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chalkletters's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
I first encountered The Go-Between on a list of great first lines given to my English class as writing prompts. From then on, I always kept it vaguely on my massive list of books I wanted to read some day, despite having no real idea what it was about or even what kind of book it was. (Interestingly, I made no such resolution about The Trial or 1984, nor can I even remember what the other books might have been.) I didn’t actually get around to reading The Go-Between until years later, which is probably for the best, as I don’t think I’d have understood it.
When I finally did read it, it was because I was on holiday in Norfolk and wanted to read something set in the surrounding area. The Go-Betweencertainly delivered on a sense of place and time, both during that read and this. There’s a slight metafictional flair in Leo looking back on his memories, which I always enjoy. It was interesting that Leo’s obsession with the soaring mercury matched so well with my own increasing temperatures as I suffered through a nasty febrile cold. Just one of the many ways that books seem to be reflecting my own life back at me this year!
Though the story wasn’t as compelling this time around, the prose is beautiful. The Go-Between is the kind of book that I think Rebecca would like because she appreciates a really stunning sentence. That’s not really something that I read for, but I do my best to notice them when I stumble across them.
Leo and the rest of the characters are very well-drawn, to the point that Leo is uncomfortably embarrassing at times. L P Hartley does a very good job of conveying adult characters through the perspective of a child who doesn’t really understand them, which is quite a tricky feat of writing.
The first time I finished The Go-Between, I was eager to read it again, feeling that there were many more layers which would offer up their secrets now that I knew the whole story. This time, I don’t feel quite that same drive — perhaps because I didn’t get as much additional understanding out of it as I had hoped. Still, I’ll keep it on my shelf. It’ll be interesting to revisit it again and see what I make of it a third time.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Infidelity and Suicide
Minor: Death of parent and Death
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