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A Girls' Own Young
Ones
Kate Atkinson's first novel,
Behind the Scenes at the Museum, began her career with a fanfare
- it won the 1995 Whitbread award, snatching the prize from no less
than Salman Rushdie. But there was chorus of disapproval, as when
this year's Whitbread nearly went to Harry Potter's latest magical
adventure. Judges and readers professed themselves charmed, and the
book became a best-seller.
Atkinson is still a literary charmer, her chosen territory now familiar
to her readers - though she is too original a writer to merely repeat
herself. None the less, certain elements are found in all of her three
novels: a first-person narrator, who is a young girl of spirit and
linguistic flair; weird, unhappy families; irreverent humor; and conclusions
in which the characters get their just and moral deserts.
As Atkinson notes, a happy ending is "the one thing we can do
in fiction'', unlike real life, which "goes on and you die''.
Emotionally Weird is set in Dundee, home of Scotland's worst
poet, the inimitable William McGonagall - something of significance
given that most of the characters are aspiring writers. Effie the
narrator recalls her university years, spent in a state of terminal
confusion. Her essays are invariably late and she is continually in
danger of failing. Perhaps the least of her worries are a truly hopeless
boyfriend and her mother, Nora, who claims to be a virgin.
The novel hilariously and accurately depicts how awful student life
can be, with a mixture of literary theory, feminism, popular culture,
bad sex, squalid share-housing and even worse food permeating the
pages like a miasma. It reads at times like a Young Ones for
girls, both in its content, wild humor and elements of fantasy.
Effie's tenuous grip on reality is not helped by the fact that everybody
else's writing invades her textual life. These intrusive narratives
range from a philosophy lecturer's hospital romance (The Wards
of Love) to student Kevin's fantasy doorstopper featuring "the
beast Griddlebart''. Even Mother Nora erupts into the story, interjecting
"Is that magical realism?'', or betting Effie a pound as to whether
a minor character reappears later in the narrative. Effie herself
is writing a crime novel, or trying to, another assignment she is
failing.
Thus, Emotionally Weird is not the book to read if you are
teaching, or attending a course in creative writing. Atkinson is a
writer who can make you squirm even as you snigger. There is Martha,
the creative writing lecturer, and her dire class assignments: "Write
me a paragraph in 10 minutes, incorporating the words bracteate, trowel
and vilifies''. Atkinson exploits metafiction skilfully, at the same
time sending up most of its tropes and tricks.
Emotionally Weird is - like all of Atkinson's novels - lively,
witty and quite mad. But there are signs that perhaps it has been
finished hastily, with the expected cache of weird family secrets
not revealed with the aplomb displayed in Human Croquet. But
for fans, this book has much to recommend it.
- Lucy Sussex (author of The Scarlet Rider), 15th May 2000
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