonds. Also, George has a sickening feeling that, despite his oratorial brilliance as a teacher, he's not really reaching his students.

George visits a dying woman, also involved in the Ohio car crash that killed Jim. Once upon a time, Doris was a rival for Jim's affection. George's ambivalent reaction to her sad condition, somewhere between grieving and vanquishing a foe, testifies to the unflinching honesty of this portrait.

George raves about the hour he spends at his health club, entering a lively sit-up competition with a 14-year-old he finds incipiently attractive. "How delightful it is to be here," Isherwood writes, "If only one could spend one's entire life in this state of easygoing physical democracy."

George's only hope for a full communion with another person comes with a happenstance nighttime meeting with one of his students, Kenny, at a beachside bar. The 60-year-old man and the 19-year-old youth enjoy smart, witty, and flirtateous conversation, which culminates in a Pacific Ocean skinny-dip and a visit to George's place. The visit is sensual but not sexual, leaving George short of the Jim standard again--but not without hope.

A ordinary day of an ordinary (but for his intellect) man. Why then is this book so spectacular? The prose flows. Check out these stunning sentences: (Of Doris dying in a hospital room) "Here on the table...is a little paper book, gaudy and cute as a Chrstmas card: The Stations of the Cross. Ah, but when the road narrows to the width of this bed, when there is nothing in front of you that is known, dare you disdain any guide?" (Of George diving into the ocean nude with Kenny) "He washes away thought, speech, mood, desire, whole selves, entire lifetimes, again and again he returns, becoming always cleaner, freer, less."

Isherwood's warts-and-all approach to his semi-autobiographical lead character is so refreshing! And the novel makes the most of its beautiful, decadent SoCal setting. Who would have thought that one of the greatest novels of the 20th century could be so simple and honest? I'll always love this book. It is my crystal ball, since I may be very much like George one day. Don't ask me in what ways!