“The Secret History” by Donna Tartt is the second book that I read by the author and I really liked it. A lot of the writing reminded me of “The Goldfinch” but in a bit more subdued form. I feel like Donna Tartt first wrote “The Secret History”, almost as a practice session for “The Goldfinch” before she created even sharper and more exhilarating characters.
“The Secret History” is a reverse murder story: at the beginning of the book, we already know the killer and who was killed, and then we fill in the blanks of what actually happened in between. The story focuses on five students of ancient Green – Richard, the narrator, and a poor guy from California, Henry who seems to be brighter than any students you meet, the twins Camilla and Charles, Francis, who is homosexual, and Bunny, a boy who was killed. Richard, after finishing high school and hating his college in California, decides to move to Vermont. Once he arrives at Hamden College, he is mesmerized by a group of students who study ancient Greek – it is an exclusive group that is selected by Professor Julian. When Richard learns that Julian takes no new students and rarely takes anyone in, he is even more motivated to get acquainted with the group. Once he joins, he becomes a part of their weird dynamics, distorted reality, and complicated relationships that often cross the lanes of morality. I am going to leave this for you to discover the rest!
I had two main thoughts when I was reading the book. The first one is the line between intelligence and morality: Henry often wanted to explore how the ancient Greeks lived but some of their rituals were not necessarily moral and that mark could be easily missed in the name of scientific discovery and exploration.
The second thought was that it is important to stay in the present: our minds can carry us away and make us unaware of the present but it still exists and it makes life move forward. I found it interesting that none of the groups actually knew about the exploration of the moon or any other present events because they were so wrapped up in their own truth. As usual, here are some of my favorite quotes:
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“Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it. And what could be more terrifying and beautiful, to souls like the Greeks or our own, than to lose control completely? To throw off the chains of being for an instant, to shatter the accident of our mortal selves?”
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“Except that my life, for the most part, has been very stale and colorless. Dead, I mean. The world has always been an empty place to me. I was incapable of enjoying even the simplest things. I felt dead in everything I did.” He brushed the dirt from his hands. “But then it changed,” he said. “The night I killed that man.”
I was jarred—a little spooked, as well—at so blatant a reference to something referred to, by mutual agreement, almost exclusively with codes, catchwords, a hundred different euphemisms.
“It was the most important night of my life,” he said calmly. “It enabled me to do what I’ve always wanted most.”
“Which is?”
“To live without thinking.”
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“I’ll get down on my knees if you want me to,” I said. “Really, I will.”
She closed her eyes, dark-lidded, dark shadows beneath them; she really was older, not the glancing-eyed girl I had fallen in love with but no less beautiful for that; beautiful now in a way that less excited my senses, than tore at my very heart.”
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“An abrupt departure, I knew, would be too much; if I was to leave the East at all, I could do so only gradually and so I rented a car, and drove and drove until finally the landscape changed, and I was in the Midwest, and the rain was all I had left of Camilla’s goodbye kiss. Raindrops on the windshield, radio stations fading in and out. Cornfields bleak in all those gray, wide-open reaches. I had said goodbye to her once before, but it took everything I had to say goodbye to her then, again, for the last time, like poor Orpheus turning for a last backward glance at the ghost of his only love and in the same heartbeat losing her forever…”
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“What are the dead, anyway, but waves and energy? Light shining from a dead star?”
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I really enjoyed this story. It is captivating, enigmatic, and well-written. Give it a go!
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