The underlying resentment in the tale began to stir and acquire form only after the narrative found a certain stability, making its delayed emergence a surprising revelation. The tardiness of this emotional response became another revealing fragment. It portrayed how my whole existence has been plagued by unforeseen conflicts and a sluggish defence reflex. One of the qualities that define a great novel is the profound sense of loss that the reader experiences upon completing it, leading to a purging, therapeutic relief.
Alan Hollinghurst’s wonderfully insightful Our Evenings accomplishes this in a refined way, creating a kind of pathos that arises from a deep and extended understanding of a character. In this case, the actor David Win’s journey, from his unconventional childhood in the Home Counties of England during the 1960s through to his twilight years in a Britain dealing with the aftermath of Brexit, is chronicled.
Born to a mixed-race parentage, Dave spends his early years under the care of his English mother, Avril, who resides above her boutique in the imaginary market town of Foxleigh. Information about his father is scant and drawn largely from a single picture and Avril’s vague accounts of a brief matrimonial alliance in Burma with a bureaucrat who died shortly after Dave’s birth, precipitating her return to England.
The bond between mother and son is key to the novel’s dynamics. It paints a picture of two gracious, thoughtful characters bound by a deep love for each other. Avril often brushes aside the hurt caused by local affronts and dismissals, shielding her son from the harsh realities of growing up in a prejudiced society on the cusp of a shakey journey towards equality. Dave, acutely aware of Avril’s sentiments, understates his fascination with his absent father as well as his solitude as an ostracised teenager on a private scholarship at the Bampton boarding school.
Dave, our charming and plucky narrator, enthralls with his tales of boarding school, Oxford studies, coming to terms with his homosexuality, and his gradual evolution from experimental theatre to mainstream acting. Hollinghurst’s storytelling is elegant and unassuming, propelling the reader through shifts in time without explicit direction, instead leaving them to skillfully navigate the narrative.
The scenes are characterised by short, stylish bursts of vivid imagery, and the storyline is permeated by a poignant longing which ultimately transforms into loss with the passage of time. Hollinghurst skilfully intertwines themes of familial bonds, theatre life, classic music, and poetry with the overarching motif of time, which holds fort from the story’s onset.
Extracts such as “In your 50s and 60s your father-figures drop away – the ones who had licensed, enabled and witnessed your life – and no one can replace them,” aptly highlight this thematic underpinning. Even as the novel grapples with grand topics like race, class, sexuality, and identity, time emerges as the primary catalyst for tension and suspense.
Hollinghurst’s critique of post-Brexit Britain’s unfortunate regression only starkly reveals itself towards the captivating conclusion. While the narrative encounters minor structural challenges due to the wavering prominence of early-introduced characters like Dave’s affluent classmate Giles and his family, this is a minor drawback in an otherwise deeply stirring narrative filled with emotional intensity and sharp observations.
A seasoned author, Hollinghurst has an impressive repertoire of six previous novels, including The Swimming-Pool Library, The Folding Star, and The Line of Beauty, and has been awarded the Somerset Maugham Award, James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction and the Booker Prize. His latest work, Our Evenings, is bound to collect further laurels with its profound narrative strength.
Sarah Gilmartin adeptly portrays Dave’s identity struggle as a biracial homosexual man living amidst a society recognized for its looming intolerance. From his boyhood days when lads taunted him with narrowed-eyed expressions through the window, to adults instructing him to return to where he supposedly belongs, there is a persistent melancholy. This prejudice, unfortunately, remains as he matures, but his sharp intellect and command of language become powerful tools to counteract such bigotry – “‘Been in England long?’ asked the driver. ‘Twenty-six years,’ I replied.”
By the conclusion of the book, readers experience a sense of mourning due to the absence of Dave’s presence – similar to the departure of a dear friend. With his latest work ‘Our Evenings’, Hollinghurst has encapsulated the quintessence of life, projecting it as a daylong journey into the evening. Sarah Gilmartin is a respected author and critic with her recent book being ‘Service.’