Biography Writing Is Semi-Fruitless
By BEN SZMANDA
A biography is the attempt to recreate the life of a subject. But this is a doomed project: There is no way to capture the complexity of a life without excluding other, possibly contradictory facts. As near as I can figure, this is the central point of Julian Barnes’ Flaubert’s Parrot, where we are treated to a series of lectures by a Geoffrey Braithwaite, a former doctor and amateur Flaubert scholar. This isn’t the only thing Barnes has on his mind here. Just like with his other work, Flaubert’s Parrot covers a whole variety of different subjects. Also, I’m guessing that Barnes would agree with Flaubert and Braithwaite in arguing that you can’t separate the form itself from the idea, which means that the odd shape of Flaubert’s Parrot deserves mention at least as much attention as anything else.
There are times when Braithwaite is talking to a specific person, present with him at the moment. Other times, he is playfully acting out the answer portion of what eventually would become known as a FAQ (this book was written in 1984). He also presents the reader with a final examination, a working glossary, a description of his dead wife and a section written in the voice of Louise Collet, Flaubert’s on again off again mistress. This doesn’t include the chapter that retells Flaubert’s life three times, each version pulling out an entirely different set of facts to create various impressions. Nor does it include the titular sub plot: Braithwaite’s hunt for the authentic parrot that sat on Flaubert’s Desk when he wrote the book a simple heart. Each approach Barnes takes goes further to elucidate this central point that accessing the truth about a historical — or even contemporary — personality is impossible. To Barnes, truth is an elusive quality, and one that can be easily damaged by the subjectivity of the one asking the questions.
Of course, if you can’t describe a person properly, how can you expect to describe something like a work of art, or say, a book? Well, Barnes, Braithwaite and Flaubert all seem to be in agreement on that score: You can’t, and those who try (*cough*) are little better than parasites. Oh well. In my defense, I should point out that Barnes does seem to go out of his way to make a decent description well nigh impossible.
I have two criticisms of Flaubert’s Parrot, and what I have read of Barnes in general. The first is that they can come across as strictly intellectual exercises, funny ones, sure, but still: They can be very bloodless. The second criticism is a bit harsher. When I reviewed his book a History of the World in 10 ½ chapters — a book that describes history much the same way Flaubert’s Parrot describes biography — a commenter mentioned the Armenian Genocide, and the despicable attempts to pretend it never happened. He was quite right to bring it up, and doing so underscores the seriousness of these issues. Barnes may be correct about the difficulties found in describing people, art or history. I think he might be. But I also think that the stakes are a lot higher than he sometimes lets on. Maybe this light handed approach is an attempt to introduce a perilous topic with out obscuring it. Maybe Barnes has chased down these risks in other works I haven’t read. If he has I take it back. Even if he hasn’t though, his work, and Flaubert’s Parrot in particular, are worth reading. Barnes is a very good writer, he is a careful craftsman, and — even with his flaws — he has a lot to say.