Hemingway, Seriously? : The Notebook

Hey folks,
As I've teased in a little Prelude a few weeks ago, I was compelled by a horrific interview in USA Today to read Nicholas Sparks. Now let me make this very clear: I do this of my own volition. No one has put a gun to my head. I kid. I feel that I have the ability to give everyone a chance. I try very hard not to be a snob.

So here we go. Starting with The Notebook I've decided to focus on the central love story between Noah and Allie, in regards to Spark's own idolization of Hemingway. In that USA Today interview he considers himself to be comparable to Hemingway's love stories such as Farewell to Arms.

(By the way I am consciously ignoring the other 1/3 of the book that deals with the older versions of Noah and Allie. While considerably overwrought I was actually touched by the Alzheimer's subplot. However Spark's inability to write anything realistic does the horrible toll of that disease a disservice. Alzheimer's is a scary disease and should not just be used as a plot device. But I digress...)

So here's my first installment.

Hemingway, Seriously? : The Notebook

Nicholas Sparks knows the geography of the South. It's his home region. He knows the wilderness in a Thoreau-like way. Everything about nature is good, and any urbanity is bad. In The Notebook he spends long passages making the connection between our main hero Noah and his link with all things natural. He goes out on a lake every morning so he can watch the dawn. When he wants to impress true love Allie, he takes her out on a lake to float amongst swans. Evidentally Noah is good because he exemplifies the natural environment that surrounds him. This is why he is better than Allie's other suitor who is an urbane money rich attorney.

In reality Hemingway would laugh this away for the trite characterization that it is. Hemingway wrote about nature, but only in juxtaposition to what it said about the nature of man. Hemingway was not an environmentalist. He was a Darwinist in a sense that he felt that it was a man's obligation to fight for what he cares about. A weak man spends the night crying over the fact that his true love is engaged to another man. Hemingway would beat any sensitive man with a club, and tell him he deserved it. If Sparks believes he is akin to Hemingway well then he deserves a similiar beating.

On the other hand the female lead Allie is even weaker. She is caught up in a typical triangle between two men: the true love of her youth or the man her family approves of. What will she do? Of course she'll pick the true love of her youth. Now Noah is in fact the boy that she lost her virginity to and chooses to consummate their reunification in a similiar fashion. However she has not done the same with Lon Hammond Jr-her fiance. In a bizarre way Allie's cheating with Noah is justified because well they were meant to be together all along. The passion between them is so strong that Allie just has no choice. She has no control over her rational mind or physical body. It's sad and insulting how powerless Sparks makes Allie's characterization. She is simply a woman who is ruled by emotion in the great Bronte melodrama fashion.

Which brings me to the conclusion that while Sparks refuses to link himself to "romance" that is exactly where his characterizations can be found. The central romance in The Notebook is a tame version of Bronte all over again. Forget about Hemingway. These folks aren't human or real. They are fantasies from a man who can't admit that he idealizes love and relationships.

Oddly enough I have thought about reading The Notebook before now. The book reached my consciousness because of the movie adaptation a few years ago. I checked it out on cable and thought it was good, because of what the actors brought to the story. Noah and Allie are three-dimensional in a sense that I can understand their motivations. And there are multiple levels at work in their actions. Even though the story is still trapped in Sparks overt romanticism, the actors are in small ways rebelling against the sappiness inherent in the original text.

So in the end I think Sparks could learn a lesson or two on realism from re-reading his Hemingway or watching the movie version of his own book.