The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai
Title: The Great Believers
Author: Rebecca Makkai
Published: 2018
Type: Fiction
Pages: 418
“But what a burden. To be Horatio. To be the one with the memory. And what’s Horatio supposed to do with it? What the hell does Horatio do in act six?”
In Brief:
I couldn't put this book down. I do wish some of the characters/relationships were fleshed out a bit more, but overall it was a heartbreaking and engrossing account of the AIDS epidemic, as well as what happens to those who are left behind.
Rating: 4.3
Synopsis:
(I’m still so behind) Goodreads:
“In 1985, Yale Tishman, the development director for an art gallery in Chicago, is about to pull off an amazing coup, bringing in an extraordinary collection of 1920s paintings as a gift to the gallery. Yet as his career begins to flourish, the carnage of the AIDS epidemic grows around him. One by one, his friends are dying and after his friend Nico's funeral, the virus circles closer and closer to Yale himself. Soon the only person he has left is Fiona, Nico's little sister.
Thirty years later, Fiona is in Paris tracking down her estranged daughter who disappeared into a cult. While staying with an old friend, a famous photographer who documented the Chicago crisis, she finds herself finally grappling with the devastating ways AIDS affected her life and her relationship with her daughter. The two intertwining stories take us through the heartbreak of the eighties and the chaos of the modern world, as both Yale and Fiona struggle to find goodness in the midst of disaster.”
Where I’m At:
So – obviously – I read this book during the coronavirus pandemic. So it would be nearly impossible not to draw parallels between that and the AIDS epidemic. Of course, there are a lot of differences between the two – the age of those affected, the transmission, the level of scientific advancements, the media narrative, etc – but the parallels are still there. You can pretty easily compare Donald Trump and Ronald Reagan, the way they’ve minimized the disease, dismissed the deaths under their watch, turned public health into politics. You can compare the fear, the way our bodies have somehow turned radioactive, the paranoia of just not knowing what to do, what’s a risk.
I learned a lot, too. It’s terrifying how much the AIDS epidemic was truly erased, never taught in US schools in spite of hundreds of thousands of deaths. It’s a cold relief that I at least feel confident that the deaths from today’s pandemic will be remembered and recorded in history books.
On a personal note, I also liked this book because I related a lot to Yale, the main character. (Obviously, any good main character should be relatable, but I have specifics!) As I’ll get into later, some of the relationships aren’t very fleshed out, which might be attributable to Yale’s deep insecurity – he doesn’t understand why people want to be friends with him. Similarly, I feel somewhat perplexed by many of my closest friendships, always unsure what I’m offering, baffled when people I secretly admire start inviting me to hang out. Though it’s never confirmed explicitly, I suspect the character and I share anxiety, and I ached with sympathy for him.
There are also similarities in our relationships. Early on, it’s noted:
Yale was suited to relationships… He hated drama – hated not only the endings of things but the bumpy beginnings as well, the self-doubt, the nervousness. He was tired of meeting guys in bars, would rather lick a sidewalk than look for action in some parking lot by the beach. He enjoyed having standing plans with someone. He liked going to the movies and actually watching the movie. He liked grocery shopping.
Later on, after a toxic relationship, Yale also reflects:
The thing screwing itself into his heart right now was that he’d let himself be so cowed by Charlie’s demands. He’d been walking on eggshells for this man, and meanwhile Charlie, behind Yale’s back, had just been throwing the eggs straight at a wall.
Yes to both. I’m guilty of nearly constantly being in some kind of relationship, have been with very little breaks since I was fourteen. I’ve felt guilty in some ways about it – is there a dependency? A fear of being alone, an uncertain sense of individual self-worth? Maybe, but I also just prefer not to be single. I like the reliability of being in a relationship, a familiar person to intimately know and intimately be known. I prefer domesticity to a hook-up. Grocery shopping is one of my favorite activities – in fact, I often go with my partner just to be with him, wander around while he stocks up, even when I need nothing myself.
