The Driver’s Seat by Muriel Spark, included on the list of 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read, along with the celebrated The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie http://realini.blogspot.com/2016/07/the-prime-of-miss-jean-brodie-by-muriel.html - 8 out of 10

 

The Driver’s Seat by Muriel Spark, included on the list of 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read, along with the celebrated The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie http://realini.blogspot.com/2016/07/the-prime-of-miss-jean-brodie-by-muriel.html

8 out of 10

 

 

Muriel Spark seems to have a penchant for outré characters and Lise from The Driver’s Seat is one of the most awkward we can meet, we may think of To The Hermitage by Malcolm Bradbury, who writes that the literary life is much more interesting than the physical one, for we meet much more vivid, wiser, intense personages, the events are way more vibrant and challenging, and besides, we can access all these from the house, or even bed – not in those words, but I hope to this effect - http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/09/to-hermitage-by-malcolm-bradbury-author.html and this novel is a wild ride

 

Lise is one of the most intriguing figures we can find, though on the other hand, there is plenty to observe outside and wonder where all this is going – they have voted for Lula in Brazil, with a small margin, but both he and the other thug, Bolsanaro are examples of what the people identify with, the lamentable choices and models out there, Lula will embrace Putin shortly, and the other one needs no more presentation, and then you have the likes of Trump and let me stop right here, before I descend into a mad outcry and eventually join Lise into her miserable destiny – self destruction seems to be what humanity has in mind, if it does have a common conscience, for the way the climate is changing, we do not think much

The main character of this ‘metaphysical shocker’ is working somewhere in Europe, where she has a bizarre episode, we are told she only had had another one five years ago, but she does behave in very weird manner, although again, what is strange in this Mad, Mad World of ours, where we now have conspiracy theories peddled, encouraged by the most prominent fellows, the supposed role models, like the often idiotic Musk, do fantastic things, with electric cars and what not, and then show such a despicable side to their character as to have the decent folks freeze…in the latest descent into the latrine, the richest man in the world tweeted a link to a site which suggested, with others, that Paul Pelosi, the eighty two year old attacked with a hammer, was having sex with his assailant, or something along these lines, I mean what the hell, how much lower can you get, you goddamn fool

 

On the other hand, this latest proof of perversity shows us that we must not envy the ‘poor’ rich, for their mind can bring about great projects, but has plenty of space for the most foul productions, and thus we should follow the stoic precepts and be satisfied with what we have…coming back to our Lady of the Flowers, she is clearly nuts, but seeing that the definition of crazy is they do what ‘normal’ humans avoid, would not think of, then how come hundreds of millions vote for the likes of Trump, Duterte or the son of a dictator, Bolsanaro and many other creeps, it is because these voters themselves are just mad

 

The opposite is also credible, I could be mad, for there is the example of the comedian that looks at If by Rudyard Kipling and takes a mischievous, funny look and says that if all around you are saying this thing and you keep with the ‘alternative fact’, then you should see a specialist, which is how I felt at the sauna at the Downtown Club, when one after another, members would walk inside and affirm the veracity of the various conspiracy theories, starting with 9/11, and then continuing with the rest, for I would try and argue – which is so damn futile, to try and use rational arguments with absurd freaks – let us presume 9/11 is along your lines, but then what about the countless other attacks, priests stabbed in France, various demons running people over with their trucks, scores killed in nice and in so many parts of the world, area all those phony, and the answer from the troglodytes is of course, yes…

This was a divagation, which is the ‘style’ of this rambling maniac, but it is because Lise reminds me of all those apparitions I have met – and maybe will again, as I contemplate returning after the pandemic to the same old club, only I have to consider it seriously, if I want to face the same cave men again, with their ludicrous views of the world – and when I think of her as extreme, and say how could she do this or the other, the thought of much more serious alienation and excess comes to mind, from the ‘real world’ where you have folks embracing the likes of Putin, Trump, Bolsanaro and others like them

 

Lise is looking for her ‘type of man’, something that sounds reasonable, for we are all looking for our type of man, woman or other, even if some of us have been giving up hope – nonetheless, even if I have a respectable age, being ‘mature’ in a new age parlance, I am still keen, and you could comment on the note and then we see how we can get together – but she is not having much success in that, when she embarks on the plane, the fellow she is targeting stands up from the seat next to her, just as the plane is about to take off, and changes his place (however, he will enter the frame again at some point, and do not allow me to spoil the reading of the book for you here) to allow another weird character to be part of the picture, a bizarre fellow who has a diet based on rice and insists on having an orgasm every day, or else he has to have two on the following one and that is causing him some nausea

The protagonist of the saga – if we can call it that at one hundred and eighty very easily readable pages – has a strange taste in choosing clothes and colors, some will address her on the street, asking about the circus or carnival, she keeps lying about various aspects, insisting she travels all the time, but thinking about her reasons, it could be her way of coping, which will not be very effective in the end, imagining things in an attempt to see them happening in real life, such as the boyfriend that she claims is waiting for her, when she has not yet met him, we learn in fact very early that she will be found stabbed to death and then the media will cover the story and the police will ask various people about their encounter.

 

There is a sadness combined with humor in this often weird, and thus amusing story of an eccentric, who has a tragic ending ahead of her, she is both causing smiles and a series of shudders, as we take in what will happen to her, how desperate she is to find someone and get out of her isolation, a solitude that has driven her crazy and to the brink, in a position where she may want out…completely and irrevocably

http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world