I was talking to a friend about comedic / farcical literature the other day, and Catch-22 by Joseph Heller came up. That made me remember - I first read this book when I was about 15 years old. Or rather I read about 80% of it, didn’t quite finish it that time. I forced myself through it because I had heard it was subversive and intelligent and challenging, and I got nothing out of it. I didn’t see the humor, I didn’t get any political commentary, it was just a series of absurd things happening to absurd characters with no rhyme or reason.
I reread that book two years ago and damn near pissed myself laughing on every other page, but then the ending rolled around and it hit so hard. That sudden switch from absurdist comedy to heavy, bleak, depressing, and then he gives you just this glimmer of hope at the end anyway. I found it absolutely brilliant, and yet I kept thinking back to how none of this connected with me when I first read it.
Do you have books like that? Books that just plain went over your head, that you didn’t have the maturity to appreciate, that were too difficult in style or subject matter, and that you’ve come to appreciate years later?
I got to John Le Carré when I was a James Bond obsessed teenager. I knew it was supposed to be more “mature” but I read multiple of his books and was bored out of my mind, but kept going try to find the good stuff.
I came back to him in my 20s and reread the books I hadn’t liked as well as a few others and found that I really enjoyed them a lot more. I just had to put some time into the workforce and the boring adult world to appreciate the kind of subtle personal dramas he writes in the midst of political and espionage settings. And I also had to not compare them to the Bond formula so much. Now he’s one of my favorite authors.
I read a few in my late teens and I really liked them, oddly I think the part that stuck with me most was the “a whole inch of cream cuff!” Line from I think the first Smiley book. Cracked me up then and still does.