And, as I’ve talked about ad nauseam, in spite of this, most (not all! Hi, Jeff!) of my past relationships have objectively been less than stellar. I’ve felt myself constantly walking on eggshells or even glass, twisting into knots and making myself small with very little in return. Putting up with transgressions, surprised by each new betrayal as if the writing wasn’t clear on the wall. Hindsight is 20/20 and I’ve felt like an idiot looking back, but I also try to be gentle to past-Allie. As a wise old woman says in The Great Believers, “you’re never reasonable when you’re in love.”
Getting Into it:
Like already mentioned, my main complaint about this book is that some relationships and characters felt like they weren’t fleshed out, specifically in Yale’s chapters. There’s a coworker who takes care of him when he’s sick, a couple who donates to his art gallery and lets him stay in their apartment for months, a friend he’s quietly in love with, another who is among the first to die and seems to be his very closest – but I never really understood why. These are also characters who I wanted more out of, who played an instrumental role in Yale’s life, but felt largely one-dimensional.
Yet, again, this can reasonably be explained by the unreliable narrator – Yale’s own insecurities and anxiety, the way that sometimes even our friends can be unknowable, and the fact that he was too focused on the terrifying current events of the narrative to dwell on the past details that shaped those relationships. So though I still found it irritating, I’ll let it go.
Beyond that, I think the book was technically close to flawless. Fiona and Yale are exceptionally well-realized characters, the villainous Charlie is perfectly believable, the vapid and beautiful Julian has a serious and beautiful redemption arc. Even though it goes over my 400-page rule, the pacing and quick and tightly plotted, with short chapters. This was particularly effective given that the chapters alternate between Yale and Fiona’s stories. I preferred and cared a bit more about Yale’s, but the break was never too long. Plus, Fiona grew on me and provided something of a break from Yale’s especially dire situation. Though her life was no cakewalk, Fiona at least had a wry sense of humor and lines that made me laugh out loud:
Stupid men and their stupid violence, tearing apart everything good that was ever built. Why couldn’t you ever just go after your life without tripping over some idiot’s dick?
This alternation was also effective at establishing Yale as an unreliable narrator, by contrasting the way he saw himself with the way that Fiona saw him, with so much love. She recalls him goofing around, friends drawn naturally to him, in a way that you could hardly imagine if you only had Yale’s more timid, self-effacing perspective.
And, gosh, does the book deliver on its messages. Fiona is clearly compared to her great-aunt Nora, who lost her generation to the first World War, drawing a connection between the epidemic to warfare, the innocent loss, those who are left behind (see my initial quote, which makes me tear up every time I read it. Also, listen to “Who Lives Who Dies Who Tells Your Story” from Hamilton.). You see the effects of generational trauma. You see the struggles of parenting, the contrast between your chosen family and your biological one. You see the terror of death, the desperate desire to live.
Bread, hot from the oven. Or even stale in the restaurant basket, rescued by salty butter.
The Cubs winning the pennant someday. The Cubs winning the Series. The Cubs continuing to lose.
His favorite song, not yet written. His favorite movie, not yet made.
The depth of an oil brushstroke. Chagall’s blue windows. Picasso’s blue man and his guitar…
The sound of an old door creaking open. The sound of garlic cooking. The sound of typing. The sound of commercials from the next room, when you were in the kitchen getting a drink. The sound of someone else finishing a shower…
Arthritis. Gray hair. Bushy eyebrows, like his father’s. Dentures, canes, prostate issues…
The next Harvey Milk. The first gay senator, the first gay governor, the first woman president, the last bigoted congressman.
Dancing till the floor was an optional landing place. Dancing elbows out, dancing with arms up, dancing in a pool of sweat.
All the books he hadn’t started…
The love of his life. Wasn’t there supposed to be a love of his life?...
Dr. Cheng said, “Whoa, there, let’s lie down. Let’s get you lying down.”
And finally, I think this book has one of the most emotional death scenes I’ve ever read. I’m not going to post it here, but it absolutely ruined me. It will make you very very very sad, so read it!
