Stunning debut
Peter Levi
The Wolf Max Davidson (Quartet £7.95) This first novel is a stunning success. One
1 is not sure at first whether one likeAs ti any of the people. 'Paul lay in the bath an' sipped a whisky and soda. He cast an nci critical eye over his unremarkable bodY art became thoughtful.' Not a bad oPeni:11,,,,g; but no better than not bad. This 01'; warms slowly to his work. But I have; seldom crowed aloud with laughter, °tie any first book as I have done over this' ah is almost a second William Cooper, th°t14 not as economic, not so much a master - all the techniques. He uses too manY w°rd,est and his best successes are the great et pieces. His avant-garde theatre is ullWr1;;ci table, and the straight talk of the liberated man, after many chapters of ti
women, make a very strong comic iln13,,t. sion. And the wedding itself, tottering "w ween realism and farce, nicely conveYsti,°,,,r, closely reality and farce can come tog ion The subject is the sentimental educt.°,t1"
of a young solicitor, his worries, his c1 in affections, his intolerable girl friend, hisit.; trigues and his marriage. In a necess:ao.e epilogue we are reassured that them ,a1Lja:Ss did not last very long. The highminne',a. of the Women's Liberation talk is;(11 describable, or was so until Max Da.,ius:c. described it. He writes with wickeu "vin curacy about what I think must be his so generation. Sometimes the accuracy s'step uncanny that I wondered if he was ITIY pll daughter writing under a pseudonYtn' to amusing books about growing UP Irv:e if- have a rather null, almost priggisl"); heat obsessed hero, who takes on light an":‘,0 as time passes. All really funny books a 'abet- sex
have to stress the ironic contrasts id
ween high-minded words and absitio events. The combination of these two elements makes this book slow to begin'
as it goes to work, it works well ,,, have
The only reservation a reader !nig"' -‘,0,0 about it is what the hero feels at his fun- wedding reception. 'Middle-class an"of loving himself, he disliked the sPectacie-le oneselfthe middle b y classk eep keeping gp one's e s . One ey emnuos it:,07,itoh characters, but on the writer, on 1115 nie and considerable glee. I see with srii°11st alarm that he is a civil servant. rte ":,t it concentrate on his prose style, svtliov, down, refine it, prune it, study Che",,to- keep notes. It is a long time since s° new pected a kind of talent appeared. F' just sort of humour always turns out to be Je it what we needed, but one can neve!,.,eand coming. Max Davidson is admiram t quite needed mocking.oveickioinug.s about a lot a b things q
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