When I Was Otherwise: A Novel, by Stephen Benatar
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When I Was Otherwise: A Novel, by Stephen Benatar
Read Online and Download Ebook When I Was Otherwise: A Novel, by Stephen Benatar
Two women looking back over fifty years: one full of regret, the other not admitting to mistakes and continuing to be fiercely positive. Which approach, in the end, is likely to prove more satisfying—both for Daisy herself and for those who live around her?
When I Was Otherwise: A Novel, by Stephen Benatar- Published on: 2015-03-17
- Released on: 2015-03-17
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.50" h x .75" w x 5.50" l, .94 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 332 pages
Review “Particularly welcome . . . Funny, outrageous and unpatronizing . . . a cunning, convincing novel that, dealing primarily with the past, manages to be more up-to-date in its observations than the majority of contemporary satires.” —The Scotsman “This book is remarkably convincing . . . One’s first reaction on finishing the novel is ‘Goodness, how sad!’ One’s second is ‘Goodness, how funny!’ —Francis King, The Spectator “Benatar writes with wit and humour about subjects most writers do not tackle—ageing, age, the frequent nastiness of family life.” —Doris Lessing “An intriguing, funny, sometimes exciting and, finally, sad story; the elegant idiosyncrasy of the author’s viewpoint, which made Wish Her Safe At Home so enjoyably inventive without discarding a carefully controlled narrative, here creates a moving story from what might at first appear to be the elements of a black farce.” —Christopher Hawtree, The Literary Review “Arnold Bennett, reflecting with satisfaction on the ability of his novel, The Old Wives’ Tale, to give an authentic sense of the passage of time, once observed complacently that ‘it isn’t in many books that you can see people growing old.’ Much to its credit, When I Was Otherwise is such a book.” —Peter Kemp, The Times Literary Supplement
About the Author Stephen Benatar was born in 1937 in Baker Street, London—and in the block of flats where H. G. Wells and Arnold Bennett once lived; one of these days there’ll have to be a third important plaque beside the other two! Benatar is married, with four children, but now openly gay and living with a male partner.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful. "When she was in certain moods, even Scrooge might have found it difficult to hold out long against Daisy." By Mary Whipple Sometimes described as "the best British writer that no one has ever heard of," Stephen Benatar, now in his mid-seventies, has been self-publishing and hand-selling his books for the past thirty years, despite his awards and prize nominations. He believes his sales are better than they were when he was published by mainstream publishers. The New York Review of Books has recently republished his 1981 novel, Wish Her Safe at Home, and When I Was Otherwise, Benatar's third novel, written in 1983, has also been republished in England this past spring by Capuchin Books. Benatar has always paid special attention to characters who are dealing with significant emotional stresses, and his novels are filled with psychological insights and feelings the reader understands, even as his mordant wit draws the characters to the edge, allowing the reader to watch them cross the line into darker and darker worlds of their own.When the novel opens, the police have found two women dead in a house they shared with a male family member in north London, one of the women having been dead for over a year. The three people mentioned are Dan Stormont, a seventy-six-year-old widower; his sister Marsha Poynton, age sixty, a divorcee with two sons who live far away; and Daisy Stormont, their sister-in-law, around whom all the action turns, the widow of Henry Stormont, Dan's brother. Daisy, a lively flirt with great appeal to men, at least in her early days, has kept her age secret for her entire life, and most women are convinced that she is at least fifteen years older than she says she is, which would put her in her eighties at the time of her death.The novel starts at the end and works its way backward, jumping back and forth among time frames as the background and the entire history of each character are laid bare. Often information about one character is conveyed by another, usually Daisy, from her own point of view, and Benatar is absolutely brilliant at writing dialogue which reveals character, attitudes, and information simultaneously. Daisy has a knack for saying the worst possible thing at the worst possible moment, while seeming to be ingenuous and innocent, and the reader quickly believes that no one could be so insensitive by accident. In short order Daisy alienates everyone, works her wiles on more than one man at a time, turns characters against each other, and causes some to question their own sanity, a problem that only increases when she moves in with Dan and Marsha in their run-down house in Hendon, outside of London.Page after page of vibrant dialogue initiated by Daisy reveals Marsha's marriage and divorce and her later relationships with her sons; Dan's marriage to Erika; and Daisy's own marriage, widowhood, and flirtations. The roles each takes within the threesome at the house, the resentments caused by Daisy and exploited by her, and the deliberate hurts she causes in order to get her own way are examined leading up to the demise of the two women. Because every reader will be able to imagine someone acting like Daisy (since she probably acts out the fantasies of many of the book's own readers), the book feels true to life, no matter how bizarre Daisy becomes. A casual wittiness to the scenes keeps the reader simultaneously amused and horrified by her behavior. Those who enjoy offbeat and darkly humorous novels will find this one a noir classic, the ending especially memorable. Mary Whipple
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