Is it possible to be extremely disturbed by something you've just read, so disturbed that you feel sort of nasty and a little dirty, and when you turn the last pages and close the book all you want to do is go and take a shower. Yet at the same time you appreciate the story the author was telling and how she managed to get there? And she elicited all these feelings in less than 150 pages. That's pretty much how I feel about Joyce Carol Oates's Beasts, a very aptly titled book considering the type of characters the story is peopled with.
Probably this story could have happened at any time in recent history, but it fit in well with the reckless abandon of the mid-1970s. The story begins, however, with Gillian Brauer in Paris some thirty years later coming across a primitive wooden totem figure of a female with her child in the Louvre. And Gillian thinks, "so it wasn't burned after all..." drawing the reader right away into the story and making us wonder what fire? And Gillian tells us this is not a confession, as she has nothing to confess. There's no turning back now, as Gillian tells us her story.
I'm coming to discover that Joyce Carol Oates's work has a dreamlike (or nightmarish) quality to it, and you're never really sure whether any of it's real. The story takes place over the course of several months in 1975 and into the new year of 1976. Set in a small college in New England, Gillian, like most of her peers is captivated by Andre Harrow, an English professor who's a 1960s anti-establishment holdover. Talented but shy Gillian has one of the few coveted spots in Andre's poetry seminar. He's intelligent, and sensual and a little decadent, and his students lust after him. It's not just Andre, but also his wife, Dorcas, a sculptress of primal totems that Gillian secretly obsesses over. They are a very bohemian couple in this little town, so they have a sort of cachet with the students. It's assumed that Andre and Dorcas occasionally will take a student under their wings, but it's never discussed amongst the women. If you're lucky enough to be chosen to be mentored or serve as an intern to Dorcas, you don't share your experiences with the others, as if it's bad luck to tell.
Why is it that it's often the people in power that you're meant to trust who are the people most likely to take advantage of you? It doesn't take long to see how manipulative Andre is. He asks his students to keep journals with their most private thoughts, experiences, and fantasies in them. Only when they "go for the jugular" will they be able to write anything of significance. And when the reader sees the sort of lascivious pleasure Andre takes in this task without regard to the student's well being, you know that something is seriously wrong at this small New England College. Gillian will find herself in the middle of it all, and what's so disconcerting she almost seems a willing accomplice or a willing victim.
Beasts is a disturbing tale but a riveting read nonetheless. It's a story that would be great to read in a group. I know I still have questions about the story. I think I'd like to read We Were the Mulvaneys as my next Joyce Carol Oates novel (though not right away). I'm wondering if it is a little more 'mainstream' and hopefully less distressing? Beasts is my second R.I.P. Challenge book (The Ivy Tree was my first--two down and two to go). Now I am trying to decide between We Have Always Lived in the Castle (which I am sure will be good) and The Law and the Lady (which I'm sure will also be good, plus it comes with Victorian goodness!). Decisions, decisions.