4 3 2 1
Paul Auster
Faber & Faber
Set around New Jersey and New York in the 1950s and 1960s, 4 3 2 1 tells four alternative stories of the young Archie Ferguson’s life: in each, the same basic character is placed in slightly different circumstances and faced with slightly different choices and twists of fate.
From these four different perspectives, Auster explores family feuds; friendship; fumbling teenage explorations of love, sex and sexual identity; the formative influence of movies and music, of sports and education; and the politics of the civil rights movement and the Vietnam war.
Despite their divergent paths, all of the Fergusons are aspiring writers. The book becomes a sustained reflection on Auster’s own relationship with the written word and allows him, in typical Auster fashion, to insert stories within the story.
Fundamentally, though, this is a novel about mortality. Inspired in part by the death of a friend in a lightning strike aged 14 (that could just as easily have killed Auster himself), the cruel, random deaths that recur throughout are handled with a lightness of touch that makes them all the more devastating.
Words – James Hayton
