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As I write, impassioned protests in Kenosha and elsewhere attest to the anguish experienced by many Americans at the racialized violence meted out to African Americans. The incomprehensible shooting in the back of Jacob Blake, father of three, by a white police officer is the latest in a string of recent shootings and assaults. Shocking levels of violence by whites against black Americans is in fact a recurring theme in U.S. history.

One of the first significant protest works to explore racism, oppression and violence against black Americans is Richard Wright’s 1940 novel, Native Son. Wright was a black American who fled the Jim Crow south (Mississippi) to inhabit what must have seemed a new form of prison on the South Side of Chicago in the 1930s. He interrogates the racist practices of his society from the standpoint of its victims. Never before had such a threatening, dangerous character as Bigger Thomas been selected as the central consciousness who will lead the reader through a lengthy novel. The three parts – Fear, Flight and Fate – reveal in economic terms the stark nature of the predicament and the powerful response of the main character.

Major critic Irving Howe summed up the novel’s significance by claiming it changed American culture forever. Howe stated that Wright’s work had made impossible a repetition of the old lies, and brought into the open the hatred, fear and violence that have crippled the culture. The Modern Library’s list of the best 100 novels ranked Native Son as No. 20. As a formidable, path-breaking protest novel, though, it is easier to value it as an important social event and provocative exploration of the vexing problems of race relations in America than it is perhaps to endorse its brilliance and greatness as a work of art.

Never before had such a threatening, dangerous character as Bigger Thomas been selected as the central consciousness who will lead the reader through a lengthy novel.In this Black Lives Matter era, this novel provides readers an unrelenting look at the violence that the forces of law unleash on the black characters who emerge from their one-room apartments and do life in conditions little better than those faced by actual prisoners. The opening chapter is a perfectly executed description of the stunted lives of Bigger, his mother and his two siblings, under the pressure of hunger and despair. It is twenty year-old-Bigger, badgered by his mother to find employment or lose welfare benefits, whose toughness and tenacity is needed to once again battle a huge black rat menacing the Thomas family. The author gives a vivid and authentic account of the desperate struggles in which his protagonist and others in the black community of Chicago’s South Side must engage.

Bigger is encouraged to take employment with a wealthy, privileged white family: the Daltons. His crossing the color line creates in him a palpable sense of dread at the prospect of saying or doing the wrong thing. While escorting home the daughter, Mary, after she had a night of heavy drinking, tragic circumstances result in her accidental death at his hands. A sequence of cascading actions leads Bigger to commit crimes and attempt various deceptions to escape capture.

The most remarkable scenes in the novel depict the harsh circumstances of the black community and the links with the dominant class – whites like Mr. Dalton. We learn Mr. Dalton is more than an impeccable liberal who donates to worthy charitable causes. He is also a slum landlord who enforces segregated hosing through restrictive covenants and who owns the apartment complex Bigger’s family lives in. Further, Dalton charges the vulnerable tenants seemingly unconscionable rent.

Dalton is one of several characters we meet in the third part of the novel – the trial of Bigger for two murders as well as the presumed rape of Mary. Bigger’s counsel, Max, effectively draws out the predatory nature of Dalton’s commitment to market fundamentalism in cross-examination. Dalton purports to be compelled by some iron law of capitalism to charge his stiff rents. The testimony of other witnesses contributes to the portrait of economic injustice and staggering levels of racial discrimination.

One of the first significant protest works to explore racism, oppression and violence against black Americans is Richard Wright’s 1940 novel, Native Son. Max is an elderly Jewish counsel with the Communist-backed Independent Labor Office who takes on Bigger’s apparently hopeless defence pro bono. He appears to me to have employed a rather risky strategy. Many of the submissions in closing argument at trial appear to underpin a radical political critique of the type of society that would create the accused. The submissions do not seem particularly well judged as an attempt to engage the judge’s sympathies (noting he is most unlikely to share the radical views of counsel). However, the efforts of Bigger’s lawyer do link to central themes emerging from the events that have led to the crimes in question. Max’s description of Bigger’s unfortunate life assists in the realization that this young man’s life was, in one sense, a crime waiting to happen. The accused is less someone whose fate is to be determined based on an individualized assessment than he is a symbol. Precisely what is he a symbol of? Perhaps of the depths with which American society can force a black youth – denied a proper education and any opportunity for hope – to descend to.

