10.05.09
Sarah Waters: The Little Stranger
The Little Stranger is another book that I read only because of its Booker shortlisting (though I’m not sure that’s a good explanation in itself). I’d read her last two (also Booker shortlisted) novels, Fingersmith and The Night Watch, and liked them to varying degrees without doing anything mad like declaring myself a fan, or hanging onto them. These tempered expectations meant that her new novel turned out to be a pleasant surprise.
The Little Stranger is tagged on the blurb as “a chilling ghost story”, which is both true and misleading. In an interview, Waters said that while in the process of writing the book, she became ’stuck’ and decided then on the introduction of a ghost. Her primary interest initially was to explore the social changes in Britain after the second world war.
She does this very effectively. The story centres on Hundreds Hall in Warwickshire, home to the Ayres family. Our narrator, Dr Faraday, is a local family doctor, who worked his way up from “humble beginnings” to his present status, and is worried that the imminent introduction of the National Health Service by the postwar Labour government will send him crashing back down. Faraday’s mother worked at Hundreds Hall when he was a child, and he can still remember his first impression of the house:
[It] struck me as an absolute mansion. I remember its lovely ageing details: the worn red brick, the cockled window glass, the weathered sandstone edging. They made it look blurred and slightly uncertain – like an ice, I thought, just beginning to melt in the sun.
By the time Ayres returns to the Hall, called in the course of his work to attend to a sick maid, the melting is well and truly underway. Living in the house now are Mrs Ayres, and her twenty-something children Caroline and Roderick. With just two domestic staff, the fabric of the house (and spirit of the household) is crumbling, which Faraday attributes in part to the loss of the working class staff: “after two hundred years, those people had begun to withdraw their labour, their belief in the house; and the house was collapsing, like a pyramid of cards.”
There is another problem too. A belief begins to spread through the Ayreses that Hundreds Hall is haunted, perhaps by the spirit of Mrs Ayres’ first daughter Susan, who died aged seven. The story that unfolds tells of the effect that this belief has on the family, the house and on Faraday himself.
There is a great deal to like in The Little Stranger, in particular Waters’ almost miraculous ability to grab the reader and not let go through the long passages of spooky activity in the house. It is also a portrayal of those postwar social changes referred to above, such as the decline of the landed gentry: the upper middle classes, like the Ayres family, are haunted by the spectre of the rising working class, their Labour government, their welfare state. “What’s left for an old family like that in England nowadays?” The land around Hundreds Hall is sold off to make ends meet, and council homes are built up. Mrs Ayres feels that her world “is dwindling to the point of a pin.” Roderick tips closer and closer to the edge:
‘I think they’d like nothing better than to hang us all from the mainbrace; they’re just waiting for Attlee to give them the word. He probably will, too. Ordinary people hate our sort now, don’t you see?’
Faraday’s own relationship with the Ayres and their “sort” is complicated. He envies them their elevated status and resents them for allowing their house to fall into disrepair. He resents too his own origins in “labouring stock”, and is embarrassed by how, as a young man, he came to feel ashamed of his parents. Even his respectable occupation can’t obscure some kind of self-loathing: “I’m a nobody. People don’t even see me half the time. They see ‘Doctor’. They see the bag.”
The weakness of the book for me was the repeated hints dropped by Waters about the true source of the Ayres’s problems. It’s so heavily signposted that there is little room for interpretation, except around the edges of things like knowledge and intent. It closes down possibilities even as it opens them up. This, combined with the just-so symbolism and despite the room for discussion which is likely to make this a book group favourite, helps give The Little Stranger the neatness and cosiness of what some call ‘establishment literary fiction’. Nonetheless I enjoyed reading it, not least because Waters is a great storyteller who pulls the reader through 500 pages a lot more smoothly than Hilary Mantel does (or than Simon Mawer does through 400).
It struck me that The Little Stranger has some similarities with Patrick McGrath’s 1996 novel Asylum, not just in the postwar setting or the narrative by a medical man (an authority figure in whom we automatically place our trust), but also in the psychological playout of the story. However Asylum, I believe, is more subtle and complex (Jonathan Coe, a Booker judge in 1996, recently regretted that it didn’t win the prize then) … and at 250 pages, is also half the length.
