Customer Reviews

The Music of Chance

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

I don't know if I necessarily enjoyed this book (or any Paul Auster book, for that matter). The enjoyment comes from the questions I ask myself after I've put the book down. It is not an enjoyable reading experience, but rather a contemplative one. In that regard, it is a highly successful piece of art.

The story appears to be relatively simple. One man goes driving. He meets another man on the road. The two of them meet some eccentric millionaires. The four men play poker. Then two men build a wall. It is almost nonsensical now that I look back on it. But the story's not really the thing (it never is in an Auster book). So don't go looking for closure, and don't expect easy answers. It's all just an excuse for some finely written meditations on the nature of fate and the restrictions of freedom.

Auster's writing style is enigmatic. There is a faux-coldness to it, appearing at first glance distant and reserved. Closer inspection, however, reveals much humanity and passion in his prose. I've always had suspicions that his surname is really an ingeniously calculated pseudonym, for any austerity in the writing is both sincere and ironic. That's a neat trick to pull off, and, to my mind, his greatest strength as a writer. In this example from his oeuvre, he gets the balance just right.

Auster has a way with a certain type of character-one who is both on the fringe of both society and sanity both. They are not often very likeable or sympathetic characters, but they always are engrossing characters.

Jim Nash's veneer of sanity breaks when an unexpected windfall from the father he hates kicks out what little emotional support kept him on the straight and narrow and converts him into a wandering, nomadic drifter with his own transportation. In the midst of his journeys he meets Jack Pozzi, also a wanderer-sans transportation. Pozzi suckers Nash into an questionable gambling adventure that backfires, leaving them with a debt that leaves then essentially in a state of indentured servitude. The bulk of the story centers on how they cope with that condition.

The fundamentals of the story, as is so often the case with Auster, are , on reflection, faintly ridiculous. However, it is mood, character and fate that concern Auster, and his-and our-immersion into those topics render the absurdities of the actual story irrelevant.

I've read several Auster books and can't really say I've like any of them particularly, but they do fascinate me. I keep going back for more. The bottom line is what Auster does is ask questions about life and fate-in such a way that you are forced to think about them in your own terms. Auster does not supply answers-heck, not one of his books I've read can really be said to have an ending or resolution of any meaningful sort-but the way the questions are posed will haunt you-and keep you coming back for more.

First I saw the movie, and halfway through, it literally detonated in my head. It's a Freemasonic allegory! (And not exactly complimentary to Masonry, I might add, if I'm interpreting it correctly.) The masonic references are subtle (with the exception, of course, of the stone wall. 10,000 stones ain't exactly subtle <grin> but they tip you off to start looking elsewhere for clues.) I am not a Mason, but have read quite a bit about them, and our man Nashe (Wonder what Nagy means in Magyar?) is clearly a "traveling man", a man whose obligations (career,family) have fallen by the wayside (a favorite Auster motif), leaving him careening aimlessly, like a rogue pinball, from western city to western city who, as we meet him, is going "from the West to the East". (See the exchange between Michael Caine and Christopher Plummer on the train in "The Man Who Would Be King" if you don't believe me.) He picks up Pozzi, who has been "struck on the temple", just as Hiram Abiff was struck in the Masonic story of the events surrounding the building of the Temple of Solomon, and which is reenacted in ritual in the induction of every Master Mason. There are a number of other clever details such as the brand of champagne they drink with the hooker that just happens to be my old favorite "Veuve Cliquot". (It's too small to read on the film, but no other champagne has that distinctive orange label.) "Veuve" is French for Widow, and Masons often refer to each other as Sons of the Widow. The names of the two poker players, Flower and Stone, may refer to Rosicrucians and Freemasons, but their trip to France might refer to either Hugh De Payens and his pal's trip to see Bernard de Clairvoux (which kicked off the Templars, whom the Masons claim as ancestors), or perhaps Ben Franklin's (and friend?) trip to Paris where he was inducted into the French Lodge "Neuf Soeurs". They are many more (too many to mention here) and I still haven't cracked the whole thing (not being a Mason makes it a harder job), but the book fascinates me and I'll continue to dig. I've recently read Music of Chance, Moon Palace, and City of Glass, and will read the rest soon. This fellow is a joy to read, particularly for aficionados of the mystery genre, which he well knows how to seduce with his labyrinthine structures and metaphysical quandaries. He smacks of Miguel de Unamuno ("Niebla", "Fog" in English, I believe) and Jorge Luis Borges, the father of the metaphysical detective story (but whereas Borges' stories, much as I love them, are purely cerebral exercises, cold around the heart, and liberally sprinkled with red herrings as if to mock his readers, Auster's are anguished and emotionally involving), of the Pythagorean School (and its obsession with the relationship between music and mathematics) and the Priests of Heliopolis (whom I suspect they got it from), of drunken Phaeton and his wax wings and of the Minotaur in his Maze, of the poetry of Leonard Cohen and Lenny Bruce and Tony Curtis (who had his own brand of poetry, ask his women <grin>. I don't know if it's because this cat is my own age, or because I know his New York (before moving to Seattle), but I felt an instant kinship, like we'd read all the same books at some point.

