Access Instantly The Boarding-House Outlined By William Trevor Disseminated As Publication Copy

BoardingHouse is the third novel William Trevor published in, The craft of a master storyteller is evident in this unsettling novel, Trevor cleverly juxtaposed sinister and comic elements in this story about eight residents in a rooming house after the death of its owner, Mr.
Bird.

The Boarding House is a rundown red brick building located in the southwestern suburbs of London built during Victorian times.
Mr. Bird selects solitary spirits, lonely folks like himself who have neither family nor personal ties, A quirky crew of five men and three women spend evenings watching TV and drinking cocoa together, This seems pretty cozy on the surface but lodged within the personal history of each character are eccentricities, aspirations, and insecurities that threaten their coexistence.
Mr. Bird dies when the novel begins and life at The Boarding House will never be the same again, The Boarding House is willed to two dubious residents who hate each others guts but are compelled to work together while straining to achieve their personal agenda.


As the story unfolds, an omniscient narrator takes us into the interior life of each resident and we become acquainted with their anxiety over the future of The Boarding House and its impact on them.
The strength of Trevors writing lies in the insight he offers into the motivation of each resident his or her unique preoccupation, hopes, and fears.
Their quests include a desire to be freed of the past, to be loved or married, to be successful in courtship, to be sexually titillated, to extort money, to avoid harassment at work, and to appear to be useful to others.
Some of the scrapes and faux pas the characters get themselves into are laughable in cringeworthy ways, The petty fights and arguments among the residents contribute lighter comic moments,

However, an unmistakable streak of malevolence can be detected in a few of the residents, including Mr, Bird himself, which lent this story a disturbing edge, The residents perceive Mr. Bird as a kindly father figure, yet the omniscient narrator let on that Mr, Bird was laughing when he was making out his will, A subtle cruelty underlies Mr, Birds decisions as he knows full well the consequences that will befall the residents, In fact, they continue to feel the stronghold of his presence and pay the price of his audacious plan with respect to The Boarding House.


I marveled at Trevors revelation of the impulses that drive human behavior, It was discomforting to discern the dark side of human nature, Noble intentions can innocuously turn ignoble, The BoardingHouse has a fascinating tapestry woven from threads of contrasting hues: ominous dark, comic light, brooding grays, For an early work, it is compelling piece of dark comedy, Trevor's third novel takes place in a boarding house, with a cast of lonely, somewhat offbeat people, Imagine living in a boarding house! Do such places still exist I kept thinking of the Beatles' song, Eleanor Rigby, as I read.
When the owner of the house dies, he leaves it to two of the residents who make a right mess of things.
So, from a slow beginning the book revs up to its final disaster, When I began this book, I was expecting a typical William Trevor Book, Boy was I wrong! many metaphors for loneliness in the characters of the book, all brought together by a peculiar boarding house owner.
Each has his/her own quirksa petty criminal, a nurse who prefers only dealing with old people, an african immigrant, several office workers and kitchen staff.
When the boarding house owner dies, he wills the property to two of the residentsa petty criminal and the nurse, Amazingly funny and poignant scenes ensue, the denouement is spectacular and not entirely unexpected, Mervyn Peake would probably have enjoyed "The Boarding House", Maybe he did Peake was still alive when it was published, William Trevor has constructed his own miniature Gormenghast: a petty little surreal kingdom where a bunch of misfit inadequates squabble and bicker, and carve out their own niches.


Set in London SWin, the boarding house of the title is the type of institution that already as Trevor notes is going out of fashion in favour of the bed sitting room, an arrangement that promotes even deeper isolation and where residents are not required to 'get along' with each other.
The boarding house is a mixture of the bedsitter where residents have their own rooms, their little fiefdoms where they can stamp their individuality and the BampB, where there is a

communal living room with TV, and meals are provided by livein staff.


However, surely no boarding house was ever like this one, Its creator dies at the very beginning of the novel, a William Wagner Bird, who over time has sought out the lonely and the inadequate and found them places in his house.
At first this might seem to be a benevolent act, the motive of human kindness, but as time passes, and we become privy to his Notes on Residents, we see that Bird is playing some kind of sinister game, pitting distinct types of personalities against each other.
This becomes most evident when his will is read, and it's discovered to the amazement, consternation and fury of the other residents that he has left the house to the two most opposed residents, whose mutual hatred is never far below the surface.