Please note: if you haven’t read The Little Stranger, the comments below contain spoilers
Deb said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 2:54 pm
What a coincidence—I just finished The Little Stranger a couple of days ago and enjoyed it—up until the last 50 or so pages, when it became obvious that the ending was going to be left deliberately ambiguous and I felt that Walters hadn’t played quite fair with her readers, and this left me feeling slightly let down. (Certainly more could have been done with the fact that the narrator had keys to Hundreds Hall and could not account for his whereabouts when his ex-fiancee met her fate.) Perhaps Walters couldn’t decide whether she was writing a social novel or a ghost story; of course, there’s no reason that the two have to be mutually-exclusive, but I still would have liked the book more if the ending had been stronger. I would say that of the two post-WWII books Walters has written, I enjoyed The Night Watch far more—especially with its somewhat tricky backwards narrative.
John Self said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 3:04 pm
That’s very interesting, Deb. I suppose I should declare for anyone coming to this before reading The Little Stranger that messages here could CONTAIN SPOILERS, though I’ve done my best to keep them out of the main review.
My gripe, as indicated above, was that it was too obvious that the narrator was key to the whole thing, ie it wasn’t ambiguous enough! I didn’t see any way of interpreting it in any other way, as the hints were coming all too thick and fast by the end. But I should say that I had been pre-loaded to expect something like that, as I read elsewhere of there being an ‘unreliable narrator’ in the book, so others may have got further through it without feeling they were being hammered over the head every time Faraday spoke of feeling guilty, or resentful of his relative social standing. By the time Caroline started explicitly accusing him (more or less), and the night spent in the car outside Hundreds Hall, I was rolling my eyes in exasperation, thinking, OK, OK, we’ve got it!
Deb said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 3:14 pm
Oh God, I’m so sorry–I didn’t even think about that! Please feel free to edit out my spoiler.
Mary said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 3:20 pm
I agree with Deb. I felt the ending was disappointing and I’m not convinced by readers of other blogs who claimed to have found extraordinarily subtle `clues’ as to what was really going on. I’ve revealed here that I found the book intriguing to the extent that I searched on the internet for fellow readers to help explain to me who dun it. ( Was I being incredibly thick? Were there fascinating hints lying around that I had clumsily ignored?) In the end I came to the conclusion that Waters really hadn’t wrapped up the narrative ( she’s admitted it since) but there’s enough ambiguity for a lot of interesting debate as you say.The descriptions of the house created a very claustrophobic feeling and I felt relief when the action moved outside Hundreds Hall – something that displays Waters’ skill as a writer. It’s the Booker book I’ve enjoyed reading the most ( Byatt and Mantel being the others) but I haven’t read Summertime which I know has been the front runner on this blog and which sounds a more complex book than the three I’ve mentioned.
Mary said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 3:30 pm
SPOILER Now we’re in spoiler mode I ‘ll just add that I felt cheated by the final sentence. It was Faraday and his class envy at the bottom of it all? So obvious. So frustrating and in light of what had gone on – unconvincing. Hence my desperate trawl for missed clues….
John Self said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 3:40 pm
I’ve added a postscript to my review to warn of spoilers down here.
Mary: in a nutshell, yes, though I think there’s still an argument to be had (which can probably never be resolved) whether he knew he was doing it. Of course, then you might ask, what about the burn marks, or the lettering on the walls, or the fact that Betty felt spookiness before Faraday returned to the house. Well, the thing about an unreliable narrator is that he’s your only source for all information, so there’s no telling what he could say happened, and nobody can dispute it because it’s his story. Or is it that he had keys to the house and could have created all sorts of mayhem consciously or not? Is that too neat? Still, there is (apparently, as I haven’t read it) a good deal of homage to James’s The Turn of the Screw and Josephine Tey novels to chew on as well.
I am probably hypersensitive to unreliable narrators, being a fan of Ishiguro and Patrick McGrath – but, as I say, I did read somewhere before I opened The Little Stranger that it had an unreliable narrator, so I was on guard from the start. Interestingly, the Guardian on Saturday (can’t find a link) rather gave it away too by saying that if the book wins, it will be the first crime novel to win the Booker!
Deb said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 3:43 pm
I’m with Mary–I feel as if the narrator wasn’t unreliable enough.
Ben Johncock said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 4:02 pm
I’m still scratching my head as to why Waters in on the Booker shortlist at all (twice, no less!). WT, as they say, F?
