Christopher Isherwood's Mr Norris Changes Trains

When one has read a bit about Christopher Isherwood's life and particularly his memoir, Christopher and His Kind, delving into a book like Mr Norris Changes Trains becomes an experience of comparing life to fiction. There are lots of intersections between the story in his memoir and the fictionalized story written 40 years before.

The temptation, of course, is to give unnecessary emphasis to the politics of the time in the memoir, looking back with the luxury of hindsight, but Isherwood resists this and in both stories, the political situation in 1930s Berlin is there but only on the margins and when it is used as a core part of the story, it's done with humour.

And there is definitely humour in Mr Norris Changes Trains. Isherwood creates a character (in Mr Norris) who is fairly unique: highly emotional, fastidious, uptight, nervous, vain, but also charming. The narrator (as most of Isherwood's narrators tend to be) is distant, aloof, and we learn very little about him or his internal life. Again, though, what I admire about a tale such as this one is how the politics operates mainly off-stage. It's there. It affects the lives of the characters, but it's not the driving force of the plot. Like Sally Bowles, the story centers around one character and his means of survival in a hostile world.

There are colorful revolutionaries (who, for the most part, seem more interested in sleeping with one another than in actual politics), young Nazi ruffians, and suggestions that key characters may be spies or double agents or just corrupt charlatans. But Isherwood is mainly interested in the portrayals and interactions between his main characters: the ways they manipulate each other, the secrets they hold, the lies they tell. One very much gets the feeling that that book is not tied to its setting and could easily have been written/set 50 years earlier or 50 years later with only minimal changes.

That said, the book definitely represents in time and place insofar as Mr Norris is such a unique (and very British) character. It's a lovely little book and the kind of book one can read in a single afternoon without interruptions.

Sally Bowles by Christopher Isherwood

So small it fits in my back pocket

Why can't North American publishers make more pocket books? In Japan, most books are small enough to fit into your pocket. In France, Livres de poche dropped into a jacket pocket are the best way to always have something to read on hand.

Apparently, English publishers used to design books this way. Case in point: this adorable little hardbound edition of Christopher Isherwood's Sally Bowles I bought yesterday downtown. It's the second printing of the book, from 1937. In excellent condition (though no paper jacket cover as it no doubt once had).

The book was the inspiration for the movie Cabaret though I wanted it because it is set in Berlin of the 1920s. And such a quick read: between 30 minutes on the sofa last night and the metro ride to work this morning, the entire story could be enjoyed and pondered.

Isherwood's creation

Sally Bowles: an early incarnation of Holly Golightly, the vague and slightly suspect narrator (named Christopher Isherwood), the drinking, the nightclubs, the shady characters all out for themselves. Just what this chilly autumn morning required.

It strikes me that the object of this book, just as much as the story, was an enjoyable part of reading it. I loved sitting on the metro train with it in my left pocket, a clementine in the other. Now that I'm done with it, though, I have to lug out the oversized trade paperbacks per usual which means I need to bring a bag. Ugh.