Read as leg 2 (Montreal Canada) of the
Bookpacking reading journey.
Is this highly stylised novel just a curiosity
or one only for the musician’s fans? In it we follow the early life of Laurence
(Larry) Breavman, through whom Leonard Cohen paints pictures of his own time as
a child and young adult in Montreal.
Despite, or because of, his middle class
Jewish origins Breavman indulges himself in what the city has to offer. In
short chapters, some snappy some lyrical, his boyhood, adolescence and student
experiences involve girls, poetry, music and the search for novelty and
meaning, often expressed through dialogue with friend and soul mate Krantz.
Relations with women feature throughout.
Boyhood fascination with the tragic Bertha and first love Lisa (whose favourite
game it was to be flung on to snow, to land crazily and leave bizarre
impressions in the drifts) gives way to more long lasting involvement with muses
Tamara “whose thighs made him a fetishist of thighs” and then Shell.
He meets and falls at first sight for Shell
during an interlude in New York, her back story revealed in some detail as they
spend lazy days and nights holed up in an apartment.
In love but never content, Breavman returns
to Montreal to take up the offer of a summer camp job with Krantz and we get a
more mature view of the City. Here the temptations of the women, still Tamara
but also the red headed Patricia, persist and conflict with his enduring need
for Shell.
As to be expected from Cohen, the prose is
captivating as he finds characteristically unconventional but apt ways to bring
to vivid life landscapes, situations and people.
More than a curiosity and more accessible
than his poetry, the book is a rewarding read whether or not you are a Leonard
Cohen fan.
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