KevinfromCanada said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 6:10 pm
I’m a reader who likes ambiguity, so I was quite happy with the ending. It could have been a ghost, after all, if you are willing to believe in ghosts. Or the whole process may be a phantasm, shared by all the residents and the doctor. Or Caroline. Or, of course, Dr. Farrady. Or some combination of these factors. I don’t regard it as a crime story with only one solution (Waters’ previous books are quite concise with the “reveal” at the ending) so I rather like the notion that readers need to keep all theses possibilities in their head. And I do agree that the best part of the book is the way it captures the changes that were taking place at the time.
John Self said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 6:32 pm
Well clearly Waters is doing something right, if some readers think it too ambiguous, others not ambiguous enough, and some judge it just right!
Oh and Ben – three times. Oh yes.
Ben Johncock said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 10:00 am
I doff my cap to your superior knowledge, Sir!
Three times is even worse – that’s stretching back to her earlier, Victorian sex-romps.
She’s the staple beacon of optimism to writers everywhere – If she can get on the shortlist, so one day can I
I think it’s deliberate ploy to make the prize seem more accessible. Tenner says she makes at least the longlist next year.
John Self said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 6:07 pm
I’ll take that bet, thanks Ben. I’m pretty sure Waters won’t have a novel out next year, so I think my tenner is pretty safe. I accept pounds, dollars or euros by the way.
1streading said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 7:38 pm
What struck me when I read it a couple of months ago was that either the narrator is unreliable to the point of simply making up many of the events he describes or there is no non-supernatural solution to the mystery. If the former then I feel Waters has strayed from ‘unrelaible narrator’ to ‘cheated reader’; if the latter then I don’t think we can take it very seriously, although it did amuse me that the most rational character might be at the centre of all the poltergeist activity.
What no-one has really mentioned, though, is what all this tells us about Waters’ attitude to her theme of social change.
Deb said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 12:02 pm
The problem I have, as I stated above, is that Farraday is not presented as an unreliable narrator. Only two scenes really seemed to indicate that Farraday’s viw of reality was at significant odds with the views of others: The scene where Caroline makes it clear that she expects to live in London after she and Farraday are married and Farraday fails to see that a large part of his attractiveness in Caroline’s eyes is his ability to get her away from Hundreds Hall. The second scene is where Farraday’s partner’s wife reacts to Caroline breaking off the engagement. It’s clear that she sees that Caroline has no intention of ever marrying Farraday, but he persists in believing he can win her back.
Contrast this with the numerous scenes in which Farraday’s common sense grasp of what is going on is confirmed in conversation with his colleagues. These scenes with his fellow doctors indicate that Farraday is a level-headed chap who is going above and beyond the call to help Caroline and her family.
If Farraday is meant to be unreliable, Waters should present him as such. I’m not saying I want him to wear a sandwich board that reads I AM AN UNRELIABLE NARRATOR, but Waters should play fair with readers. (For example, I think it’s made far clearer in Asylum that the narrator is not reliable.) Perhaps, like the writers of “Casablanca,” Waters didn’t know how her own story was going to end while she was writing it and so she continued to plant clues both pro and con until she ran out of steam and just ended it. All in all, it was a great book for the first three-quarters, but a bit of a let-down at the end.
Deana said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 9:00 pm
I’m so glad you liked it. I did too, but I can’t escape the feeling that Sarah Waters can do much better. She does everything right and then falls into a trap (there’s always something wrong about all of her books and it’s always a different thing). I think her best work remains to be written.
John Self said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 6:09 pm
Yes despite my grumbes, Deana, I did enjoy reading it – ‘unputdownable’ is not far off the mark. Care to clarify what you think the weaknesses of her other books are? For me, the structure of The Night Watch was both its raison d’etre and its achilles heel. (Wow, three cliches in one comment!)
Teresa said,
Monday, 5 October 2009 at 11:06 pm
I think it’s amply clear that Faraday is the source of the problem, although, John, you’re the first person I’ve seen who caught on to that so early. For me, it was late in the novel that I put that together, but once I did, it fit so perfectly that I can’t imagine another solution.
But I still think there’s plenty of room for ambiguity regarding what and how. I’d decided that it was supernatural but that Faraday was the source (probably unconsciously) but then I see here that others think he could have faked the whole thing, which I hadn’t thought of. (It had occurred to me that he wasn’t honest in his account.)