NOTE TO THE AUTHOR:

If you read this, Mr. Auster, please drop me an email to either disabuse me of these notions or to confirm that I'm on the right track. In return, regardless of the answer, you have my word that I'll buy the rest of your books anyway, and that I won't abuse any email response, or ask you to autograph the books, or any such nonsense. I'm a stable, happily married chap with two kids and a small business, not a wacko or a literary groupie. Thanks for the ride, man, and keep 'em comin'!

Paul Auster uses a unique, engaging tone in all his novels, a somewhat lyrical prose involving chance, a quiet pace and surreal plot lines, and The Music of Chance is my favorite of all his novels.

Jim Nashe is a fireman who suddenly inherits some unexpected money. After buying a new car and going on a road trip, his return sets him about a different path:

He had told them he was planning to go back to Massachusetts, but as it happened, he soon found himself traveling in the opposite direction. That was because he missed the ramp to the freeway - a common enough mistake - but instead of driving the extra twenty miles that would have put him back on course, he impulsively went up the next ramp, knowing full well that he had just committed himself to the wrong road. It was a sudden, unpremeditated decision, but in the brief time that elapsed between the two ramps, Nashe understood that there was no difference, that both ramps were finally the same. ..He could go anywhere he wanted, he could do anything he felt like doing, and not a single person in the world would care. As long as he did not turn back, he could just as well have been invisible.

And so he is off, driving just to drive. So begins this story, which (if you'll pardon the pun) eventually takes a detour when he runs into a beaten Jack Pozzi, a gambler. The two get involved in a poker game - and at this point, I should mention that the whole book is predicated on much the same beat as poker - it's about chance, challenge, bluffs and risk.

The relationship between the two strangers led down an odd path together is original, somewhat disturbing, and incredibly well paced and engaging. Without giving any of the actual plot away, understand that major plot devices center around both the construction of a stone wall, and a mammoth miniature model called the City of the World. Described in the novel, the City of the World "...is more than just a toy,' Flower said, 'it's an artistic vision of mankind. In one way, it's an autobiography, but in another way, it's what you might call a utopia - a place where the past and future come together, where good finally triumphs over evil...It's an imaginary place, but it's also realistic. Evil still exists, but the powers who rule over the city have figured out how to transform that evil back into good. Wisdom reigns here, but the struggle is nevertheless constant, and great vigilance is required of all the citizens - each of whom carries the entire city within himself.'"

The Music of Chance is a loopy, incredibly engaging novel that is an absolute joy to read, but try it for yourself. Pick up a copy! Another book I need to recommend -- completely unrelated to Auster, but very much on my mind since I purchased a "used" copy off Amazon is "The Losers' Club: Complete Restored Edition," a funny, highly entertaining little novel I can't stop thinking about.

As a lifetime worshipper of Paul Auster, I have yet to read his book I would not like. "The Music of Chance" is another one I immensely enjoyed. The life of Jim Nashe, a fireman from Boston, which so far has been good, average and rather unremarkable, with all common joys and problems, is forever changed by the unexpected inheritance he receives from the absent father.