The novel also offers some engaging arguments for and against the use of the death penalty and incorporates references to other leading trials of the era. Wright makes good use of the shocking trials know as the Scottsboro trials (1931-37). In those cases, the state of Alabama was determined to prosecute nine young black men for the rape of two white girls aboard the top of a freight train, no matter how many miscarriages of justice the state had to keep committing to succeed. In the case of Bigger Thomas, Wright has attempted to depict a very different scenario. His protagonist becomes a figure who can stand as the logical counter to the immoral violence of 1930s law as it applied to black Americans.

I conclude that Native Son is indeed a must-read. I do remain ambivalent about a few of the artistic choices Wright made, the most controversial being telling the tale through the consciousness of such a thoroughly unpleasant and violent character as Bigger. (One should remember as well that this was his first novel.) Some readers will not buy into Bigger being the symbol who brings together the various strands of the author’s radical critique. However, no reader will fault Wright’s courageous attempt at an autopsy of an unhealthy and divided society.

I have always intended to work my way through all three volumes of Dos Passos’ U.S.A. trilogy, published between 1930 and 1936 and clocking in at 1,300 pages. During today’s strange pandemic times, I have taken advantage of the opportunity to do so. And I can tell you that, while at times it was a steep climb and rocky road, I have reached the final ascent. It is truly a unique trio of novels. U.S.A. is a demanding modernist masterpiece which dispenses with any notion of a conventional plot. Instead, it operates by way of a pattern that illustrates the deepest impulses of the American experience over the first three decades of the twentieth century. It ends with the series of hammer blows that announce the onset of the Great Depression.

1919 is also the year that the worldwide pandemic known as the Spanish flu hit its peak.Dos Passos employs a truly revolutionary prose style and juxtaposes four distinct types of writing in the narrative. These styles serve to operate in a conveyor belt manner to capture the onrush of the new technologically-advanced society that comes into being in these pivotal years. First, the reader must attempt to grasp and make sense of Newsreel sections. These exemplify the rapidly changing circumstances that his generally hapless characters must attempt to adapt to despite the disadvantages of their circumstances – they are not part of the class of wealth and power that will dominate. This is followed by the brilliant short Biographies of key individuals who stand for either the best, or the worst, of the era. We are then funnelled toward the fictional narrative of the novel. We follow the lives and the temptations and challenges that threaten to sweep away 12 different characters living in various parts of the nation (from one end of the 42^nd parallel to the other, as it were). The fourth, very different prose style is the “Camera Eye”, which employs impressionistic – and at times poetic accounts – of the world that the diverse characters experience. The subjective viewpoint is Dos Passos’ – one of frequently acute observations of the situations in a much richer prose style than the flat, purposeful and naturalistic style used to describe the fictional characters.

The three novels making up the trilogy are: The 42^nd Parallel, 1919, and The Big Money. I will focus primarily on the middle volume, 1919. In The Guardian’s survey of the 100 best novels, critic Robert McCrum lists 1919 as the outstanding volume of U.S.A. and number 58 on his (necessarily subjective) list.

1919 introduces us to several characters who in one way or another are deeply affected by President Wilson’s decision in 1917 to enter the war. This declaration contradicted his election pledge to keep the country out of the murderous conflict. We encounter supporters of the democratic socialist leader, Eugene Debs, who leads a party dedicated to keeping working men free of the sacrifices incumbent on participation in warfare. Dos Passos gives Debs pride of place in the trilogy by making him the very first biographical subject – “Lover of Mankind”. The sketch ends with Deb’s stirring words at his trial for defending the right of fellow socialists to protest against the war: “While there is a lower class I am of it, while there is a criminal class I am of it, while there is a soul in prison I am not free.”

Dos Passos employs a truly revolutionary prose style and juxtaposes four distinct types of writing in the narrative.In 1919, we witness one character’s initiation into the dangerous world of labour activism. Ben Compton is an idealistic Jewish student who overcomes his timidity. When confronted with the desperate conditions of workers, he finds his calling as a brilliant speaker, condemning the injustices of predatory capitalism. Like Debs, though, Ben cannot escape the punitive spirit of the Wilson administration. He claims to be a conscientious objector but is rejected with disdain. All that stands between Ben and a lengthy prison term is his friend, the radical lawyer and defender of civil liberties of the most vulnerable, Morris Stein. Ben will become yet another lonely rebel in the course of the narrative, his dream of studying for the law under Stein shattered by the effects of wartime fervour.

