A brief review of this work appeared in The New York TimesMarch 21, 2021
'Considering literature’s value is a difficult task in that it asks one to quantify an aesthetic form that by its very nature thwarts measurement. This does not mean that literature is an ineffable phenomenon. The value of literature comes from its ability to foster a sense of communal belonging and provide a unique window into the lives of others. The imaginary worlds of novels in particular enable one to inhabit vast linguistic spheres that generate sensations beyond the everyday. Shirley Hazzard’s novel The Transit of Venus (1980) provides remarkable evidence of literature’s ability to conjure such worlds and experiences. Her technique of ‘prolepsis’ installs the future into the present in unpredictable ways, making The Transit of Venus a powerful example of how novels can transport readers beyond themselves and into imaginative spaces of deep reflection. This novel demands close analysis because it is a carefully crafted work of fiction that offers a rich, even painterly sense of the world. It is also a novel that at times adopts an aerial perspective that crosses both physical and disembodied realms – landscapes of the body and of the mind. As in life, the generosity of Hazzard’s writing is antithetical to naive or simplistic outcomes, as the subtlety of her prose invites both readerly speculation and contemplation. I argue that Hazzard’s novel is a deeply generous fiction that awakens in readers a profound sense of interiority as one is encouraged to ponder the many facets and dimensions of The Transit of Venus.' (Publication abstract)
'It’s a fact readily acknowledged that one can encounter some books simply too late in life to appreciate — or, in some cases, even tolerate — them. The famous examples include “The Catcher in the Rye,” most of the Beats, all of Anaïs Nin. But I’m more curious about the counterpoint: Those books said to require experience, and age, to unlock.' (Introduction)
'Alongside Shirley Hazzard’s largely European literary coordinates are also to be found traces of other more obscure figures, and of her persistent return to other sites and cultures. If the biographical narrative of her expatriatism arcs from Sydney to Manhattan via Naples and Capri, then Hiroshima, which she visited briefly in 1947 at age 16, and which reappears in her writing as a chronotope of post-nuclear modernity, is a trace of other possible expatriate trajectories. This essay examines this chronotope through and in light of Hazzard’s long-standing friendship with two US-born scholars of Japanese literature: Ivan Morris, one of the founders of US Amnesty International, and Donald Keene, a Japanese citizen resident in Tokyo until his death in 2019, and will examine the ways these friendships and the careers of these two fellow writers, both also expatriate for much of their lives, bore on Hazzard’s understanding of her own place in the world.' (Publication abstract)
