James Salter died today at age 90. I think he might be one of the most under-read and under-decorated greats of American literature. Like many other readers, I'm still slowly discovering him, but find that everything I've read has been nearly perfect.
I first read Salter a few years ago with his outstanding book All That Is. I had written a review for about.com in 2013 but it seems it's been scrubbed from their site now that they're no longer updating. I figure I'd post it here: if anyone opposes, please let me know and I'll remove it. (The image, above, is from a signed first edition of Salter's memoir, Burning The Days.)
All That Is by
James Salter
Knopf, April 2013
Review by Jeff Alford
All That Is, James
Salter’s first novel in thirty-five years, follows the life of Philip Bowman
through the middle decades of twentieth-century America. When the novel opens,
Bowman is a junior naval officer in World War II amidst some action in the
Pacific. The novel expands episodically: we next see Bowman a returned hero in
New Jersey, then studying at Harvard, and eventually in Manhattan, getting his
foot in the door of a publishing house. Bowman consistently takes what he wants
when he wants, from his career to the women he sleeps with. He’s an unusual
hero to follow, as Bowman’s American Dream is whatever the best thing is in
front of him. This is a masterful work of subtle complexity: Philip Bowman is a
difficult, new mind in a familiar trajectory, finely tuned with deficiencies
most authors would overlook.
All That Is embraces
Bowman’s philosophy and develops his story slowly through short, beautifully
written chapters. Each episode could easily be presented as a short story and
builds throughout the novel into a layered, achingly complex character
portrait. Salter often drifts his spotlight from Bowman to one of the tertiary
characters in All That Is, and their
inclusion reveals additional complexities to Bowman’s character. In the company
of the rest of the cast of All That Is
it becomes clear what Bowman’s lacking: remorse, nostalgia, and wonder for the
future. All he cares about is the man he is and if that man can continue to
take what he decides is his. About halfway through the novel, Salter writes of
one of Bowman’s many trysts:
“…in Spain with a woman who had given him the feeling of
utter supremacy. He had crossed some line… He saw himself now to be another
kind of man, the kind he had hoped, fully a man, used to the wonder.”
Although All That Is is
predominantly driven by Bowman’s story, it’s fascinating to step back and
attempt to build a more conceptual understanding of Salter’s novel. Bowman’s
character is classically confident and strangely unpredictable: chapters open
that reveal him either on a plane, suddenly en route to Paris, or in the arms
of a new mistress. Salter’s tempering of Bowman makes it uncomfortably clear
how many of these movements are mistakes. For example, we watch as Bowman falls
for a married woman:
“He had met her by chance…. She was married, she had said,
but that was understandable – at a certain point in life, it seemed everyone
was. At a certain point also you began to feel that you knew everyone, there
was no one new, and you were going to spend the rest of your life among
familiar people, women especially.”
We, as readers, see Bowman’s decisions to be just as poorly
planned as his previous infidelities: he vies for the unattainable because he’s
already tried his luck with the immediate vicinity. But somehow Bowman is
oblivious to his history of social and romantic carelessness. And, it’s with
this in mind that one can return to the title of Salter’s novel and ruminate on
the author’s carefully succinct, properly tensed wording. Bowman lives entirely
in the present and allows no past regrets or ambitious aspirations to distract
his day-seizing vivre.
Salter’s handling of eroticism in All That Is is an extension of this hedonistic slant but is often
executed at the expense of the reader’s enjoyment. Bowman’s actions between the
sheets are in step with the brash decisions he makes outside the bedroom and
are justifiably, frustratingly in character. One could stretch a connection
from Bowman to Rabbit Angstrom or Nathan Zuckerman, but their sexual exploits
are much more affirmative and often celebratory than Bowman’s empty, mirthless
lovelife. All That Is could even be
read an experiment in the anti-Roth, or anti-Updike: what happens when the
glory days are removed from the mid-century American male’s identity? It seems
only success is left, devoid of any gratification.
Having only read about four of his books, I can say that Salter was one of the best. 90 years is a long haul but it's sad to see him go.
Currently reading:
The Book of Numbers by Joshua Cohen
Currently listening to:
Kamasi Washington, "The Epic"
