Book review: Coda

Published on Friday 7 November 2008 21:06

Coda by Simon Gray Faber & Faber/Granta, 252pp, £14.99

JUST GET A FIRST SENTENCE, then another one, Simon Gray tells himself, "and if you're lucky, you'll catch up with yourself in what you understand, at 4am on this Friday morning, will be an account of what you've been told, on good medical authority, is the beginning of your dying ..."

That's what this book is about, coming to terms with death, even though on the first page he tells us that, actually, he's feeling better than he had for a long time. So perhaps it's not so much that he's dying as that he is being killed off by his tumour: sentence of death by cancer has been passed, and, though there may be a stay of execution, there will be no reprieve.

Though near the end, Gray takes part in a church service, a christening where he and his wife Victoria have been asked to be godparents, he has no faith. Nevertheless, conscious that his cancer has almost certainly been caused by his 60- cigarettes-a-day habit, he has notions of original sin; something in him respects the idea of consequences and punishment. He reminds himself that he is "not only a great-great-grandchild of the Enlightenment, which was itself the father of chaos, but also that I'm descended on my father's side from a long line of Scots Presbyterians, on my mother's from a long line of Welsh Anglicans, ie Anglicans who, because of their Welshness, believed in sin, original sin and sin ever since. In other words, what a mess."

He tells us about his doctors, nurses, stay in hospital, then about the decision he and his wife took to go to Crete for a holiday. Much of the book was written there. What is at once attractive and moving is the manner in which he remains alert to the details of everyday life, to the mannerisms of those he encounters, even while never able to escape for long from the knowledge that the sand is seeping through the hourglass faster and faster. He curses his foolishness in having lived as he did, gives way to moments of self-pity and fear; yet is for the most part stoical.

Those many readers who have enjoyed the three previous volumes of the Smoking Diaries will find this one every bit as compelling: less funny, despite frequent shafts of wit, considerably more moving. It's affecting for two reasons. First, Gray refuses to give way. He still finds pleasure in swimming, reading, remembering, in the simple act of being. Second, his love for Victoria, and his dependence on her, shine through every page. He often calls himself a mess, regrets the mistakes he has made, mistakes of social clumsiness rather than malice; yet a certain grace is apparent in everything he writes, a grace that comes from a willingness to look reality in the face, and not be daunted. He would have flown from such a compliment, but he deserves it.

He still finds delight in the world and in words. Opening the Oxford Book of English Verse at random, and promising himself he will read all that there is of whichever poet he happens on, he is dismayed to find he has arrived in the middle of Sir Walter Scott. But he sticks to his pledge, reads through them, and then comes to Madge Wildfire's Song, "which made my hair shift on my scalp".

Scott himself once had a dream in which he was dead, and found it comforting because it seemed he was the same man in death that he had been in life. There's no such dream here, of course, but the prospect of death and its harsh reality is always before our eyes. And as the diary continues there is comfort and inspiration to be found here too, for Gray watching death advance towards him remains obstinately the man he was. He still grumbles, chides himself, sees the humour of our wretched human condition. He still possesses what every writer needs: curiosity, and a readiness to make new discoveries about himself and those around him.

There's no demand for the reader's sympathy, but I can't imagine that many will read this book without feeling respect and affection for its author. He died of a ruptured aneurysm ten weeks before publication.