Customer Reviews

Museum Guard

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Howard Norman's The Museum Guard tells the relationship between DeFoe, a young museum guard in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and Imogen, keeper of the Jewish cemetery who first becomes enraptured by and then literally becomes Jewess on a Street in Amsterdam, the subject of a painting on exhibit. As with Norman's earlier The Bird Artist, this is very much a novel of place and character. Particular to this novel, however, is its setting in history - 1938, a time of Nazi fanaticism and anti-Semitism. It is this context which makes Imogen's "madness" particularly horrifying, because in "becoming" the Jewess in the painting she travels to Amsterdam when Nazi overrun appeared imminent. Norman manages to write a novel that is both shocking and humorous, wise and witty. His use of language, also, is a marvel.

How many times have you encountered a painting that you wanted to inhabit? Howard Norman portrays the dark side of this fantasy in this reticent novel that interweaves art, World War II history and psychology through the eyes of a guard at a provincial Canadian art museum. Although it is difficult to identify or sympathize with the characters in this novel, the author's unusual choice of narrator (most novelists seem to choose artists or art historians as protagonists in their works about art--to place a museum guard at the center is to champion the periphery), questioning of the hows and whys of human connections with art, insistence on the ways that art exists within rather than outside of history and great intelligence make this a provocative and worthy read.

I like the writing style of Howard Norman, whose lean, understated prose made The Bird Artist a unique and noteworthy novel. He has struck again in The Museum Guard, and for fans of his earlier work there will be plenty here to like as well. Narrator DeFoe Russet is a museum guard in Halifax, where he lives in a hotel with his Uncle Edward after his parents' death in a zeppelin accident. The narrator's depiction of that tragic incident, and especially the memory of the young narrator as he sat ironing shirts with his uncle's girlfriend to pass the time until his family returned, was a truly memorable and striking scene. DeFoe is painfully serious in his work as a guard at the local art museum, and his wry observations about the new exhibits at the museum, as well as his keen observation of the people who come to marvel at the paintings, suits Norman's understated narrative style well.

At its heart the novel is a love story betweem DeFoe and Imogen, caretaker of a local Jewish cemetery, who gradually develops an odd, mystical attachment to one of the paintings in the museum depicting a "Jewess on the Street in Amsterdam". At this point, in my opinion, the novel starts to take some turns that felt contrived and awkward. Why does Uncle Edward take a sudden interest in Imogen for example?

In any event, Norman has perfected a narrative style that is akin to a whisper, which as we all know is the best way to get attention right? I enjoyed reading the book, because I truly am a fan of Norman's unique style, but upon finishing the book I thought the whole thing got a little silly and out of Norman's control.

Having pressed The Bird Artist and The Northorn Lights on all of my reading friends, I was eager to buy and read The Museum Guard. I also read the excellent Amazon.com interview of the author in which he identifies the experiences that lead him to write The Museum Guard. However, The Museum Guard only compares to the other two compelling novels in that it rehashes some character traits and some happenings Norman has tossed around in the earlier works. Painfully sensitive and attractive young male protagonist. Tragic, but masculine foil. Refreshingly strong, but inherently lonely female. Surprising and shocking tragedies depicted as everyday happenings. They're all revisited in this newer work. I love this author's language, but I felt taken for a ride. The pain one experiences vicariously through these characters does not come with the same insight/payoff found by the end of the first two novels. I didn't like it, won't recommend it, but I will not give up on Norman yet. What's next?

After reading Norman's The Bird Artist, I was amazed, yet doubtful he could repeat the brilliance. Well, in the Museum Guard, he does. It takes seemingly unconnected bits of history, art, and plot and blends them togethor to form one of the most memorable books I've read in a long time. His genius takes the trials of everday people and makes the reader interested, if not obsessed with the strange twists and turns this imaginative, original plot takes. Don't read this book if you seek a story about right and wrong, a bad guy and a good guy. Norman is too brilliant to write a story like that.