The residents play out their frustrations and antipathies, trapped in this new world of its original creator's making, while the tension slowly but inexorably builds to.
. . well, I won't give a spoiler,

What is Trevor creating in this book The clue I believe is in his use of names, The residents and staff : Nurse Clock control freak, Studdy petty blackmailer, Major Eele strip club habitué, Mr Scribbin railway recording enthusiast, Venables anxious, with a bad stomach, Mr Obd African full of unrequited love, Miss Clericott will she ever be safe from men, Rose Cave, Mrs Slape and Gallelty, are never referred to other than by these names.
We never know Nurse Clock's first name, nor Major Eele's, and though we know the Nigerian Mr Obd's first name is 'Tome', this is only from relayed correspondence, or the memories of Mr Bird's cryptic "Alas, Tome Obd" whenever the two passed on the stair.


Yet the 'creator' is by turns Bird, Mr Bird, William Bird, and William Wagner Bird, This, even though he is dead by page! So we have a closed world, where the characters the players are restricted to the name they are introduced by, but the 'creator' is privileged to be known by several names.
One could read into this that the Boarding House is a kind of allegory, a depiction of the modern human condition, where our whole identity is tied into our name and character, and where God "God of a thousand names" has died.
This is perhaps reinforced by Bird's supposed appearance in the kitchen one time after his death, and the "vision" of Bird appearing to Mr Obd as first a mere mark on the ceiling, then gradually in his mind transforming into a complete heavenly vision of golden throne and celestial trumpets.


It's a very good novel, But one needs to read 'below the surface' or it might simply be written off as a piece of great eccentricity, enjoyable to read but leaving too many question marks as to "what it all means".
Having enjoyed sitelinkMiss Gomez and the Brethren, I decided to try another of the author's quirkier works, and wasn't disappointed!

Abrupt point of view switches took some getting used to, but after that I just accepted them and was able to get into the book I could see where that might drive other readers bonkers! In addition to going into the heads of all of the residents regularly, there are also excerpts from the deceased owner's notes on each.


Our UK friends, as well as Global Britcom addicts, might appreciate that I had the image of Nurse Gladys from Open All Hours in my head for the nurse character.



Setting: London, The book is set in a London boarding house and starts with the death of the boarding house's owner, Mr Bird.
We are introduced to the residents of the boarding house both from their own points of view and the comments of Mr Bird, recorded in a notebook.
Mr Bird's death disturbs the residents' settled lives particularly so when Mr Bird's will is read and it is discovered that he has left the boarding house to the two residents who are probably most diametrically opposed to one another Nurse Clock and petty thief Studdy.
The conditions of the will mean that they must maintain the boarding house as it is and none of the residents can be evicted although they can move on of their own free will but eventually Nurse Clock and Studdy manage to join forces to work towards their own ambitions in relation to the house.
. .
Great characters and brilliant observations of the hypocrisies of life in London in thes when you are at the 'lower end' of the pecking order, as most of the residents are, each with their own idiosyncrasies and petty foibles.
Wonderful writing as ever from Mr Trevor/,.stars

Looking at this book from a purely technical perspective, I would give it the highest rating possible, Trevor's incredible deftness in constructing this novel boggled my mind on every page, The level of skill it must take to write something like this is staggering, First of all, there is a lot of dialogue going on simultaneously between a large cast of characters, both inside the boardinghouse, and in many locations outside of the house.
The action and dialogue is not only taking place simultaneously in different places, but also in different times, So for instance, we might have people talking in a room in the boardinghouse, also in a restaurant across the street, also in an office, on a train, and in the past all on the same page.
This concept is so difficult to think about, let alone construct a novel around, What is amazing is that Trevor does this with absolutely no confusion to the reader at all, I can't think of another novel like this, And I must point out that the dialogue is topnotch it is on a level with Patrick Hamilton, whom I was reminded of so often while reading this, as he wrote so much about boardinghouses and their odd inhabitants.


The story itself is soso, He uses a device that I don't think worked that great, with the late owner of the house having died but having written notes on the tenants.
We get to learn about them through his notes, The way the dead owner appears throughout the book, with past exchanges popping up randomly in the book, I did like.
It served to show us just how good Trevor was at this interplay between times and places,

Another thing that stands out is the humor, The exchanges between the tenants and all of the conversations are flatout hilarious, I was surprised at this because I never thought of Trevor as a humorous writer,

I have read quite a few of his novels but have not found one to rival READING TURGENEV ELIZABETH ALONE comes close but is a totally different kind of book.
I keep reading him hoping to find another one like it, What I have found is that all of his novels are different and seem to even be written in different styles.
Not one of my favorite writers, but without doubt a writer of astonishing diversity and amazing skill, .