1919 is also the year that the worldwide pandemic known as the Spanish flu hit its peak. One of the humanitarian doctors who toil in relative anonymity and for little reward is Doc French. His exhausting schedule will cost him dearly. In the final volume of the trilogy, Doc French’s daughter Mary will take the torch from her father and become another of the tale’s fighters for social justice. Mary will emerge as the novel’s most sympathetic character. She will find her way to Chicago to work at the legendary Hull House, caring for vulnerable down and outers.

U.S.A. possesses wide scope and is a unique combination of tragedy (best captured in some of the most brilliant of the Biographies) and satire (the fictional stories juxtaposed with the other elements). Dos Passos ties it together with his commitment to his personal conception of the history of his country through the first three decades of the twentieth century. The second Biography perhaps best captures the sense of tragic loss and missed chances for the country. It is of Randolph Bourne, the radical thinker, musician and educational theorist. He was the leading spokesman for the youthful members of the Progressive movement that had such high hopes for the building of a humane society in the years immediately prior to the war.

1919 introduces us to several characters who in one way or another are deeply affected by President Wilson’s decision in 1917 to enter the war.Bourne overcame gigantic handicaps in his short life – he was deformed at birth by misused forceps and later developed tuberculosis of the spine. His articles were incendiary in their day. “The Handicapped – by One of Them” is now considered a foundational work in disability studies. The article that surely inspired Dos Passos while composing 1919 is“War is the Health of the State.” Bourne was prophetic in fearing the build-up of a large military, and indeed the military industrial complex has developed into a monster that has dominated decision-making in Washington over many decades. Dos Passos, in a prose poem, refers to Bourne as a “little sparrow like man” who nonetheless overcomes his constant pain to put a pebble in his sling and achieve a direct hit on Goliath through his brilliant writing.

Bourne was another socialist who was harried and followed by the secret service in his last year before succumbing to the Spanish Flu. At his end, he was saddened by the repressive practices of the Wilson administration. We are told in the novel though that this prophet-without-honour retained his capacity for joy to the end. Although suffering with pneumonia, a friend brought him an eggnog and he kept exclaiming: “Look at the yellow, it’s beautiful.”

The author imagines Bourne in 1919 to be hopping along the old brick and brownstone streets of New York, a ghost in his famous black cape. For me, Randolph Bourne’s ghost echoes through the pages of the trilogy. It constitutes a prophetic warning and vision of an organic community based on humane values that are distinctly lacking in the fragmented and mechanical world of this haunted novel.

While 1919 is a novel that certainly conveys the pessimistic worldview of the author, nonetheless there is a certain nobility in defeat that merits our attention. The diligent reader who reaches the end of the novel will encounter the brilliant prose poem “the Body of an American”. That final section doesn’t evince faith in the ability of Dos Passos’ characters to avert disaster, but it is a fighting faith in the power of art to strike a meaningful chord.

I recently read Peter Brook’s book Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris: The Story of a Friendship, a Novel and a Terrible Year. The book provides a fascinating account of the composition and the literary and wider political history of Gustave Flaubert’s 1869 novel Sentimental Education. Brook’s book led me to return to Flaubert’s difficult literary classic at least 30 years after first reading it. This time, I inevitably focussed on different aspects of the work and was rewarded with a rich experience. One should of course turn to Brooks’ intriguing account only after reading Sentimental Education itself.

For me, a minor character, Dussardier, offers one of the few glimmers of hope for a somewhat brighter future.The novel focusses on a rather hapless, albeit somewhat sympathetic, protagonist, Frederic Moreau. Frederic tries and tries but fails in fulfilling his various dreams. He fails because he is too passive at critical moments and really lacks the resolute character that would be required to find genuine success and happiness. The setting is shortly before and during the revolutionary events of 1848 in and around Paris, France. The novel wraps up with a long denouement covering the next two decades.

I want to sketch out a few key themes that struck me and convinced me of the great significance the novel possesses for us today.

Much of the novel focusses on Frederic’s relationships, particularly his romantic entanglements. The great love of his life is a married woman, Madame Arnoux. His love for her is unrequited, at least in any meaningful sense. Throughout his relentless pursuit of Madame Arnoux, he has a succession of mistresses. Running parallel to the plot of Frederic’s romantic affairs are important political and social aspirations, held by many of his friends and acquaintances.

The novel is a full-bodied account of a generation, as it aims to significantly reform the France of the Second Republic in the years leading up to the 1848 revolution. Flaubert skillfully develops the theme of failure in relationships with the theme of failure of a generation to achieve its political and social goals. At the end, all seems to be for naught. Society is resistant to the well-meaning efforts of socialists and liberals to bring about a properly functioning democracy. And indeed, by novel’s end, the conservative forces of reaction and repression command the field.

