Sub Rosa

'The angel of his youth became the devil of his maturity.  He went out with women when he was young, always holding something in reserve.  There would always be a reason to break it off, which opened the door to a multitude of relationships. Heaven. Or so he thought. As age encroached upon his sensibilities and form, he longed for something with enough vitality to endure.  But the covering cherub of his Lothario days had stayed with him and was no longer so angelic  It haunted him, guarded him kept him from intimacy, promising him ash dry glory of so many toppling relationships, toppling like dominos, one after another, ad finitum, or at least until he died.'

Mark Z.Danielewski - House of Leaves (p.544).

I am approaching the end of the book, now - where it appears to be more about Truant than ever before.  Truant's font sized has changed into that of the omniscent 'editor.'  There is a bit of Breaking Through the Fourth Wall stuff going on, too; Truant addressing the readers who were hoodwinked into believing his lies. It also reminds the reader that with enough acadenic garbage hurled at them, any plot is plausible. Dreams and reality blur - a fictional music group ('Liberty Bell' - they're 'cracked', haha) has read The Navidson Report and it all slides, so you can't be sure if it is a dream/lie/hallucination etc. They even perform a cover of 5 & 1/2 Minute Hallway.

You would think that as the book concentrates less on sliding narrative and more on the fixed, then the book becomes easier to read i.e. no cross referencing, tilting the book, reading through a mirror.  But no...if anything, it becomes more painful, as Johnny suffers the realisation that things change and time moves on.

So what IS real? Has Truant actually killed the Gdansk Man and Kyrie?

Last night I had stopped at p.504, because I wasn't taking much of it in, to be frank. Fragments of text are ok to decipher at two in the afternoon; not so great when you are an hour off of bedtime.  Words and bars of a song - even printed (but not bevelled) braille, which is read as follows;

'The walls are endlessly bare.  Nothing hangs on them, nothing defines them.  They are without texture.  Even to the keenest eye or most sentient fingertip, they remain unreadable.  You will never find a mark there.  No trace survives.  The walls obliterate everything.  They are permanently absolved pg all record. Oblique, forever obscure and unwritten.  Behold, the perfect pantheon of absence' (p.423).

Staring into an abyss and letting it stare back at you.

Samples of the multi dimensional walls have been taken, showing that the test tubes contain all three rock classifications. Personally, I think the house has taken the concept of metamorphic' rock to the next level. However, it appears to be a vacuum; a type of well-crafted, multi-chambered/hallwayed black hole. I HAD wondered if this was going to turn into an inside out Jumanji, but to no avail.  Occasionally, the text is plagued with xxxxx's - seemingly Truant's editing but could be reminiscent of Truant mirroring Karen's separately guilty past - both have exes abound.

Truant seeming has his own dreamlike labyrinth in the shape of a boat; 'a vessel [...] endlessly descending into dead ends, turning around to find other ways which in the end lead me only to still more dead ends' (p.403).  Yup, pal - but at least you have the luxury of waking up.  After reading various old manuscripts, Truant starts to replace 's' with 'f' - rather than amusing, I find that more irritating than trying to read upside down, with a mirror, or trying to find the reason for the minced up DIY catalogue/dialogue from a few days back.

There is a nice comparison to Samuel Taylor Coleridge's 'Ancient Mariner', Dante and even the Bible's 'Jonah and the Whale' (as opposed to Moby Dick).  The plot thickens as Karen returns to the house. Mwa hahahahaha!

Quote of the Day
Bearing in mind that Truant has quit all of the noxious substances, yet is in a progressively worsened state for reading the 'academic' essay, he comes across a flyer under the wiper of his car.

Update

I have started p.182, just after the fact that Truant has had to go on to prescribed meds, in order to regain some sort of sanity. An interesting concpt has come up re of houses and the psychology of people. Narrow, closed houses drawn by a child who survived a German concetration camp; the theory of how doorknobs function in the psyche of 'tense' children - doorhandles mostly open, whereas key/keyholes lock. Wonder if we are back to Jung again? Hmmm.

