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A review by holmesstorybooks
Reflections in a Golden Eye by Carson McCullers
4.0
I read this novella for my 20th century queer project, a project where I read 100+ books by queer or trans authors, I read this for the year 1941.
Less of narrative and more of an examination of every cluster of deep, dark, human desires. McCullers is a master of tension, of horror, of a slow, creeping dread. Her work reminds me a lot of Daphne du Maurier, Patricia Highsmith, Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote and other gothic authors of that ilk. Her writing is watching you, as you read, examining you, seeing right into your soul.
I wasn’t cheering for any of the characters in this novella. I wasn’t agreeing or disagreeing with who they presented themselves to be, but I still was transfixed, unable to look away, to keep reading. Darkly humorous, sometimes loud, orchestral, other times silent and creeping, it has a way of lingering with you. Many of the characters struggle to articulate their own feelings, their own thoughts, but the author demonstrates their innermost emotions, even if the character themselves remains blind to it.
There were only a few times where I felt this novel was overwritten or too dramatic. So layered, so complex, rich like dark, peat earth, hiding a thousand secrets amongst its pages, it also managed to be … camp? Queer? Absurd?
Reflections of a Golden Eye illuminates where other books fear to tread. One I wish I could’ve read in high school, but it would’ve been far too ghastly to read as a class.
‘You mean,’ Captain Penderton said, ‘that any fulfilment obtained at the expense of normalcy is wrong, and should not be allowed to bring happiness. In short, it is better, because it is morally honourable, for the square peg to keep scraping about the round hole rather than to discover and use the unorthodox square that would fit it?
‘Why, you put it exactly right,’ the Major said. ‘Don’t you agree with me?’
tw: stalking, racial slurs, racially motivated crime about 70% of the way through, gun violence, mental illness, many trigger warnings for this one, it is dark!
Less of narrative and more of an examination of every cluster of deep, dark, human desires. McCullers is a master of tension, of horror, of a slow, creeping dread. Her work reminds me a lot of Daphne du Maurier, Patricia Highsmith, Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote and other gothic authors of that ilk. Her writing is watching you, as you read, examining you, seeing right into your soul.
I wasn’t cheering for any of the characters in this novella. I wasn’t agreeing or disagreeing with who they presented themselves to be, but I still was transfixed, unable to look away, to keep reading. Darkly humorous, sometimes loud, orchestral, other times silent and creeping, it has a way of lingering with you. Many of the characters struggle to articulate their own feelings, their own thoughts, but the author demonstrates their innermost emotions, even if the character themselves remains blind to it.
There were only a few times where I felt this novel was overwritten or too dramatic. So layered, so complex, rich like dark, peat earth, hiding a thousand secrets amongst its pages, it also managed to be … camp? Queer? Absurd?
Reflections of a Golden Eye illuminates where other books fear to tread. One I wish I could’ve read in high school, but it would’ve been far too ghastly to read as a class.
‘You mean,’ Captain Penderton said, ‘that any fulfilment obtained at the expense of normalcy is wrong, and should not be allowed to bring happiness. In short, it is better, because it is morally honourable, for the square peg to keep scraping about the round hole rather than to discover and use the unorthodox square that would fit it?
‘Why, you put it exactly right,’ the Major said. ‘Don’t you agree with me?’
tw: stalking, racial slurs, racially motivated crime about 70% of the way through, gun violence, mental illness, many trigger warnings for this one, it is dark!