At various points in the novel, Frederic’s friends attend meetings and clubs, such as the Club de I’Intelligence in Rue Saint-Jacques. Vigorous debates on the best way to advance a radical change in the declining France of the day take place. Worker’s rights, an enhanced role for women and the end of the death penalty are all proclaimed as necessary for the building of the good and just society. One persistent goal is that of universal suffrage. A country built on the goal of equality – and the removal of all previous efforts at disenfranchisement and exclusion – is at the heart of a modern democracy. While a worthy goal, Flaubert is attentive to the various ways in which divisions can materialize in society – both between left and right, and within a progressive movement of liberals, anarchists and socialists.

The novel is a full-bodied account of a generation, as it aims to significantly reform the France of the Second Republic in the years leading up to the 1848 revolution.We can focus though on Frederic’s relations with two different friends: Charles Deslauriers and Dussardier.

Deslauriers is Frederic’s law classmate, close friend and sometimes foe. Both have come to Paris to study law with a goal of making a name for themselves in a highly competitive world, whether in the fields of law, politics or art. But the training the two friends have received equips them to develop a series of well-considered positions on the right to vote and its role in forging a democratic society.

Neither of the two friends proves to have all that impressive a career in the law. However, they are afforded the opportunity to pronounce on the ways in which reformers can use the law to advance a progressive agenda. In thinking through the indispensable aspects of modern liberal democracies, it is important to bear in mind that the right to vote, as conceived in contemporary Canadian legal circles, involves far more than the bare ability of each person to cast a vote every 4 years or so. Our Supreme Court of Canada has affirmed that denying a person a meaningful right to vote detracts from their dignity and sense of self-worth. The right protects the ability of each citizen to play a meaningful role in the electoral process. It further includes the idea that all citizens should have a voice in the deliberations of government and have the opportunity to bring their concerns to their governmental representative. These potentially radical democratic ideas help the reader appreciate the efforts of the characters in Sentimental Education to achieve a wider suffrage in their society.

Despite their eloquence and their relatively privileged position in society, Frederic and Charles, in their separate ways, both largely fail to put forth a convincing vision of the inclusive nation they wish to construct. Frederic, in keeping with his irresolute character, is easily defeated and disillusioned by his attempts to gain an audience. This is marvellously captured in a scene in Part Three. At the Club de I’Intelligence, his radical friend Dussardier sponsors Frederic to give a major presentation. Frederic attempts to present again and again. A harsh and puritanical chairperson, who considers Frederic lacking in “man of the people “credentials (too much the bourgeoisie), first shuts him down. Frederic makes one last effort to give his carefully rehearsed speech but is surprised when a young Spaniard jumps up, rolls his eyes and energetically offers a speech in Spanish. Frederic’s efforts to interject lead the dictatorial chair to rule him out of order. Frederic leaves the Club in total dejection. Rather than considering how best to advance his position, he takes a meagre comfort by dining with his mistress and largely retreats from the playing field.

Running parallel to the plot of Frederic’s romantic affairs are important political and social aspirations, held by many of his friends and acquaintances.Flaubert leaves the reader with a pessimistic reflection on the immense difficulties of making progress in a world lacking in any genuine sense of fraternity and vulnerable to counter-attack. However, we cannot leave it there if we continue to have faith. For me, a minor character, Dussardier, offers one of the few glimmers of hope for a somewhat brighter future. Frederic encounters this shop assistant and deliveryman at various points. Early in the tale, Frederic and other law students see an uprising in the streets (the first stirrings of what will become a full-blown revolution). A policeman strikes a heavy blow at a young child, sending him sprawling. Dussardier defends the lad and knocks the officer to the ground. He is arrested. Dussardier is described as a “sort of Hercules, whose hair, like a bundle of hemp, spilled out from under an oilcloth cap”. Frederic and Charles assist Dussardier and encourage him to join a loose alliance of progressive figures who hope to make a difference.

I will leave other scenes of note for the reader to discover in the vivid and exacting realist style that Flaubert offers. (The new translation by Helen Constantine in the Oxford World’s Classics edition is lively and scrupulously accurate.)

As 2020 shapes up to be a time when autocrats grow stronger and the modern democratic model appears wobblier than ever, Flaubert’s overriding pessimism may become a common sentiment. Yet we need radical democrats as well. While their voices are in danger of being drowned out by noisy reactionary figures, they remain our last and brightest hope. Perhaps Dussardier’s efforts may not have been in vain after all.