Some interesting 'Jacob and Esau' binaries are turning up - where Zampano infers that the brothers are the net result of their upbringing; both 'paying the price for their parents' narcissism'; Navy recreating the same parental patterns with Karen, with Tom 'intervening' (p.246 & 251).

Unexpectedly for me, that went home :-/

Something I have noticed - the font for Tom's narration is not too dissimilar from Truant's own (font size a little smaller).  I wonder if in some way, JT is reflecting TN's persona?  This book makes you feel like you have locked yourself into the Nut Fun house with a Hall of Mirrors alongside.

Quote of the Day must be this;

'(Karen) must face the meaning [...] of the darkness dwelling in the depth of her house' (p.316)

Difficult as it is, I find this book absolutely gripping.

MZD has thrown in yeards of Greek mythology that he keeps on crossing out, specifically Minos etc.  Oh and references to Echo and Narcissus, which I can fully relate to.  This is interlaced by Johnny's sexploits, which veer from mildly amusing to a bit icky, so I think MZD has succeeded in making the reader a grubby voyeur in his/her own right.  Kinda making me realise that this would be a prime example to my Postmodernist module last year.  An expedition has been mounted and people go missing.

I have heard that some people (even noted academics) have thrown it against the wall, deeming it 'unreadable trash', but I would say that the layout conveys a certain something.  Johnny's drug taking and dwindling mental state, the disappearance and madness of the men seemingly either trying to kill each other, or (Reston and Navidson, take note) are seemingly being terrorised and/or 'eaten' by the house.  It aptly portrays distorted time, defragmentation, claustrophobia, agoraphobia, confusion and abject madness - the fonts/spacing/lay out bear witness to this.  Rather than a deterrent, I feel that it draws you in and gives you a more visceral experience of the stories.

I have read to page 182 (not so hard when the last few pages have about five lines on each page).  I am sticking with this because it IS challenging, BUT...I see it as a multi-layered artefact.  It is difficult to keep it all together, but I think it is worth the effort.

NOTE TO SELF- If I am ever in a labyrinth that changes dimension and/or starts 'growling' (which it does in HoL) - run for the fricken' hills!!!

Before I start, it has to be said that it can be quite a challenging read; mostly because of the nature of the layouts, fonts and different writing styles - amongst other things.  Plus, rather than try to retell the story, it would be better if I posted the link to the House of Leaves story and the link to Mark Z.Danielewski's site.

There will be additional links embedded within my post.

Disclaimer::: I know there are many House of Leaves fans out there that will know the book inside out - please have patience with me, I have only just begun.

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House Of Leaves

Part of the challenge is to keep this story together, as there are many narrators, both unreliable and intertwined; also the footnotes (both Zampano's, Truant's et al.) can be difficult to unravel too. It is advisable to read the book with as fewer distractions as possible, plus I suggest maybe a bookstand, as it is 600 pages long and about A4.5 in size (for 'novel', read 'baby-style-old-school-telephone-directory').

Johnny Truant's narrative is peppered with listing, doubling/trebling and continually slides into a second person retrospective.  Short sentences in old fashion type font, then long rambling sentences that would give James Joyce a run for his money (see pages 48 and 72).  Is he deliquent, complex or a complex deliquent? Zampano's observations are largely third person, present tense (as you would when discussing a film in real time) and the whole lot is stitched together via footnotes and ramblings etc.

The irony of all ironies, is that I was approaching the novel in the very same way that Truant tries to unravel Zampano's work.  I read, drop son at station. I read - realising that my brain has fogged over and then briefly watches Time Team and their discovery of a series of small walls.  Resume reading, private wondering whether I understand it, whether MZD is a great author, or a gabbling loon etc.(I veer towards the 'great author' point of view - even if his protagonist Truant uses the modifier 'maybe' too often; it IS part of his character). Disrupted by texts, emails, hubby revising for exam. Resume reading.  Rinse and repeat.

I hit page 80 yesterday - today, I will resume.