Novels of Ideas (Musil)

I suppose virtually all novels start off as one big idea or another, but in at least some novels the characters are representing some specific train of though or strain of philosophy.  In a poorly constructed novel, you end up with characters just bouncing ideas off of each other, but in a better novel of this sort, the reader actually cares about the characters and may (or may not) absorb the philosophical message.  No question in my mind the Russians take this to extremes - -Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Bulgakov and arguably Turgenev all wrestle with big ideas -- and often the characters do make long, important speeches to each other.  While Proust's Remembrance of Time Past is certainly long and has many asides on art (and memory), I'm not entirely sure I would characterize it in the same way.  In any event, it does not have all that much plot to speak of.  While Gide and Camus wrote more compact novels, I would say they are more successful novels of ideas.

I'm not as sure about writers working in English, but perhaps Iris Murdoch and Nabokov would qualify.  In any event, I have started off badly, since I didn't intend to make another long list.  I mostly wanted to note that, after many, many years of carting it around, I am finally ready to start reading Musil's The Man Without Qualities.

I actually can't remember where or when I picked this up (and if I actually paid full price, though I hope not).

I had read that Gregor von Rezzori held Musil in very high esteem and actually modelled Abel and Cain upon The Man Without Qualities to some extent.  However, I was so disappointed in the first part (The Death of My Brother Abel) that it kind of threw a bit of shade on Musil.  I did a bit of a preview of The Man Without Qualities last week and decided that it seemed to have actual characters (that didn't dissolve in postmodern fripperies like von Rezzori's did) and at least some plot elements (not just endless discussions between characters), so I started in on it proper.

I'm not quite sure how long it will take to read.  The first volume is 700+ pages and the second is more like 1000 (with 600+ pages of unfinished material!).  Under normal circumstances, this would probably take me through April, though I may schedule a train trip to Montreal with the added benefit of being forced to stay in one place (as it were) and get through a large chunk of the second volume.  Even though I am enjoying this considerably more than Proust's Remembrance or von Rezzori's The Death of My Brother Abel, it is still highly unlikely I will make it through a second time.  I will try to note down interesting passages (and perhaps post them here), so I will feel better about parting with this beast* of a book down the road.


* While it isn't too hard reading this on the train, it is just a bit too cumbersome for reading at the gym, so I am bringing Montaigne's Essays, which I'll discuss in the next post, along for my workouts.  At any rate, I definitely feel bombarded by ideas right now...