In 1977, Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac sang “Gold Dust Woman, … take your sliver spoon , dig your grave.” A mere two years later, Margaret Thatcher was elected prime minister of Britain. She declared there is no such thing as society, and progressive politics based on democratic socialism must be defeated at every turn. Shortly thereafter, Ronald Reagan, a huge fan of the scriptwriter-turned-novelist Ayn Rand, became President in the biggest performance of his acting career. Although the Reagan Revolution entailed a war on drugs, the use of illicit drugs such as cocaine skyrocketed in the decade whose catchphrase was “greed is good.” However, it is my contention that Reagan and his circle didn’t need cocaine – they had the writings of the cult novelist Ayn Rand to offer a high every bit as exhilarating and potentially lethal (for their society).

The message that clangs through loud and clear is that any attempt to regulate the lives of men and business interests is simply an impediment to freedom.Indeed, the legions of Rand fans must be inhaling some mysterious essence to continue propelling her novels The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged to the top of the “most influential novels of all-time” charts. Sadly, in my view, such crude political (and legal) romances – which from start to finish extoll a ‘survival of the fittest’ mentality – have had a truly dangerous influence. This influence stretches beyond the attitudes of many readers to undoubtedly the practical philosophies of an astonishingly large number of powerful men and women in the worlds of politics and business.

After reading an excellent work of cultural criticism, I have gone back to struggling to work through the 1946 novel, The Fountainhead, with its uber-macho hero, architect Howard Roark. Before analyzing the role that the law and the wider legal system plays in Rand’s novels, I want to first explore the massive influence a mere cult novelist has been able to exert. This is so even though her writing skills are mediocre at best. Nonetheless Rand injects directly into the bloodstream of readers a cascading, super-charged plot, and populates her novels with isolated, elitist protagonists. These apparently afford those under her spell the ultimate dopamine hit. Although said to be novels of idea, it is really their appeal below the surface of rational argument that one must dissect in order to make sense of the Rand phenomenon.

I want to focus on political developments in two of the major nations in the Anglophone world, the U.S. and Britain, and the significant role of Rand’s novels in understanding the worldview of the Donald Trump and Boris Johnson teams.

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Trump is no great reader but he has gone out of his way to praise The Fountainhead and to express his admiration for its ability to “relate to everything.” Rex Tillerson (fantastically wealthy oil executive turned Secretary of State) and Mike Pompeo (Tillerson’s replacement after he joined the lineup of those ejected from the Trump Team’s Tilt-A-Whirl ride) are huge Rand fans. Further, when we examine the type of judges that Trump will appoint in droves to the various courts, right up to the Supreme Court, we can look no further than Clarence Thomas. Thomas has sat on the Court for 18 years and has done much to mould America’s understanding of the Constitution as a document that assists the wealthy and powerful. Thomas each year reportedly requires that all of his law clerks watch the film version of The Fountainhead as a primer on the ideal approach to matters of law and morality. He is one of many justices who marry a fanatical commitment to neoconservative social views with market fundamentalism. He has ruled, for instance, that regulation of child labour is beyond Congressional oversight and is better left to the market. Under his theory of the Constitution, civil rights laws banning whites-only lunch counters would also be invalid. Further, he is a strong advocate of interpreting free speech as trumping any attempt to limit campaign spending during elections (see Citizens United, the 2010 decision of the Supreme Court).

Turning our gaze across the Atlantic to Britain, we find another nation that has embraced a corporatist neo-liberal agenda more aggressively than the majority of democratic nations since the onset of the Thatcher Revolution of the 1980s. This month sees the winning of power by a confirmed Thatcherite, Boris Johnson. As with his good friend Trump, so too we note in the Johnson cabinet a number of confirmed Randians who give every indication of wishing to pursue an astonishing anti-egalitarian agenda. Johnson himself is fresh off the recent prorogation debacle. The High Court dealt a mortal blow to his attempt to prevent other members of Parliament in the House of Commons from weighing in on the merits or otherwise of his Brexit arrangements by peremptorily shutting down the institution. It ruled that he had violated constitutional norms as there was no reason offered and certainly no valid reason for his autocratic move. The High Court ruled the prorogation to be completely illegal.