Nashe, left by his wife just before he receives the news about the pleasant sum left for him, decides to leave his daughter with her aunt, quits his job, buys a Saab and starts driving aimlessly through the country, spending time on the road, listening to classical music and sleeping in motels. The money lasts for just about a year of such life and before Nashe manages to think twice, he is left with just about enough to see him through until he finds a source of income. Driving aimlessly, but just about to (reluctantly) decide to get back to his sister and his daughter, Nashe spots a wrecked-looking young man walking alongside the road. On an impulse, he stops and gives the badly beaten man a lift. It transpires that Jack Pozzi a. k. a. Jackpot, is a masterful poker player (and a poker addict) who needs money to put on the table in a very important game, which he fully expects to win. Nashe decides to give Jack his remaining money in hope this adventure can multiply his funds and continue his careless lifestyle for a while.

This is a start of an unexpected string of events, involving Jack's life story, meeting two fabulously rich eccentrics, Flower and Stone (Pozzi and Nashe's opponents in the crucial poker game) who owe their wealth to the winning lottery ticket, and building (in a middle of the woods) the wall of the stones which once constituted the medieval castle in Scotland.

The story is, in a way, based on a similar premise as some other Auster's novels (e. g. Brooklyn Follies): a man changes his life and it takes an unexpected turn. Here, the theme of chance is prominent: lottery, card games, surprising inheritance. But is the message really that chance drives the lives of those who let it do so? After all, Nashe makes conscious decisions till the end of the novel and although he likes to surrender his life to chance, the surrender is never complete.

The cultural references are, of course, numerous and a pleasure to think about. From music to movies (a theme recurrent in "The Book of Illusions") - Flower and Stone compared to Laurel and Hardy - and other allusions to widely understood culture, Auster's works are always a maze to get through, with lots of clues and possible associations, and a pleasure for people who have some education in so called "general culture". I always wonder how much of Auster's original ideas hidden in his novel I manage to catch, how many I miss, and how many are only figments of my imagination. For example, is it only me, or can there be a reference to "Waiting for Godot"? Pozzi's name, road, the two against two, like Pozzo and Lucky (and here the appearance of luck over and over again) versus Vladimir and Estragon, last, but not least, the absurdity of the whole situation with the wall? Well, I guess I will never know, but it was interesting for me to see (or perhaps: imagine) this correlation.

I was not sure what to make out of the very end, which is rather abrupt and seems rushed - this is the only reason why I don't give this novel five stars, but four and a half would be appropriate.

This is a great book - definitely my favorite by Auster. I was surprsed by all the negative reviews. This is not a simple book and it is not for the simple-minded.

As with all Auster books - the reader is compelled to participate by thinking - there are no simple answers. You are left to speculate.

Nashe, the "play by the rules - leave it to fate" hero trusts the system. His desire to play by the rules gets challenged by fate, the rich and powerful, brute force, and the cynical characters around him.

It's a mystery without a simple answer - read it and think.

"The Music of Chance" feels like an incomplete book. Mr. Auster is not known for very lengthy works, and at 217 pages, TMOC is not unusually brief. However, the pacing of TMOC is significantly slowed down from many of his other books, and for the majority of the novel, that works to the story's advantage as a meditative musing on the nature of fortune. Unfortunately, "Chance" stalls about 4/5ths of the way through and never recovers. The ending feels rushed and cobbled together, nearly claustrophobic compared to the wide open, universal feel of the book up to that point. I have no reason to insinuate anything about the writing process behind this book, but it certainly gives me the impression that the author reached a certain point, and was unsure of how to proceed. There's little confidence in writing in the latter half of TMOC.

I consider myself a big Paul Auster fan, and while I feel some of his recent books have had very prominent fault lines (Timbuktu, The Brooklyn Follies) TMOC is right in the heart of what was, in my opinion, Mr. Auster's best phase as a novelist. TMOC comes after "Moon Palace" and before "Leviathan," and then "Mr. Vertigo." Those three novels are a very clear representation of what Mr. Auster has to offer as an author. I'm aware that "The New York Trilogy" gets thrown in a lot, but honestly, I don't think the vision in TNYT was as clear as in the aforementioned stories. One of Mr. Auster's best abilities as a novelist is to make a short book feel like a Greek epic. TMOC feels like a 217 page book, and nothing more.

