The Singapore Grip by J.G. Farrell

[Freewheeling Andy]

This 600 page monster, set in the period from about 1940 until the fall of Singapore, is a fantastic, fantastic novel. The book starts calmly, with families working out how to proceed in their little domestic problems whilst running a major rubber company exporting to Britain.

 

Slowly, as the war progresses around them, and circumstances change, you begin to see the slow breakdown of society, you see the intransigent failings of the later phases of the British empire. All the misplaced arrogance, the confidence that it will last for ever, the subtle racism, it's here.

 

It's hard to do justice to the plot - in many ways you could see it as similar to the first part of War and Peace, you keep being introduced to new characters, there are real and fictional ones, there are love stories and bit part characters, there's the progress of the war. There's a character, Matthew, a heir to part of the company that's the start of this, who could easily be a British ringer for Pierre in Tolstoy's book.

 

Yet it doesn't suffer from the flabbinness or quite the confusing excess of characters that War and Peace does, and therefore is a much easier, less daunting read.

 

As the book continues, amongst the bombing, and with the Japanese getting closer and closer to Singapore, it's fascinating to follow the characters, see them try and focus their lives, see them try and carry on as normal in the chaos, often competely unwilling to accept what is happening.

 

A hugely entertaining and informing novel, this.

[Philip Stein]

Andy, I'm guessing if you've tackled this that you've probably read the first two in Farrell's 'Empire Trilogy', Troubles and The Siege of Krishnapur. If so, can I ask how you found those? I enjoyed both to some extent - very funny, fine writing - but they didn't half go on! I was bored far too often, and his style just seemed to distant and compressed much of the time. Given that The Singapore Grip is 50% longer than Troubles and fully twice as long as Krishnapur, I had planned to give it a wide berth. Am I missing out?

[Freewheeling Andy]

I've not read the other two. I can see why people might get bored, it's not full of clever writing. In fact, I've read more than once that Singapore Grip is the worst of the three, so probably isn't for you.

 

Much more exciting is the fact that you're currently reading one of my two favourite books of the last decade. That's a book I really, really love.

[Philip Stein]

Oh sorry Andy, I haven't changed my signature for about 18 months which is when I last logged in here! I very much enjoyed The Debt to Pleasure (in fact it was a reread when I listed it here) and indeed at times I thought it full of the greatest sort of pleasure literature can give: a sort of drumming-the-heels-in-merriment at its self-conscious cleverness and wit. But by the end I felt it came down a little, partly because the outcome was too clear, and partly because the debt to Pale Fire was too obvious.

[Freewheeling Andy]

I really must read Pale Fire some time. Have you read Lanchester's other books? Mr Philips was rubbish, but Fragrant Harbour is great.

[Philip Stein]

No, I read Mr Phillips and because it was rubbish, I didn't read Fragrant Harbour! And he published a memoir recently didn't he, Family Romance?