Trump is no great reader but he has gone out of his way to praise The Fountainhead and to express his admiration for its ability to “relate to everything.”Johnson’s cabinet will feature several individuals who favour a dog-eat-dog ethos. One such individual is Priti Patel, a lobbyist for Big Tobacco who was recently Home Secretary and who repeatedly calls for extreme punishment for criminals, ignoring the value of rehabilitation of offenders. Further, she contributed to the Tory pamphlet, Britannia Unchained, which denigrates British workers as “amongst the worst idlers of the world.” There is also Sajid Javid, most recently the Chancellor in the Theresa May government. He is an unabashed advocate of a “greed is good” economics philosophy and specifically seeks to channel the character Howard Roark to spur his vaunting ambitions. With hard-faced men and women with these attitudes dominating the new government, perhaps we will see a return to Dickensian levels of inequality, with fewer and fewer supports for the most vulnerable.

Reading The Fountainhead now is a rather jaw-dropping experience. For a novel that has inspired countless leaders in politics, law and business, it is rather, well, appalling. A romance – very much of the love then hate then lust variety – sees the tempestuous Dominique Francon fall for the strong and silent “lone rider” Howard Roark, once she has submitted to him. By submission, I mean a literal rape. The language gets to the point with remarkable candour: “He did it as an act of scorn. Not as love, but as defilement. … One gesture of tenderness from him – and she would have remained cold.” Rand goes on to describe the violent intercourse as the act of a master taking shameful, contemptuous possession.

The villain of the novel, Ellsworth Toohey, is a complete caricature of the committed socialist thinker who believes the state can better the lives of citizens through social welfare initiatives. But of course, the journalist and architecture critic is not committed to genuine socialist ideals. Rather, he uses these as a cover for his insatiable quest for more and more power. The message that clangs through loud and clear is that any attempt to regulate the lives of men and business interests is simply an impediment to freedom. Somehow the free exchange of services through contract is all that is magically needed to solve all problems. Those needing assistance from the state are mere ‘second-raters’ whose whining is best ignored and whose envy threatens the ability of towering geniuses like Roark to build their bold, visionary works.

For a novel that has inspired countless leaders in politics, law and business, it is rather, well, appalling.A ludicrous trial sees the prosecutor and Roark – naturally representing himself, and naturally disdaining any need to speak with civility and consideration to the jurors – face off with long, didactic philosophical speeches. In the fantasy world of The Fountainhead, it is hardly surprising that Roark gained an acquittal from a star-struck jury. He does so through sheer willpower and an indefatigable belief in the innate superiority of himself and the few other geniuses who are the sole contributors to the good of society. It becomes irrelevant that he placed many lives in danger by dynamiting a large public housing project merely because certain modifications were made that, in his Olympian view, detracted from the original vision. What a man of Roark’s stature wants, Roark is clearly entitled to.

As we watch the remaining period of Trump’s time in office – and as he continues to display disdain for the impeachment process and otherwise runs roughshod over the Rule of Law – we  can reflect on the concluding scene of The Fountainhead. Roark is handed a commission to design a massive skyscraper that will be an enduring monument to greatness (and to his towering ego). We read of Dominique, his ever-admiring wife, riding the elevator up, up and away. The novel ends with the two egotists towering high above the rest of the city. Trump and his entourage will no doubt continue to enjoy the “high” of contemplating that boastful conclusion and see Trump as the Howard Roark of our time. His only challenger is on the other side of the pond, as Boris Johnson and his wrecking crew prepare to mould Britain to their will.

Albert Camus’ early masterpiece The Stranger, published in 1942, is an enigmatic fable that has entranced generations of readers. One such reader, the Algerian journalist Kamel Daoud, has expressed his admiration for Camus’ writings. Despite his appreciation, he also poses serious questions about a glaring omission in The Stranger.

The central act in the novel is the shooting of a man on a beach outside the city of Oran. The protagonist and narrator, Meursault, describes his rather confusing and hard-to fathom actions leading to the firing of five shots in the middle of the afternoon. These shots kill a man. But almost all we learn about the victim springs from the clipped confession of Meursault: “I killed an Arab.” Throughout the novel, the victim remains nameless. Instead, the focus is on Meursault, including his having earlier reacted with seeming indifference to news of his mother’s recent death.

… Daoud reveals the ways in which Camus’ work can be woven into a depiction of today’s Algeria.The famous trial imagined by Camus is a striking example of the absurdity inherent in the society of his time – French Algerian society twenty years or so before its demise through a revolutionary insurrection by the indigenous Algerian population. Symbolic of the hypocrisy of the legal system is the manner in which the trial unfolds. Meursault is found to be guilty far more on the basis of his lack of proper manners and his unwillingness to cry at his mother’s recent funeral.

