944 pages, Mariner Books
Review by Hereward L.M. Proops
A word of warning: Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White is not a novel to approach
half-heartedly. If you make the choice to read it, you are committing yourself
to a substantial task. At 835 pages of very small type, Faber's novel is not
one the average reader will waltz through in a matter of days. Even the keenest
reader is likely to have to dedicate several weeks to ploughing through this
weighty tome.
If the sheer size of the book doesn't put you off, the
novel's intrusive narrative voice might well do the job. Being a novel set in
the nineteenth century, Faber chose to follow the tradition of Dickens and his
contemporaries by telling the story through an omniscient, somewhat smug
narrator. Many readers will find the constant interruption in the flow of the
story almost too much to bear. I found myself reminded of Laurence Sterne or
Henry Fielding's interminable rambling digressions rather more than the
Victorian authors Faber was clearly hoping to imitate. I confess that I almost
gave up on the book after the first few chapters and only persevered after a friend
assured me that I'd get used to it.
I did get used to it. I read the whole thing and I want
more. I want to take all my clothes off and rub myself down with this novel. I
want to cook it up and shoot it into my veins. I want to do things to this book
that words don't yet exist for.
To call The
Crimson Petal and the White a great novel is an understatement. It is a truly
magnificent book. As intelligent as any work of literary fiction, Faber's book
doesn't once patronise the reader but neither does he seek to alienate his
audience. A huge cast of superbly realised characters that are both hilarious
and pitiable whilst, most importantly, remaining believable. A storyline that
manages to be suitably melodramatic without coming across as crass or exploitative.
A vibrant and incredibly well-researched setting that readers can lose
themselves in. Everything about this book screams quality. I cannot think of
the last time I felt so transported by a novel. It is as though I've been
eating cinema hot-dogs my whole life and have just been presented with a
sumptuous banquet.
The novel follows a nineteen year-old prostitute named Sugar
and her relationship with William Rackham, the reluctant heir to a successful
perfumery. Sugar dreams of a better life and sees William as a means to escape
her current situation. Though born into money, William's own personal life is
by no means simple. His pampered wife is undeniably mad and his brother is
irritatingly godly. As with many Victorian fathers, he is barely familiar with
his own daughter. Frustrated by his father's expectations and the stultifying
demands of high society, William's desires can only be vented through his
relationship with Sugar. When he purchases Sugar for his personal use and
installs her in her own apartment, she is able to begin her climb out of
prostitution towards a more civilised lifestyle. However, Sugar realises that
her situation is precarious and is not guaranteed to be permanent and so
hatches a plan to make herself indispensable to William.
From one point of view, the novel is about how people use
one another to get what they want. Sugar's mother pimps out her own daughter as
a means to make money. William uses
Sugar first as an object of desire and then as a means to help get to grips
with running Rackham Perfumery. Sugar massages his ego and gives him the
affection and support that his emotionally unstable wife is incapable of
providing him with. Damaged by her experiences of the countless men who used
her services as a prostitute, Sugar uses William as a means of escaping her
past.
From another point of view, the book is about how people,
often unwittingly, manage to thwart their chance of true happiness. William's
pious brother Henry is so absorbed with being seen as a good and holy man that
he fails to see that his widower friend Emmeline Fox is in love with him. Sugar
and William's relationship has the potential to develop into something that
transcends its sordid roots but never does. William is nauseatingly
self-centred and manages to remain oblivious to the thoughts and feelings of
anyone. Sugar is so scarred by her past and desperate to protect her future
that she neglects to enjoy the present.
Whilst Faber allows the relationship between William and
Sugar to simmer and readers might begin to hope that some good might come of
it, he wisely avoids a happy ending. This isn't to say that the book's climax
is depressing. Faber might not provide his readers with what they expect but
this makes final chapters of the book even more gripping.
Faber's evocation of Victorian London is wonderfully
well-written. From the well-to-do neighbourhoods of Rackham and his friends to
the seedy, filth-strewn alleyways frequented by Sugar's people, the locations
in Faber's metropolis feel as authentic as those in a novel by Charles Dickens
or Wilkie Collins. However, Faber is able to give us a far more seedy portrayal
of London life. Coarse language, brutal violence and graphic sex give us a
glimpse of the vice-ridden streets of London that the Victorian authors, bound
by the conventions of their time, were unable to describe. Yes, there's a hell
of a lot of shagging in this book and Faber doesn't hide behind pleasant
euphemisms to describe what's going on. This direct approach won't be appreciated
by everyone (there were a few moments when I could have been spared yet another
description of William's spunk trickling down the inside of Sugar's thighs) but
this frank approach to sex gives the novel with a pleasingly modern
sensibility.
The
Crimson Petal and the White is a novel that demands quite a lot from its
readers but rewards those who stick with it. Think of it like a totally epic
nineteenth century version of Pretty
Woman but with filth,
repression, insanity, filth, depravity and more filth. I can't recommend it
highly enough.
Hereward L.M. Proops
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