It is sometimes joked that the only thing Jonathan Franzen likes to do (apart from complaining) is Bird- watching. And so it isn’t particularly surprising that a huge portion of his latest novel, Freedom, which I’ve had the privilege to read recently, centers on “saving” the smallest North American songbird, the cerulean warbler from extinction—a species that isn’t exactly endangered.
Franzen hit fame with his third novel, The Corrections, which came out a week before 9/11 and which Oprah so graciously chose for her book club. Franzen didn’t attend her show, though, sparkling more controversies. The Corrections, paved the way for his transformation from, (as the Pulitzer winning critic Michiko Kakutani opines) “a sharp-elbowed, apocalyptic satirist focused on sending up the socio-economic-political plight of this country into a kind of 19th-century realist concerned with the public and private lives of his characters.” I’m sure Franzen would disagree with it. (He calls Kakutani, “an international embarrassment.”) But I do see some light (or limn) in her words.
Freedom came out in 2010, nine years after its predecessor, with huge hype. (Barrack Obama read it, apparently.) The books starts off with a section titled, “Good neighbors” which introduces us to the Berglunds through the eyes of their neighbors—some fascinated by them, some jealous, and some only finding them weird. The Berglunds consist of the passive aggressive Walter (“who is very nice”), his wife Patty and their two children Jessica and Joey. The Berglunds seem socially conscious and their behaviors do seem commendable—almost idealistic, at one point.
At the end of the section the cracks seem to surface (triggered by the teenage Joey’s sleeping with the slightly older next-door neighbor, Connie) and we slowly start to discern the reality of Franzen’s characters.
The second section is a 168 page unpublished autobiography (written in third person) by Patty, named “Mistakes Were Made” that she wrote at the recommendation of her therapist.
Franzen’s most enjoyable prose rests here. The wonderful old-fashionness that Rushdie claims he has is quite evident in these parts, along with his usual bag of interesting narrative tricks. Patty tells us about her childhood. How her teenage self was raped at a party. How she made friends with a girl named Eliza, who was bizarrely obsessed with her to the point of feigning to have cancer so that she can be with her. How she fell in love with a rock musician, Richard Katz and seemingly ignored his roommate, a young and charming law student named Walter Berglund. How she went out with Walter just to be close to Katz. How Katz rejected her, prompting her to run back to Walter, because she felt confused and didn’t know what to do, and felt that only Walter could truly care for her. How she became depressed with her life. How she kept wanting Richard Katz, even though Walter was an amazing husband, and was willing to do everything to make their relationship work.
Franzen can really write, if you know what I mean. At one point, Walter’s college roommate Richard Katz makes a remark to Walter regarding the “meaning” of his genitals. The exact comment was made by David Foster Wallace to Franzen. Katz, like Wallace, is also republican and at one point contemplates suicide, like Wallace, but doesn’t do it, unlike Wallace. Which brings out an honest and humane attitude of Franzen toward his friend. He didn’t want him to leave this world so early. At other times, Richard Katz feels like Franzen himself, being critically acclaimed and what not for two decades before suddenly attaining superstardom with a work that looked more confessional than representative.
Patty’s Autobiography is followed by another section entitled “2004” that rotates between Katz, Walter and Joey’s close third person accounts.
Walter, a man who is “greener than Greenpeace”, ends up joining an evil coal company. He’s life is further complicated with the arrival of his sexy Bengali assistant, Lalitha, who he so wants to do but cannot because he’s still very much in love with Patty. He’s dilemma of trying to save a bird in a way that he feels is right brings further chaos in his life.
Richard accomplishes the feeling of feeling the lowliest (He gets nominated for a Grammy award). He gets a job building decks and tries to (I mean, had plans to) help Walter by bringing awareness to his cause. He and Patty tries to keep the tension between them at check.
Joey, like his father, goes to work for a crook guy by shipping off junk as car parts for jeeps that’d be taken into Iraq. He understands what he does and continues only so that he can repay the loan he took from Connie, who is now he’s wife.
The part where Joey accidently swallows his wedding ring and then tries retrieving it by going through his s***, while a woman who is not his wife knocks on the bathroom door impatiently is one of the most heartfelt parts of Freedom. It shows Joey’s affection and care for Connie even though he’s very well cheating with her.
We are then fed to an addendum to Patty’s Autobiography. We are led to believe that the “reader” she’s referring to this time is Walter only. (They had separated by this time). Patty goes back to her family to attend to her father who might be dying any day and contemplates her life thoroughly. She comes to the conclusion (she doesn’t; her thoughts and reflections leave the reader to come to the conclusion) that she does love Walter. That she does need him.
The last section (“Canterbridge Estates Lake”) of the book flash-forwards to six years, giving us a glimpse at the Berglunds, now in 2010, (again) through their neighbors. Walter lives alone now in this new neighborhood, and most of the neighbors find him weird and annoying, because of his excessive talks on how to save birds from being murdered by the pet felines they keep. There might or might not be a reunion between Patty and Walter, Joey is happy with his wife Connie, Jessica’s in New York, dating some guy that Patty disapproves off but shows her support anyway and Katz has grown old and dabbles in “scoring projects”.
Franzen’s novel is: marveling, radiant (I won’t use “stupendous” because I’m not Philip Hensher), unforgettable and most of all “American”. He throws his characters into a well of freedom and lets us watch how they will climb out of it; he wants us to see how they will “compete” while doing so.
Upon completion it seems like (as David Foster Wallace once made one of his characters wish) as if Franzen stabbed us in the heart, only to inject morphine.