In his first (and beautifully written) novel, The Meursault Investigation, Daoud gives us another take entirely on the trial. The nameless narrator of the novel offers up a detailed depiction of the victim’s life and restores his dignity by giving him a proper identity. Indeed, we might speak of the novel as a remarkable victim impact statement.

The first part of The Meursault Investigation irrefutably challenges the notion that Meursault provided a thorough and definitive version of the key events. The very fact that Meursault has so little to say about the man who has been shot – and appears to lack much in the way of curiosity or concern – means that he did not provide a fair and balanced account of the crime. The man with the capital “A” for Arab was shot presumably after he menaced a visiting French shipping clerk. In Camus’ novel, he remains a type – with a murky and unknowable life that leaves him deprived of the qualities that would render him a proper citizen and fully embodied individual. Daoud becomes an effective advocate, challenging assumptions readers of the earlier novel were likely to have made.

Daoud’s Algerian narrator reveals that he has obsessively returned to the famous trial and shreds Meursault’s “official” account. He takes us back to that long-ago summer day on a deserted beach. He states:

The Arab is killed because the murderer thinks he wants to avenge the prostitute, or maybe because he has the insolence to take a siesta. You find my summary … unsettling, eh? But it’s the naked truth. All the rest is nothing but embellishments…. Afterward, nobody bothers about the Arab, his family, or his people.

This novel is essential reading, but any reader must not be misled by the tenor of the opening chapters. One review, quoted on the dustjacket, suggests that Daoud’s novel stands as a rebuke to Camus. Later chapters broaden the scope of the work, so it is far more than an extended commentary on the earlier novel. Rather, it reveals that the death of Musa commences an unfortunate sequence of events for the narrator and his mother. Vital comparisons can be made between the role of the mothers in the two novels and the theme of separation and alienation, in families and in the wider society.

Further, the narrator in Daoud’s novel recounts the way in which he is drawn to commit his own crime and is later judged by Algerian authorities for something other than the act itself. We come to perceive that, in significant ways, Meursault gradually is understood to be a dark double of Daoud’s narrator.

One of the ways in which this happens is through a revelation in the new, independent but constricted society of Algeria post liberation. Religious authorities operating under a fundamentalist worldview do what they can to force our narrator to conform to the prevailing, conservative worldview. He rebels but pays a steep price for doing so. This naturally harkens back to the dialogue between Meursault and the priest, who urges him to confess his sins and somehow make peace with the Christian God that he does not believe in. He too refuses to act in an insincere manner and is further viewed as an unredeemable outcast.

The first part of The Meursault Investigation irrefutably challenges the notion that Meursault provided a thorough and definitive version of the key events.The Meursault Investigation shines as a profound contemplation of some of the paradoxes and uncertainties associated with the pursuit of justice. It is much more than a straightforward postcolonial condemnation of the shortcomings of the “colonial writer” Camus and the parochial approach that he might possibly be accused of in his treatment of colonial non-citizens in his work. Instead, Daoud reveals the ways in which Camus’ work can be woven into a depiction of today’s Algeria. The various ways in which Camus fought with his pen for the importance of liberty in all its manifestations – freedom of thought and of association, freedom to rebel against injustice, economic liberties for all citizens – continue to be relevant in the 21^st century, just as they were at the dawn of the Cold War and the anti-colonial struggles.

Daoud is a journalist and now novelist of rare courage. He continues to report on Algerian affairs even in the face of a fatwa declared against him for daring to speak truth to power. I recommend that any reader search out interviews with the author to learn more about his diagnosis of the ills of the current era but also for his ongoing bond with the land of his birth.

John MacLachlan Gray is a celebrated playwright who penned the immortal masterpiece Billy Bishop Goes to War. Having not seen any new plays from Gray for many years, I had wondered whatever had become of him. Not to worry. It turns out that in recent years he has reinvented himself as a mystery novelist. His latest work is The White Angel, a novel to be embraced by lovers of both suspense and literary fiction.

In this novel, Gray offers us a panoramic look at Vancouver circa 1924, when the city is at least momentarily distracted from celebrations of the British Empire in favour of the exciting investigation into the hard-to-fathom death of a Scottish nanny. The official investigation concludes that the young woman committed suicide. This narrative unravels quickly though, as the police force proves incapable of backing up its elaborate but rather clumsy theories. Quick to reach the conclusion that murder, not suicide, was the likely cause of death, is our engaging protagonist: the poet turned sensationalist journalist Ed McCurdy. As McCurdy digs deeper, the authorities reluctantly designate the death as a murder.

