February 14, 2015
Oates is definitely one of the most important authors of our time. Over the last few decades, she's put out countless written works. I've read only a handful, but all of these were so different from the others...she is versatile, writing in many different genres.
This lengthy novel is one of her more recent releases. I read that it's the fifth gothic novel she's published. The Accursed has been critically acclaimed, but I could see why some readers might be turned off. For the most part, I found it well-constructed, and the unanswered questions are the most fascinating part.
Real-life historical figures, like Upton Sinclair and Woodrow Wilson, are characters of this story, set in 1905-1906 in Princeton, New Jersey. Wilson is the insecure, though ultimately morally strong, president of the university. Sinclair, living in very modest circumstances with his put-upon wife and infant son, is becoming famous beyond his Socialist circles for The Jungle. I think that most of the other characters (besides Wilson's family, Jack London, and my old pal Mr. Clemens) are fictional.
A curse, revolving around the family of the respected Winslow Slade but effecting many other people in Princeton, brings the well-to-do of this tidy community to its knees. Slade later claims all responsibility for it, as he'd killed a black teenage girl years earlier after fucking her. He believes that God is punishing him. But he's missing the point. It's not really God coming after him alone for that crime, but rather the devil preying on this hypocritical community. Wilson, for example, dismisses a young relative as a student and TA at the university after learning that he is mixed race. The people of Princeton are indifferent to the lynchings of black citizens in other parts of Jersey. And those wealthy families made their fortunes on slave labor in the South generations ago, yet are all so high and mighty and pious. It's for racism and hypocracy that they are all punished.
Oh, and can we not ignore the possibility that the narrator, M.W. Van Dyck, could be the son of the devil? This is implied but never stated outright. His mother mysteriously became pregnant in her forties, though his maybe-father claims that they hadn't slept together in years (lots of sexless marriages in this book!). Pearce Van Dyck was shown to have brain damage after his death, so who knows if he's remembering accurately? It's a bit mind-blowing to consider that this might be the case, though.
I don't really get why the Slade grandchildren got to come back to life when the curse was broken. Why not Cobblestone Slade, Adelaide Burr, or Edgarstoune FitzRandolf? Were they so much more "innocent," being young? I guess it's nice that Wilhelmina got to reunite with Annabel and marry her long-time crush Josiah, and that Todd and Oriana got their childhoods back, but why? I guess that's my one beef with the story. The devil's other victims stayed dead or gone; what happened to Amanda FitzRandolf after Todd destroyed the Bog Kingdom?
Oh, and there were a couple of historically inaccurate comments made about Mr. Clemens. For one thing, he didn't smoke Havanas...he much preferred cheap cigars, which he would buy by the crateful, practically. Also, he didn't fancy himself as being able to resist womanly charms. He loved women; he loved being petted and adored by college girls when he gave speeches at places like Barnard. I guess Oates should have made his autobiography part of her research! Mr. Clemens was a rather minor character, but these clearly incorrect assertions really stood out to me.
Other than that, this book was interesting. It makes me want to know more about Woodrow Wilson. Was he really such a whiny little pussy? Yet he at least resisted temptation from a demon in the form of a lovely woman with whom he'd become smitten; I think this had a small part in ending the curse. I always felt bad for Wilson, as he was widowed and remarried while in the White House. Anyway, whether the historical figures are accurately depicted (personality wise or not), I think this is a book that would require multiple readings in order to pick up missed details. Maybe I will reread it sometime, though not before I read more by Oates.
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