It seems to me that with so many people still puzzling out what was gonig on–and wanting to figure it out–Waters must have done something right. I’d be surprised if this were to win the prize, but I don’t think it should be dismissed as something slight, which some seem inclined to do.
maxdunbar said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 9:10 am
Fpr me the realisation that Faraday is the ghost came about three quarters of the way through and by then I couldn’t put the thing down. Arguably the process starts when, as a child, he breaks the acorn off the wall. The fact that he had keys is something I hadn’t considered but I think the nub is in Seeley’s speech about the ‘little stranger’ itself. The idea that a ghost would not have to be dead seemed original to me.
maxdunbar said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 9:10 am
and it has to be said, I knew people who read the whole book without suspecting Faraday of anything.
Deb Walter said,
Tuesday, 10 November 2009 at 5:14 am
One of those would be me….
Lee Monks said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 2:42 pm
Well guys, the result is nearly upon us. I’m not saying it’s a Christmas-esque frisson of hardwired excitement exactly, but I do like a good book award, a swanky celebration (which is what it is, whoever’s up for the gong) of literature. And any such thing is a good thing, however slight. One can only hope that it isn’t another compromising symposium of Mantel genuflectors, but even if it is, it’s about as big a shebang as we get over here. And you never know, the hat-trick may be on…
John Self said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 6:38 pm
Teresa, Deb, 1streader and max – I think the clues to Faraday’s involvement are so glaringly obvious once you read it from the viewpoint that he is involved that it actually makes the book, as max has pointed out, even more gripping. Of course this is a somewhat circular point, but I suspect some of the judges had different experiences of reading it, which probably influenced them to put the book further, and also enhanced their rereading – hence its advancement to the shortlist.
As I mentioned above, it’s a highwire act for an author to get an unreliable narrator ‘right’ – and the majority of the ‘clues’ to Faraday lie not in conflicting accounts with other people, but with details of his class resentment and feelings of responsibility. That he even articulates these – where a clever liar would try to hide them – may mean that his unreliability is such that he just doesn’t know what he’s doing, or why he’s doing it, and that his involvement is either subconscious or unconscious. Of course if all the clues meant nothing and there was just a ‘real’ ghost, then – as 1streading says – you’re left with a bit of a trifle, and all what seem to be clues are just coincidental. I don’t buy that.
Deb said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 7:46 pm
But John, your explanation presupposes that everyone who reads the book is going to assume that Farraday is an unreliable narrator right from the start and realize immediately that he is behind all of the manifestations of the little stranger. If Farraday is indeed responsible for the “haunting” and its aftermath, I would like Waters to have written a little more about how Farraday moved large pieces of furniture, put scorch marks on the walls, locked the nursery door, made the speaker tube work, made the service bells ring, knew exactly what little Susan’s childish scrawl looked like, knew precisely what the Ayres family reactions to all these things would be, etc. Not to flog a dead horse, but the ending of the book really lets down what came before it, because it feels unresolved—not just deliberately ambiguous.
It puts me in mind of a feature that used to run in either Salon or Slate called “The Scene We Missed.” They would take a movie with an improbable ending and write a scene which, had it been included in the movie, would have made sense of the ending. It was all tongue-in-cheek; the added scenes would include things like time travel, super powers, or a character being two places at one time, because these were the only things that made sense of the ending. If Farraday did everything (up to and including the murder of Caroline) just to get his hands on Hundreds Hall, how would he know that the Hall would still be standing after Caroline’s death? How did he know that it wouldn’t be sold or razed to make way for more council houses? It just doesn’t hang together for me.
I enjoyed the book, but think it could have been so much better if Waters had included a few more scenes to resolve these things.
Max Cairnduff said,
Tuesday, 6 October 2009 at 8:56 pm
John,
Interesting you say it would be more gripping knowing from the outset that Faraday is involved. Don’t Booker judges read the books twice, in which case on the second reading they would know that?
Otherwise, it sounds enjoyable but not great literature, which is no bad thing to be – unless that is you’re up for the Booker.
You really should give Turn of the Screw a try by the way, along with The Aspern Papers (which it’s often packaged with) it’s a superb novella.