Gray has drawn significantly on one of Vancouver’s most famous cold cases – the mysterious death of Scottish nanny Janet Smith. And during a key moment in the city’s evolution. World War I had ended a mere half dozen years earlier, and the British Empire was apparently still very much a united cultural entity.

I was in Vancouver recently and found it interesting to stroll through a number of the districts described in such lively and often humorous prose in the third person narration Gray adopts. My visit led me to appreciate the deep knowledge and appreciation for the city that Gray possesses. McCurdy and his undertaker friend, Howard Sparrow, visit a variety of districts in the early chapters of the novel. Gray’s vivid descriptions remind the reader that, while Vancouver’s business and political elite would like to attribute the city’s growth to its British (read “white only”) citizenry, in fact there are many ethnic communities interacting in interesting ways.

Gray leads us on a rambling but meaningful journey through much of Vancouver …I stayed at the historic Patricia Hotel on East Hastings Street on the edge of Chinatown – a street that McCurdy spends considerable time on. The Patricia became a lively entertainment hub in the ‘20s. It could easily have been one of the sites McCurdy and his friends would have sought refreshment and solace at, while also hoping to get tips from the clientele for his sensationalist stories about the Janet Stewart investigations. In 1924, one could have checked out the resident band featuring legendary pianist Jelly Roll Morton and the larger-than-life singer and dancer Ada “Bricktop” Smith, both who resided at the hotel during their long residence. Live jazz performances continue to offer dynamic and irresistible music.

I strolled through the streets of Chinatown – past pagoda roofs, red and white restaurants and the world’s slimmest building, the Sam Kee building. The office building is a perfect display of the ingenuity of the Chinese business community over the years. Several Chinese characters feature in The White Angel, including some involved in slightly less legal activity, such as opium trafficking.

I also witnessed the police at work investigating a man lying on the pavement with a significant gash on his head. The police officers in the novel who investigate the death of Janet Stewart are certainly less diligent than the officer I saw at work. Given the political dynamics at work, with an election fast approaching, it seems the police have orders to favour the interests of one of the tycoons, who is keen to seize the mayor’s office. He does not wish to have unwanted scrutiny thwart his ambition. Nonetheless, racial tensions quickly bubble to the surface.

The powerful United Council of Scottish Societies demands a full inquiry. A Chinese houseboy who worked alongside the Scottish nanny quickly becomes a murder suspect. The Klu Klux Klan and the Asian Exclusion League, convinced of the dishonesty of a member of what they trumpet to be an “inferior race”, march through the streets and demand immediate action. Provincial politicians cynically propose a Protection of Women and Girls Act, with a racist, anti-Chinese motivation. This happens parallel to the barrage of racist commentary in the “yellow” newspapers of the day, owned by powerful business tycoons.

Gray has drawn significantly on one of Vancouver’s most famous cold cases – the mysterious death of Scottish nanny Janet Smith.Gray leads us on a rambling but meaningful journey through much of Vancouver, stopping dramatically at the courthouse for the inquiries and then the trial of the houseboy, Wong Chi. Chi takes the Fire Oath and then later the Chicken Oath before giving his testimony. We see the veteran defence counsel Harry Stickler at work. Stickler makes full use of an encyclopedic knowledge of procedural rules “delivered in a voice seething with outrage and a sincerity that have exculpated some of the shadiest characters in the province’s history.”

I much appreciated the descriptions of the stately courthouse with its marble steps, a symbol of the British respect for decorum and the rule of law. Gray contrasts this with the bedlam on opening day of the inquiry when a frenzied crowd stampedes up those steps, the “stone lions above them averting their eyes.”

The White Angel stands not only as a beautifully constructed crime novel that affords insights into a fascinating historical case and an entire era, but it is superbly written and features engaging characters. Gray stated in an interview that the novel bears comparison with the Polanski film Chinatown insofar as a crime leads to a deepening mystery that affords the reader a genuine insight into the ways in which society is run, favouring a wealthy and largely unaccountable elite. I would add, though, that this is a very Canadian Chinatown, which does not descend as far into the lower depths as does Polanski’s dark film. The White Angel creates its own magic, lacing humour with sharp commentary. It is one of the best novels I have read in the past year.