Leaving the Atocha Station

This novel follows a depressed stoner poet learning Spanish in Madrid. It's very clever at portraying the psychological jujitsu of trying to absorb a new language, with all the guessing and mind games. There's really not much of a plot though, so the mental twists and turns of this young man will have to suffice. But the novel does capture, very well, the interior of a person on the cusp of adulthood, who is trying to figure out where his life is going.

UN-funny, despite reviews. Trying to be too cute, or something. I put it down after thirty or forty pages. But, of course, "New York" loved it. Go figure. Once again.

The book has its virtues - the Spanish characters are quite well sketched, the narrator's character and motivations and behavior are quite believable, and the "poetic" passages are effective. The main problem for me is that the narrator is such an unappealing character - really hard to stomach. I found it hard to keep going. I know it isn't a fair reason for downgrading the book; I suppose I am rating my enjoyment of it rather than my judgement of its artistic merits.

In his blurb, Jonathan Franzen says this book isn't like anything he can remember reading. Surely you can't mean that, Jonathan. The days and nights of a young, literature-obsessed man recording his life in a foreign city, Lerner's book has many precedents, from 'The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge' to early Nabokov novels such as 'Mary' or 'The Gift' to Murakami's 'Norwegian Wood' to the hundred pages of journal entries that open Bolaño's 'Savage Detectives.' James Wood adds to this list Fernando Pessoa's  The Book of Disquiet (Penguin Classics)  (a book I haven't read) and places Lerner's novel in the flâneur tradition. No, we've definitely been here before. And while this Madrid-set story cannot live up to the weirdly extravagant praise it's received, it has many of the trademarks of those earlier works--the obvious autobiographical dimension, the spartan surroundings, the rootlessness, the oceans of free time, the impulsive actions--and does a good job of updating the genre to the digital era.Baudelaire envisioned the flâneur as someone who drops himself into the life swarming around him (what Lerner nicely calls the "white machine"), not taking part but passionately witnessing it, in order to create his art. Lerner's stand-in, Adam Gordon, walks plenty of city streets and does witness the terrorist attack on Atocha Station and, only days later, the national elections that galvanized Spain in 2004, but the bulk of the book is spent pondering a lack of feeling in himself that even he finds strange. He doesn't feel pain but, instead, "the shape of pain." He is almost unbearably self-conscious and keeps bumping up against an old-world (often feminine) sensibility for which he is no match. He attempts to give blood after the station's bombing but, due to his drug-taking, is turned down--even his blood is no good! Despite all the evidence that he is not human, of course he does end up feeling and living; he can't help it. The lyric becomes the dramatic.

Is it a memoir with names changed or a novel? I found myself not liking the main character because of the extreme self absorption. A stream of consciousness he calls experiencing experience--no question alcohol and drugs affect the experience and reflection on it. Sophomoric, pretensious writing, more biography than art. The use of spectacle --the drowning and the bombing --do little to enliven, and his "Aristotle" would agree. I want to read a more recent "novel" to see if Lerner has evolved. I like the way his writing flows, streams...the long sentences, and at least some nods to intellect.

Assume the stereotype and embrace it: I can't enumerate how many ways this book speaks to me, something I've been ever hesitant to say (for fear I might ever change my mind) but I feel obligated to say something as this is my first book review ever. If you've ever been 'the American' abroad and have been unsure how to feel about it...well 'Leaving Atocha Station' vocalizes that feeling better than how you felt it. A multi-faceted ambiance in essence, existential tendencies carry this poetic narrative throw the winding streets of Madrid, the railways of Spain, seamlessly in and out of memories both past and future, hipster American shame abroad etc. etc. Adam's shoes are those worn in the quest for authenticity.Find out for yourself.

Started off a little slow for me, but the writing and the story kept me intrigued. I didn’t find the book as humorous as some of these reviews and I knew nothing about the author, but the writing was unlike anything I’ve read.

