If you follow me on Instagram, you’ll know that I read a lot. Although this is a garden blog, it’s also a space for me to share a few bits about my life… so I hope you don’t mind a bit of book chat! I read Susanna Clarke’s ‘Piranesi’ last year and it’s one of a few books that have really stayed with me.
After reading the first couple of pages of the novel, I felt totally adrift within a setting that I didn’t recognise or understand. I am used to having to find my feet within unfamiliar settings – I’m a huge fan of historical fiction – but they are always fundamentally placed within a world with which I am familiar. I considered whether or not this novel would be ‘for me’, but by the time I reached page 6, I was utterly captivated by the character of Piranesi and I knew that I had to read on.
Although it threw me to start with, the setting of the novel is really incredible: an otherworldly labyrinth (known as ‘the House’) which is slowly crumbling, succumbing to the elements. The birds fly freely overhead, nesting in the nooks and crannies of the building and the sea, which is a constant reminder of the power of nature and appearing as a character in its own right, ebbs and flows in to the lower levels of the House. The tides are mentioned frequently throughout the novel and are a source of wonder, comfort and nourishment but also anxiety and chaos.
However, it was the character of Piranesi that I really enjoyed. The story is narrated through his journal entries so we are given access to his innermost thoughts, fears and feelings. I think this really helped to anchor me within the world of the novel and I felt really invested in finding out more about him. As well as this, he is a really endearing character who is able to see the beauty in the world around him and the positives in his situation, despite his isolation and the many hardships that he faces. I think this seemed more poignant to me given the fact that we’re in the grips of a cost of living crisis and still very much reeling from the experience and effects of global pandemic.
The first half of the novel was enjoyable for the beautiful prose and the well-written characters and setting, but the second half was really gripping as the plot started to unfold and the race seemed to be on to figure out who is Piranesi and how did he end up in the labyrinth? This is the shortest novel I’ve read in a while but it’s also the grandest in some ways and also the most thought-provoking.