At the end of the day, you'll know if you'll like "The Music of Chance" before you read it. It's not the book people use to get into Paul Auster (I was personally recommended "Mr. Vertigo" as a starting point, and I pass on that recommendation) and by the time you work your way to TMOC, you'll know if Auster's style is for you or not. "Chance" will do nothing to upset that perception.

I have recently read a number of Auster novels and become a fan of his work. This present work starts terrifically and has a great first half. The restless wandering endlessly driving through America former fireman father of a two year old daughter who he has left with his sister, abandoned by his wife, Nashe is a typical Auster loner, intellectual, interesting, tough- minded and decent. When he takes into his car and saves a beaten- to- the pulp young Italian man they strike up a scheme for making some money fast. Nashe who started out with a large sum he inherited from the father he never really knew agrees to bankroll Pozzi(Who also grew up with a largely absent father) in a poker- game in which he will play against two weird multi- millionaire Lottery winners. The story of the poker- game itself is told in an interesting and exciting way. But the best thing in the book is the friendship and dialogue between Nashe and Pozzi.
In any case the second part of the book is really a kind of crazy prison story which I found largely unbelievable. I have noticed Auster often puts his heroes in dead- end disastrous prison- like situations. I have noticed that he also too often leads them to very cruel endings.
Again and again I find Auster creates very fascinating characters who he develops to a certain point and then abandons.
In any case this work for me anyway had a very good first half, and a mediocre second one.

As always, Auster excells in the innovative premise of the novel--a man who defines freedom as living entirely on the whims of chance. The plot and the language are entirely engrossing, and I read the novel in breathless one day's sitting simply because I couldn't put it down. After all this, Auster deals with the enormity of what he started with a weak whimper of an ending, the most trite, 70s B-movie-like weak bravura conclusion pretending to be a philosophical challenge. The ending is the LEAST interesting instance of the "chance" that the protagonist takes.

I'm an immense fan of Paul Auster's writing. He is disquieting, edgy, and probes the deeper recesses of the reader's mind. My first book of his was The New York Trilogy (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition), which was enough to "set the hook." Others followed, including Moon Palace (Contemporary American Fiction) and Timbuktu: A Novel. In ways almost certainly unintended, there is this "Homeland Security" aspect to his writing. There is always this amorphous, undefined threat out there; that can wreck one's life, if you are not alert enough, and `don't report unattended baggage'... Auster has a strong following in France, probably more so than in the USA. He has been promoted by the publisher "Actes Sud," and his works have resonated in Marsailles. All too often, his themes involve fleeting thoughts, if not recurring dreams or nightmares of the reader... and a willingness to pursue them in creative and imaginative ways.

Jim Nashe is the main protagonist in this work. He is a 30's something fireman in Boston, recently estranged from his wife, and still responsible for his two-year old daughter. His father deserted his mother and him (a common theme in Auster's novels), but "redeems" himself by dying, and leaving him a couple hundred grand. Nashe, like many of our own fantasies, decides to take to the road, a la On the Road: 50th Anniversary Edition, driving simply for the sake of driving. His money is dwindling when chance, one of so many in this novel, brings the young card player and hustler, Jack Pozzi into his life. After a stint in the Plaza Hotel in NYC, they decide to risk Nashe's remaining fortune in a classic "double down" poker game with some eccentric... truly eccentric millionaires who made their fortune, sure enough, through blind chance also: purchasing the right lottery ticket.

Acquiescence and even adaptation to the twists and turns that fate throws at you are also prevailing themes with Auster, and this novel. At one point, a given situation is viewed as utterly absurd; but within a few paragraphs, it becomes the "new normal." Of contemporary American writers, only Thomas Pynchon has a similar ability to make the implausible and unbelievable turn into reality, and have you doubting yourself if you remain skeptical. And thus, the new reality becomes Nasbe and Pozzi working in a Pennsylvania field, building a wall out of stones that had once been part of an Irish castle.

Auster's allusions and references reflect his erudition. On one page he is quoting from William Blake's poem "Jerusalem." Two pages later, it is the subject quote from Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury: The Corrected Text Unlikely that Auster is bluffing in such matters; he does have the cards. Amazon however makes the Reagan adage: "Trust but verify" easy. The search function confirms that the subject quote is on page 177. Like his other works, 5-stars, for sure.