After finishing this wonderful novel, I felt like I had "discovered" a new author. Actually, Howard Norman has been writing since the early 1980s and published his first novel, The Northern Lights, in the late 80s. I was drawn to this book by its title (I work in a museum) but fell in love with it for its quirky characters. It seems that Norman's characters are often forged by tragedy. The parents of DeFoe, the young museum guard, were killed in a Zeppelin accident when he was a boy. He develops a close relationship with his often-drunk uncle Edward, but even closer ones with many of the women that pass through Edward's life, including Imogen, the caretaker of a Jewish cemetary, whom DeFoe and Edward both pursue, though in radically different ways. Be warned, there may be a moment in this novel when you will detest all three of these characters; but forge ahead, because at least two of them will redeem themselves. Don't think of this as just another novel with "quirky" characters. They certainly are quirky, but in ways that make them real rather than caricatures. I was left feeling somewhat troubled about Imogen and the reasons for her crisis, which drives the latter part of the book, and the determination of the people around her to sacrifice everything for her, but that is only a minor complaint. Above all, this is a coming of age story, mainly for DeFoe, who is a product of arrested development due to his parents' untimely deaths, but also for Edward, Imogen, and even--you will see--for the world.

I enjoyed "The Bird Artist" by this author very much, so I wanted to read other books he had written. This one is a very well written, short work, but it tells a compelling story about the many types of obsession that exist in life. The prose is spare, but beautiful, and the tale moves along fairly swiftly to its bittersweet and somewhat mysterious and enigmatic ending. You're caught up in the lives of the various characters, particularly the unusual young woman who changes herself into the embodiment of a figure in a Dutch painting. Along with the title character, you can tell that it's going to end up badly for her, but like him, you realize that, ultimately, there is nothing that can be done. The book may be a little depressing, but that's the story it tells, and it's one that is well worth reading, if you like good writing.

In late 1930's Nova Scotia, a young man named Defoe Russet works as a muesum guard in Halifax , has difficult relationships with his wayward Uncle that raised him(who also works there)and as well as a Jewish girlfriend, Imogen( a care-taker at the small Jewish cemetary nearby).The book seems to be about that until The author weaves into an interesting tale centering around a Dutch painting that arrives at the tiny Glace Museum and how it affects Imogen,who can only be properly described as rather neurotic,as she(too) closely identifies with the painting titled "Jewess On A Street In Amsterdam" As a result, she makes a strange,life-threatening decision to actually become the woman in the painting,first by dressing like her,then making a very risky voyage to Amsterdam to live as the "Jewess" in the painting. The terrible news from overseas being dictated urgently by a popular radio personality only makes her more unbalanced and eager to assume this new life. Though a bit pedantic at times,this is an intriguing,and overall unsettling,tale,with flashes of dry humor. A unique book that will make you think.

I have read all of Howard Norman's books and this is definitely the best. The characters are quirky and interesting. The plot is original and thought-provoking. Anyone who has read Norman before and enjoyed him should like this book. It is faster paced and has many more twists and turns than the others.

There are certain things you can rely on in a book by Howard Norman: distinctly quirky protagonists, odd character names, a relatively remote Canadian location, and a dynamite opening sentence -

"The painting I stole for Imogen Linny, 'Jewess on a Street in Amsterdam', arrived to the Glace Museum, here in Halifax, on September 5, 1938."

That's the voice of DeFoe Russet, the main protagonist of "The Museum Guard". He is one of two guards at the museum, his uncle Edward being the other. DeFoe's narrative tone borders on lugubrious throughout the book, but never fails to be engaging. To be fair, he does have some reason to be mournful - both parents died in a fiery Zeppelin crash when he was eight, his plodding romance with Imogen isn't exactly going swimmingly, in no small measure due to recent unwelcome competition from his philandering uncle. To put it mildly, DeFoe is a person who craves a regular life - when stressed, he likes to iron shirts to calm himself. So increasingly odd behavior by Imogen, his uncle, and everyone around him is starting to get him seriously rattled.

A lot of shirts get ironed, and DeFoe does achieve a measure of calm by the end of this book. The hook that Howard Norman places so expertly right there in that first sentence is irresistible - you just have to keep reading to find out how DeFoe, the most buttoned-down character imaginable, is driven to such an act of desperate bravado, and how it all turns out.

The characters in this book are so odd, and behave so eccentrically that, by rights, it shouldn't work at all. Yet somehow it does. I don't understand how Norman manages to pull it off, but he does it brilliantly. This is a terrific novel.