"Jim Dixon lives!" I thought happily when I started this short book. The acerbic and hilarious descriptions of the unpleasant protagonist's inner mind are insightful and very well conveyed and I hoped it was to be a Lucky Jim styled chronicle of an outsider and misfit in Spanish literary circles. But no; too quickly the book fell into exactly the sort of theorising and analysis of language that would have driven Jim Dixon to despair. In the end the protagonist is completely unsympathetic and suffers all the pretensions that seem to be skewered early on. Perhaps this is ironic in a post-modern way; that still makes my point, I think. All in all, a disappointment.

Left to its own devices, Lerner’s elegantly spun prose might purr on ceaselessly; calmly taking the measure of one-after-another labyrinthine thought-adventure. But, there could be no better metaphor for the shifting, porous nature of Lerner’s deconstructed world than the masterly metaphor that this novel itself embodies overall. As played out over the space of so many pages, however, this important sub-text might, indeed, remain hidden from view.What Lerner’s novel more obviously takes stock of are the blandest aspects of the poet-narrator’s day-to-day life in Madrid, including his skittish encounters with that capital’s younger, more progressive, literary set. Hailing from Providence USA, Adam, the novel’s main protagonist (and First Person narrator) has appeared in the foreign capital as a young American poet of some reputation and still greater promise. While in Madrid he must be seen to make plausible use of the generous research funding that his track-record and research proposal have earned him. Thanks to this fellowship he is free, for a certain period, to advance his poetry within a setting conducive to bi-lingual research and cultural exchange. Aware, however, that he may be unable to deliver the project he had over-ambitiously proposed, Adam studiously avoids foundation personnel and peer fellows; ignoring even their e-mails. He nevertheless manages (if reinforced by tranquillisers, drink, dope, and prodigious intakes of nicotine and caffeine) to weave his way into the capital’s contemporary art and poetry scene. As the days go by he gathers a widening acquaintance, and even entertains potential love interests (as though, for once, he were oblivious to the risks of mistranslation).As to the smooth-running word-stream that embodies Lerner’s tale, could this betray a certain emotional detachment? For, notwithstanding actual content, what one notices most is the unmistakable whiff of First-Person-singular self-absorption. Whereas detachment would doubtless be routine in the case of a young, averagely amoral male let loose in a foreign capital, detachment is no less a trait of the post-modern poet who scarcely acknowledges his own creative process or product. These he regards as mere outliers; less answerable to themselves than to a far-reaching constellation of super-ordinate structures wherein material and social conditions are conjoined with linguistic practices and forms. How, then, could such a poet view the ‘autonomous creative persona’ as anything but the outmoded obsession of a bygone era?In truth, apart from his diet of reading, and certain other reflective rituals that he schedules into each day, Adam’s accustomed routine is largely a round of banalities and bouts of free-floating anxiety. Indeed, courting the attention of peer-literati is not the least banal aspect of his sojourn in Madrid. To hype his literary persona in likely venues around town might strike even him as hollow; but the availability of beautiful, highly articulate young women somehow aids his concentration. Nevertheless, conceding power - even to this extent - causes misgivings that lead to episodes of crushing self-doubt.Will breaking-news of a major terrorist atrocity (and its city-wide aftermath) jolt our hero out of his cycle of appetite, anxiety, doubt and defeat? Might headlong conviction (even engagement) now issue forth, phoenix-like, from the ashes of emotional incompetence? - Possibly so; - possibly not. Poems themselves might sometimes arrive in moments of doubt - and, indeed, serve as its legitimate expression. But how might ‘salvaging doubt from doubt’ seem to square with the poet’s own longing for validation; and how might this meet the expectations of sponsors? Meanwhile, the self-congratulatory fervour of a satisfied translator might upstage the poet’s own wavering belief in his original-if-provisional offering. Perhaps terms like ‘original’ and ‘translation’ cease to have meaning. Especially in this social media era, can anyone truly be anyone - or anywhere truly anywhere - given the perverse pre-eminence of language itself; - its infamously hazardous transmissions, uncertain locus and provenance, un-policed borders, unforeseeable trajectories and incalculable reach?Perhaps it is the sheer theatricality of his privileged set-up in Madrid that emboldens Adam (on more than one occasion) to lie to his new acquaintances about his home life in the USA. When (possibly due to his own carelessness) these deceptions are exposed Adam promptly apologises, only to spin some mendacious yarn by way of explanation. Perhaps these false trails are a way of milking sympathy. Or might a total nervous breakdown be in prospect?Yet, Adam’s penchant for lying serves to remind the reader that absolutely nothing he narrates should be taken on trust. Indeed, why might we expect the characters of a novel to be more reliable, understandable or predictable than randomness itself; - or more worthy of respect than false memories or mere hallucinations? No less remarkable is the author’s tendency to toy with passing descriptions in a way that deliberately fudges the matter, or leaves it just as vague as if it had been left alone in the first place. This slovenly effect is the more distancing for being consciously counter-descriptive.If knowing what we expect from a novel might be a key to self-knowledge, less certain are our chances of understanding others. Some protagonists do understand, however, - even from the very outset - that the poet’s deceptions are just that: outright lies. But their rare perspicacity is revealed to the reader only at a later stage and (so to speak) long after the fact. Might this suggest that, not only the reader, but also the narrator (indeed, author) had been doubly hoodwinked at the time?! – Moreover, in the course of time, it may seem that Adam himself has been subtly misled in a manner that quite outclasses his own poor attempts at deception.If the scheme of this novel comes down to the age-old axiom that ‘experience will teach us what we need to learn’ readers might not be surprised to discover that this regimen entails raw disappointments and bitter truths. Might some species of mellow optimism emerge as the end-product of this objectifying process? - Perhaps so. But, only by submitting to this curriculum can we ever hope to find out!

