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~Trigger Warning: rape; gang rape, self-harm; multiple suicide attempts; car accident; domestic abuse; male-on-male abuse; heavy descriptions of self-harm, (the process and the consequences); manipulation; endless paragraphs justifying abuse to characters. Please be careful~
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara, short-listed for the Man Booker Prize in 2015, is known for its intense, violent, graphic and gruesome descriptions of some of the hardest things people have had to experience. This book has thrived itself off of the gossip and discussions that are inevitable after reading it. Whether you loved or hated this book, you will continue to talk about it for the rest of your life. Luckily, I loved it.
After hearing about this book through booktube, with it becoming a sort of challenge to try and read this book without completely breaking down, I decided to read this book. I’d heard that listening to the audiobook and reading the book at the same time was helpful because of the length of it, a whopping 800 pages, so I decided to try that. If you wish to undertake this life experience, I would also recommend trying to get the audiobook to listen too alongside your reading.
The plot follows four men, Jude, a lawyer; Willem, an actor, JB, an artist and Malcolm, an architect. They form a friendship in college and the book follows it until its end, spanning most of their lives. While Jude is the protagonist, there are chapters from the perspective from the other characters, however the focus is always Jude, an ethnically ambiguous, disabled, heavily depressed gay character. The book involves discussions of identity, race, wealth, sex and relations and other topics that would be expected amongst a close-knit friendship, however, the difference here is JB, Willem and Malcolm are hand-cuffed to Jude and his safety because of Jude’s disability and volatile nature. They realise if they leave him, there is the potential threat of Jude causing harm to himself, as he believes he ‘deserves’ bad things to happen to him. While the premise is unique, the friendship can often become toxic and unhealthy, a fact that is obvious because Yanagihara is not afraid to ensure that all emotions are spoken. Her approach to these topics is often real, raw and needed in society, but that extra step she goes creates an unhealthy environment for these conversations and results in a counter-productive result. If you’re seeking healthy advice on love, gay relations, your disability or your mental health, please seek a professional.
Yanagihara’s writing is beautiful in the most traumatic way possible. Her lyrical paragraphs and heavily descriptive chapters can only be appreciated in small doses because of the content of her writing. As mentioned, the book is known for its overly sexual, horrifically graphic details of abuse and sexual encounters. The book follows emotional torture after emotional torture, followed by manipulation, excessive abuse and self-harm, which I could only stomach because I felt I owed it to the protagonist to keep reading to find out his fate.
While the book is very profound, and very openly sheds light on topics of abuse in religious circles, prostitution, and how fame and fortune can manipulate friendships and turn people horrible, the book often pushes it too far. When you strip the book of all these shocks, the book lacks diversity, honest conversations about abuse, healthy portrayals of gay love as well as self-love. I’m not saying that authors should feel entitled to only portray the good in life, far from it, but Yanagihara drags out this abuse to the point where the reader is now a victim of her writing the same way Jude is a victim of life.
The book has had heavy criticism for not including many women in the novel and the focus being male attention, however, I actually welcome this perspective as while it is a male focus, it prioritises male emotions, male presence in family life and friendship groups; the book is as equally powerful as a book with only a female perspective, such as Girl, Woman, Other by Bernadine Evaristo. The four men in the friendship are all so different and diverse that the book manages to cover a lot through these characters.
In conclusion, please only read this book if you find yourself mentally capable to put yourself through something like Yanagihara’s writing. If you cannot cope, put it down and do not start it again until you’re ready, or ever. If you crave a book about male emotional fragility and that covers a range of topics like gay relationships, disability and a strong friendship group, I’d recommend this wholeheartedly.
Rating:
Purchase from:
Amazon UK here.
Amazon US here.