Review Swimmming Home by Deborah Levy

When the Man Booker prize 2012 shortlist was announced I got excited. It's only because the Man Booker prize is synonymous with excellent and thought provoking, new and dynamic perceptions of literature. So I rushed out and bought Deborah Levy's novel titled "Swimming Home". The blurb on the back should have probably been an indicator that this type of novel was not going to create fireworks for me, but as the old saying goes "never judge a book by its cover". 
The blurb simply states:
"As he arrives with his family at the villa in the hills above Nice, Joe sees a body in the swimming pool. But the girl is very much alive. She is Kitty Finch: a self-proclaimed botanist with green-painted fingernails, walking naked out of the water and into the heard of their holiday. Why is she there? What does she want from them all? And why does Joe's enigmatic wife allow her to remain?"
With this blurb in mind, I guess I had produced all sorts of scenarios about the possibility that lay behind the cover of the novel.

The brief outline of the plot is this: It is set over a few days, with each chapter titled with a day and each sub chapter divided into significant sub titles. A family and their friends have all turned up to a holiday villa in France for what they suspect to be a lovely and relaxing occasion. They then encounter Kitty Finch who has a tendency to walk around naked and is so thin to the point of extreme anorexia. She seems to think that she has booked the villa also and through the generosity of the family they invite her to stay. there is a building tension between them as Kitty becomes the catalyst for a new and dysfunctional group dynamic. Joe is a world famous poet, and Kitty thrusts upon him some work of her own which she calls "swimming home" which is a conversation between herself and the poet but is interpreted by Nina (Joe's young daughter) as a suicide note. Through the conflicts of control between Kitty and Joe's wife both Kitty and Joe end up sleeping together, which honestly was the most boring and obvious thing that could have happened. In the end Nina finds the body of her father in the swimming pool.

I'm going to be brutally honest, it bored me. The plot seemed insignificant and did not produce anything to hook me. However it's not necessarily about the plot but more of the socially awkward interactions between the characters, the friction punctuates the actual conversation. As a reader I felt as if both myself and the narrator were bystanders of an awkward interchange of meaningless words, but recognising that the pauses between the words were heavily loaded with seething uncertainty. As a reader I was made to feel uncomfortable for the first chapter. The introduction of Kitty and her blatant intention towards the renowned poet Joe sparks all the friction. The first image we have of her is likened to a body, lifeless within the water and naked. The imagery of Kitty's nakedness was a prevalent theme throughout and brought light the conflict for the possession of control. For the reader there is a sense of 'I understand this' because everyone has had an interaction with somebody and fought for a sense of control over the situation. Yet this novel took those sense of inadequacy and trebled the intensity to a level which goes to the point of absurdity. The main skill Deborah Levy has is the ability to deconstruct her characters and build them as so as all their flaws are personalised and on show for everyone to see.

There is a sense of game playing, Kitty seems to need or want Joe, often commenting that her poem she wrote is a 'conversation with him' and only him, which is probably why, when Nina reads it the words seem to hold little or no meaning to her and only serves to intoxicate. The portrayal of mental illness is one which I, as a reader, felt inept to fully appreciate. Having only had a limited personal experience with any type of mental illness I was surprised by how much I didn't comprehend. The whole world of Kitty Finch is swallowed up by a chaotic mind which extends its power across to the other characters who are on holiday. It is clear that Kitty's expression of mental illness was a deep, internal turmoil of Joe's and it is most likely this which causes him to commit suicide.
It is hard to pin down just whose story this is, it is as much Kitty's as it is Joe's, or Nina's, each providing a unique perspective from which the reader can attempt to detangle the web of intimate connections between all the characters.

I guess my main problem with this novella is my own personal lack of understanding. I found it to be awkward and tension filled to the point where I felt apprehensive reading it. Though one must consider that this is actually a sign of a very good writer to make a reader experience such emotions and genuine connection with the characters. perhaps this novella says more about myself and my own mental state (and my lack of willingness to explore it) then what I am prepared to admit to. It provides an insight into the social qualities which lie underneath the surface of our society, sex, lies and impromptu decisions which govern the very human existence. I think I will re read this in order to gain some more insight into it, it both fascinates and confuses me because I was both bored and in awe of it.

Life list

You know sometimes you just have to sit down and think of all the things 'i wish i could do'. Well I finally decided to jot down all of the things i've been thinking about. Of course it's a work in progress, there are so many things that i don't even know about that i'm sure that i want to do. The main thing in life is to take every opportunity, or at least have a damn good reason as to why you didn't/couldn't take it.
So, here's my work in progress life list :)

Things to achieve in my lifetime:

• Road trip across Europe
• Road trip across USA
• Volunteer race for charity
• Pay for a room for a homeless person for the night
• Buy my own car
• Skydive=  Achieved in Tanzania in 2008 :D
• Bungee jump
• Spontaneous visit to a friend
• Turn up to an airport with bags and a passport and buy a ticket for the next flight out.
• Get a job in publishing
• Take a photograph every day for a year
• Love with everything I have
• Give random gifts to people
• Own a Doberman
• Go zorbing
• Learn to surf
• Dive the Great Barrier reef
• Ride a horse Western style across the Prairie
• Go quad biking
• Climb a mountain
• Make every recipe from a single cookbook
• Host a dinner party
 
• Be an extra in a movie
• Go to a yoga class
• Go to the Olympics

• Have professional modelling pictures taken
• Experience being pregnant and a mum
• Get married
• See moose in Canada
• Swim with Dolphins and Whales
• Have something of mine published
• Travel the world and keep a record/diary of everything
• Say only kind and positive things for a day
• Say what I think even if it's stupid
• Go to random events even if I think its not my thing.

There is so much more, but all of these are totally achievable so going to to try!