Plays Well With Others
By Allan Gurganus
His friends are now dead. Seeking to memorialize them, narrator Hartley Mims,
Jr. creates a portrait of Manhattan in the early 1980s, just prior to and during
the AIDS crisis. Only hinting at the magnitude of the epidemic, he focuses almost
exclusively on his "dear ones" – his small clique of ambitious,
attractive, talented friends. A celebration of the lives of the soon-to-be-afflicted
rather than an emotional recounting of their untimely deaths, the book is a series
of episodes that focus on the fun and friendship experienced by the group. The
narration is engaging, and the dialog is sharp and witty, if sometimes a bit
arduous. If the novel suffers, it is not from the writing, which is unique and
skillful, or from the subject matter; rather, it is from the lack of sentiment.
However much the novel purports to be about friendship, it is driven much more
by the characters’ desire for fame and success. The main characters are
vain and determined, having fled the Deep South to redefine themselves as Bohemian
New Yorkers and to make a name for themselves as artists. They share an unconventional
and affected manner of speaking that renders the reader an observer rather than
a member of their exclusive club. They are believable, but one-dimensional. In
the face of death, we are not shown fear, remorse, resistance, or any depth of
emotion. Instead, we are shown their final grasps at success – frantic
painting, desperate self-promotion – as though we are supposed to be more
profoundly affected by the loss of the musical scores or pieces of art they might
have produced had they survived than by the loss of the person. Their final days
seem pathetic, not courageous, and the book kept me at an emotional distance – something
that didn’t quite seem appropriate for a novel that, at its core, is about
tragedy and loss. Alison Case
©Copyright 2008 Libretto,
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