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A review by jasonfurman
New Grub Street by George Gissing
5.0
An excellent nineteenth century novel about writers and writing, feels more like [a:Honoré de Balzac|228089|Honoré de Balzac|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1206567834p2/228089.jpg] than any other English novels I can think of ([b:David Copperfield|58696|David Copperfield|Charles Dickens|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1461452762l/58696._SY75_.jpg|4711940] is also about a writer but he basically goes from success to success in his writing career, a little like Charles Dickens, so the writing industry aspect of it is not what is most interesting). It has a set of writers that range from cynical to literary to realistic to aloof to critics all jostling around, putting out three volume books, two volume books, articles, waging fights under their own names and anonymously, and mixing this all up with the support, love, rejection, and more of a cast of women that in many cases are forces in their own right. It has a little bit of the feeling of La Bohème except instead of the artistic production being in the background as a romantic source of poverty it is in the foreground as the point of the book.
New Grub Street reads a bit like it was written in a rush (and evidently it was), it has a certain amount of excess, characters come in and out (especially Howard Biffin coming in) in ways that do not make complete sense, the plot is a little baggy at times. I appreciated how I could never tell which author(s) George Gissing was identifying with, he did a decent job of sympathizing in various ways with almost but not quite all of them in a way that embraced complexity and nuance with no real heroes or villains.
I should say this has been on my TBR list ever since I read the [b:Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem|1067289|Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem|Peter Ackroyd|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1351574124l/1067289._SY75_.jpg|913787] by [a:Peter Ackroyd|16881|Peter Ackroyd|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1232835556p2/16881.jpg] a quarter century ago, Gissing is a character in that excellent novel.
New Grub Street reads a bit like it was written in a rush (and evidently it was), it has a certain amount of excess, characters come in and out (especially Howard Biffin coming in) in ways that do not make complete sense, the plot is a little baggy at times. I appreciated how I could never tell which author(s) George Gissing was identifying with, he did a decent job of sympathizing in various ways with almost but not quite all of them in a way that embraced complexity and nuance with no real heroes or villains.
I should say this has been on my TBR list ever since I read the [b:Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem|1067289|Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem|Peter Ackroyd|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1351574124l/1067289._SY75_.jpg|913787] by [a:Peter Ackroyd|16881|Peter Ackroyd|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1232835556p2/16881.jpg] a quarter century ago, Gissing is a character in that excellent novel.