Deb said,
Wednesday, 7 October 2009 at 11:56 am
I’m glad you mentioned The Aspern Papers. I know there have been comparisons made between The Little Stranger and The Turn of the Screw, but I think the comparisons with The Aspern Papers are just as apt, given Farraday’s desire for Hundreds Hall which makes him obsessive about marrying Caroline.
Max Cairnduff said,
Wednesday, 7 October 2009 at 12:00 pm
Well, I was planning to read it anyway (even with the spoilers, I saw the warning too late), Kevin had previously convinced me to do so. But, with an Aspern Papers comparison it’s definitely on my to be read list.
Deb said,
Wednesday, 7 October 2009 at 12:30 pm
I guess I’m just spoiler central on this post!
Sorry ’bout that!
Max Cairnduff said,
Wednesday, 7 October 2009 at 12:44 pm
I think it’ll survive Deb, to be honest anything suitable for Booker consideration should still be a rewarding read even if spoilered.
Deb said,
Wednesday, 7 October 2009 at 2:38 pm
I’m in the States and the Booker just doesn’t have quite the same ability to move readers as it does across the pond. Perhaps if The Little Stranger were an Oprah Book Club selection…
(ducks!)
Chester said,
Thursday, 8 October 2009 at 12:22 am
I’m surprised that so many seem to think that Faraday was behind it all. When I read it I thought that each Ayre created their own ghost, until Caroline, who was killed by the vengeful projection of Faraday.
I have since read an interview with Waters where she claims that Faraday is only unreliable because he can’t appreciate the possible supernatural aspects of the events. She claimed he wasn’t lying to the readers.
I think it a good read but not completely realized.
Sam said,
Thursday, 8 October 2009 at 12:57 pm
Sounds like a good read. Though do wish they’d used the indefinite article in the title rather than the definite one: ‘A Little Stranger’ sounds much more lovely and ambiguous.
John Self said,
Thursday, 8 October 2009 at 1:39 pm
Candia McWilliam thought of that one already, Sam. I read her novel years ago but can’t remember much about it except that it concerned a pregnancy and possibly the trials of parenthood. If only I’d paid more attention.
nico said,
Thursday, 8 October 2009 at 8:44 pm
Hey John, did you hear? Maybe you could put Müller’s novel on top (the one I told you about a while ago The land of Green plums, or The appointment), in your series of Hoffman’s translation, now that she’s got it!! I’m so happy, this is my favorite writer. Rarely the best coincide with the ones that deserve it, but this is a matter of polemic discussion. Hope you’re well
Colette Jones said,
Tuesday, 13 October 2009 at 6:57 am
Even the ghost was not intentional when Sarah Waters started the book. She has stated that it came to her part way through to add a ghost. I like to think the Henry James knew whether madness or the supernatural was at play in The Turn of the Screw but left it for readers to decide. In contrast, I don’t feel that Sarah Waters really knows which way she meant it, and it’s more of an accident than a deliberate ambiguity.
The Second Pass said,
Friday, 16 October 2009 at 5:49 pm
[...] by a mainframe computer buried deep in a fortified bunker.” . . . John Self finds himself enjoying Sarah Waters’ new novel: “I’d read her last two (also Booker shortlisted) novels, Fingersmith and The Night Watch, and [...]
kirsty said,
Wednesday, 21 October 2009 at 7:46 pm
It’s interesting reading the comments here. I really wanted this book to have a non supernatural explanation, mostly because “oh, it was a ghost all along” really annoys me as a plot device. And human psychology is, as far as I’m concerned, far more interesting than anything paranormal. But, as Deb says above, there were just too many things in this book that I couldn’t buy Faraday having managed to pull off so I was left with the idea that at least some of it was supposed to be a ‘real’ ghost and rather ambivalent about the whole book. I liked so much about the book – setting, characters, ideas, writing – but it left me nonplussed.
Patti Abbott said,
Tuesday, 10 November 2009 at 3:56 pm
I think Ayres is the source of all the problems here, but my problem is it conscious maliciousness or is it some otherwordly demon he sets into motion through his jealousy. Perhaps something dating from his childhood.
Did anyone take that away? That he might not even be aware that the harm came from his unconscious mind.
Patti Abbott said,
Tuesday, 10 November 2009 at 3:57 pm
Sorry I said Ayres and I mean Dr. Farraday.