The Liar
by Stephen Fry
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Book Summary Information
Author: Stephen FryEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1994-06-01
ISBN: 156947012X
Number of pages: 280
Publisher: Soho Press
Book Reviews of The Liar
Book Review: Constant seedy action undermines wonderful language
Summary: 3 Stars
Consistently tawdry - in the way that having builders next door is consistently irritating. Where someone else might have a minor linking scene 'while dining' or something, Fry will inevitably have it 'while receiving oral sex' or the like. Is it a sex comedy? Partly, inasmuch as immorality is seen as merely amusing, although the typical bedroom farce still treats the act as a big thing, with some sense of taboo. For Fry there's not even a hint of such innocence: for him fifteen year old boys seducing homesick and confused twelve year old boys is innocence. It's almost beyond gratuitous: the sex is just scenery, and not nearly as important as, for example, the undeniably clever wordplay about sex. Although there's even something of the 'Pretty Woman' nonsense about the moral neutrality of prostitution - it means nothing more than any other trade, except that it's more glamorous and pays better. While I'm sure some moralists overstate it, this sort of absurd understatement isn't any better. There's also an essentially warped view of reality: he is unlikely to see virtue standing right in front of him ('What is truth' said jesting Pilate...) because he projects his own ugly stereotypes: we meet one brother and sister in the book - go straight to 'incest' (I mean, they worked on a farm - what choice does a writer have?). And on a more personal note, there is gross hypocrisy in a writer who'd bridle at yet another absurd Hollywood depiction of a gay man as emotional and neurotic - yet can blithely, and oh so obviously - write off every clergyman with his cliché dumb malicious paedophile. A guy with Fry's education has come across dozens of committed Christian writers, clergy among them (Donne, Carroll, Keirkegaard) of towering intellect, yet in this case he chooses the Daily Mirror approach to character insight.
If you can habituate yourself to the constant seedy action (and it's disturbingly easy to do so given years of sexually oriented pop-culture; most of the raving critics in the liner notes don't even seem to notice), the language itself is drenched with wit. This is not merely a prurient cynic's mistaken 'exposé'. Fry is really far more interested in words than bodies, and he's extremely good with them. The sentences are a pleasure in themselves (think Wodehouse or Chandler, although where they often brought it home with a witty simile, Fry is funny in a dozen different ways, including ingenious puns).
Critics often laud Fry's intelligence too (and he is undoubtedly smart), but I think a lot of this is mistaking his public school education and consequent vocabulary of literary 'in-jokes' and allusions for intellect. He's grown up on classical texts, but that doesn't make, for example, his bawdy line about the statue Eros 'burying his shaft down Shaftsbury avenue' any more intelligent than someone in primary school teasing Richard Little by shortening his first name to 'Dick' (ho ho) and reversing surname and Christian name (ha ha!). But because Fry can place this pun in the context of his knowledge of the myth of Eros and Psyche - this is classed as intelligent wit.
That being said, Fry sets himself up for an enormous fall when he describes his central character as a prodigy of wit. Yet unlike just about any popular thriller writer (eg. Lustbader, Clancy) who claim perceptive, sophisticated heroes but actually paint dumb thugs, Fry comes through above and beyond. The dialogue is constantly sharp, funny, and slap-in-the-face incisive. There are a thousand of the excellent 'Black Adder' style ripostes, and some tougher ones as well. I suppose that's why I've still got the book on my shelf and gave it a 'recommended' rating. For humour and wit it's an easy 'A'; for offensiveness it's an easy 'F'.
It's actually very easy to compartmentalise the book. Read it for the wit and the style (unless you just can't cope with flagrant immorality as everyday background).
Characters? You'll only get insight into the one character that Fry appears to be interested in: himself. He even describes the sensation of feeling that the rest of the world are just bit players in your own personal drama: a common enough adolescent feeling, but not one I'm sure he's ever shed. I wonder whether he's ever got past the habit of scanning a room and then honing in on the one or two people 'worth talking too'. He's not an out and out misanthrope; rather only a fraction of people in the world are of any interest to him (i.e. the people most like himself who can play with words or, at least, get his word plays because of a shared educational heritage). The central character virtually becomes the only other major character in the book, Trefusis, parroting him in the final scene to a new potential protégé.
Plot? Well, it is interesting that he breaks up the chronology, though not essential. There is also an odd departure: suddenly about three quarters of the way through we're in a spy novel (hinted at in a single teasing aberrant scene in the prologue). It hasn't been woven in to the rest of the story, it's just stuck on the end, and actually quite optional. On its own it's even a bit weak, with a 'and then he woke up' style conclusion that doesn't quite work. But you've been given plenty of other diversions, so you don't mind so much - he might get better at this plot thingy later.
Summary of The Liar
An irresistible novel by multi-talented Stephen Fry, author, film and television star, playwright and newspaper columnist."The spirits of Oscar Wilde and Evelyn Waugh glower benignly over this very funny first novel . . . An ingenious plot filled with surprises and glittering with hilarious, often indecent inventions."?The New York Times Book Review
"Transforms the sophomoric into the sophisticated."?Los Angeles Times
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