Book Tamers| book reviews

In a letter to Durrell, Henry Miller states that there is nothing that compares to Justine in the English literature. The first book in the The Alexandria Quartet, Justine, is incandescent, demanding, melancholic and painful. Words become phrases that change their form and texture throughout the novel, like Justine, like Alexandria. Durrell passes from the woman to the city, from dark secrets to the attempt to redemption through decadence.
Through Justine, Durrell lifted Alexandria together with the character-cities, next to Joyce’s Dublin and Dickens’ London. But Alexandria benefits from personifications, which next to implying its animal side, they render it as an independent existence, away from the people. This time, it’s not the people, they don’t get to create the city, but the city creates its own people, and Alexandria becomes a beautiful beast that influences the destinies of its subjects.
The whole Quartet is based on this prismatic vision. Alternating perspectives through narrator changing gives the impression of an uncertainty over reality. Durrell playes with us, leading us on false paths, leaving an opinion shadowing another one, for a third voice to add a new total side on the truth. In Justine we are always on uncertain ground, suspecting there is something else beyond what it’s being told, hoping to get through the other side of the same prism.
But beyond style and the fantastic description of the city, Justine remains a love story. Having as a motto a Freudian quote of love consisting of four people and a quote from the famous Justine written by the Marquis de Sade, the novel sets its obsessive center around the mysterious Justine. Nessim, Justine’s mature husband, impresses the reader by his dignified and silent love, by his abnegation. However, he is not absolved of the sin of not understanding her and free her from the curse of the past, striking her very own foundations. Darley and Arnauti confound themselves in feelings (comas that separates their speech are not very persuasive) and courageously assume the merit of understanding her. That is why they are the ones remaining disconcerted of her actions. The feminine vision is rendered on one hand, by Melissa, Darley and Nessim’s mistress, but she is a too humble and too slightly outlined to be credible. On the other hand, Clea’s voice, herself in love with Justine, is a firm and clear one and it seems that it is the only one who knows the truth. To this, there is the high number of secondary characters, well defined typologies that have a big contribution in forming another side of the same woman.
Justine, the personification of Alexandria, is a woman surrounded by mirrors that offer her another reflection. Loved, desired, envied, Justine is incapable of finding herself. She always changes into someone new when someone approaches her and tries to understand. She keeps Alexandria’s animal sensuality, the perversity of its night life and ends up by ruining herself.

Written by: Ana-Maria