By Halldór LaxnessIndependent People tells the tale of Bjartur of Summerhouses, a man that has worked for the wealthy Bailiff for eighteen long years and has at long last earned enough money to purchase his own small homestead. He wishes only to live a life unbeholden to any other, to be completely independent. Bjartur is proud, stubborn, and surly. He has no time for either religion or superstition and is impatient with idleness and fools.
Bjartur is also a blockhead. In his mulish quest for independence, he destroys almost everyone and everything he comes in contact with: his sheep, his farm and especially his family. He refuses to accept that he can never be fully independent. He may not be a slave to the Bailiff any longer, but he yet remains a slave to poverty, to Iceland
If my description has you expecting a long string of tragedies and heartbreak, you’d be right. The book can be bleak, very bleak. In truth, it was a difficult book for me to read. I found it rather depressing, especially as most of the misfortunes were self-inflicted, a direct result of Bjartur’s pigheaded decisions.
What kept me going? My conviction that something good or meaningful must arise from the mire. To some extent, I was right. In the end, in the last few pages of the book, Bjartur does find a small (but largely unsatisfying) measure of redemption. I was also left with the conviction that an independent life is a poor life indeed. Our lives are made richer by fostering an interdependence with friends and family.
Don’t get me wrong: Halldór Laxness is a truly gifted writer, and I think the book has a fine message. This is probably as great a book as its introduction and its numerous fans would have you believe. But not all great books are easy or fun to read, and Independent People was neither easy nor fun for me. Am I glad I read it? Yes. Would I read it again? I honestly don’t know. Ask me again in a couple of years.
4 comments:
The concept behind this book seems like a truthful one, but wow, sometimes truth is just too depressing to bear. I can see why some people would like this book, but I mostly read to get away from my problems. Not to have them magnified.
I'm with you. Books are an escape!
I think reading books like this prevents me from becoming too complacent and makes me realize how easy I have it. That's why I occassionally (very occassionally!) read them, but I am definitely ready for some lighter fare now. Seriously, this book should be made into a movie. It's got Oscar written all over it.
Love the Oscar comparison! That's so true. Remember The English Patient? I heard that book was realllly depressing.
I'll be sure to pick that one up then...not! I'm about to start wearing black and listening to The Cure.
You know, Larry and I caught the tail end of a show about Iceland: a lot of people there were getting filthy rich until the banking crisis, and now the entire country's bankrupt. I joked to Larry that if Icelanders had read this book, they wouldn't be in this pickle because almost the exact same thing happens in it! (Boom during WWI, then horrible crash.)
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