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this novel. It provides much cause for reflection on the self, the power of art in a political context and on the integrity of the artist. I enjoyed the dynamics of the relationships between the central character and his Spanish friends, lovers and associates. His insecurities can prove frustrating but the journey he undertakes during the course of the novel resulted in me feeling more sympathy with his inner thoughts than I did when he first introduced himself. The Spanish context adds greatly to the novel, as does his gradual integration with the locals. A very worthwhile read.

This novel is not for everyone; you need to be tolerant of self-indulgent, over-privileged intellectuals, but if you can get past that, then it is funny. Narrator gets into several humiliating situations, mostly his own fault, which suggests we are being invited into the writer's in-home about how people like this narrator (who is clearly based on the writer) are ridiculous. And that self-awareness rescues the novel from being utterly pretentious. Not sure I would read another by this author, but maybe one Ben Lerner book might be enough in anyone's life.

A story about not art itself but of how we relate to it, as the opening chapter cleverly foreshadows. I normally struggle with postmodern gimmicks - I barely finished Sophie's World, and hated Foucault's Pendulum - but here I found the conceit somehow less pretentious, and was able to enjoy the novel as it is.Rather than exulting writing, as too many books about writing do, Leaving the Atocha Station is almost disdainful of it. Certainly our narrator-writer cuts a truly pathetic figure - a mooching stoner who's found a way to put off getting a job a little longer, who lies to get women into bed and struggles even then. On one level this story can be read as the uplifting coming of age of the stereotypical millennial man-child, as our lead gradually realises his genuine talent for poetry and accept that it might be a legitimate way for him to live. Alternately one can see this as a Lolita-style case of sympathy for the devil.But the point that occupies most of the book is whether such ambiguity is itself fakery, pretending profundity by saying nothing. It's a trick I find all too common in literary novels - the unwillingness to essay a concrete position, especially on moral questions - but here I find it forgivable, because the novel itself is the answer - not in a self-impressed, clever-clever way, but in a simple and powerful demonstration that this stuff does, ultimately, mean something, even if we feel like we brought the meaning ourselves. Or so it felt to me.

Cf his10:04 this is dull, pettishly self regarding verbosity. Perhaps a one book talent on a roll? The literature of 'I am worth it' at the price, just about.