ponder snow, shun language

among the other tasks in her notebook

Fiction, 2017

I remember when I first got to college, I spent the first few days secretly crying. It wasn’t that I missed home, or felt lonely. I had churned through thought-cycles with such rigour that I reached the buttery conclusion that from now on, my home would always be split. When I was with my family, I would miss my new life, and vice-versa. As I wrote this in my journal, it rang even truer. When I reread it a week ago, I was awash in pages of my own idiocy. 

The Idiot follows nineteen-year-old Selin in her freshman year at Harvard. She ambles through her daily routine, thinks some professors are foolish, buys an androgynous black overcoat, and takes a Russian language class. It is here that she meets Ivan. He’s older than her, and they strike up an email correspondence (situationship?) in which they discuss atoms, Turkey, and the futility of language. Warm rumblings of affection brew in Selin. 

This is the second time I’ve read the novel. The first was a year ago, when I was exactly Selin’s age, in her position, and found the novel so painful to get through because of how correct it felt. This time around, I found it incredibly funny. Regardless of what you glean from it, Batuman still makes observations that are sincerer than anyone else’s: 

• When she wants to be an ESL teacher: “I wasn’t particularly interested in high school math acquisition, but nobody ever said we were put on this earth for our own entertainment” 

• On losing her opinions in college: “In high school I had been full of opinions but high school had been like prison, with constant opposition and obstacles. Once the obstacles were gone, meaning seemed to vanish, too.”

Film - Lady Bird (the novel follows the film seamlessly in time periods so treat it as a prequel!)

Song - Both Sides Now - Joni Mitchell (the most accurate pairing yet, in my humble opinion)

P.S. -  A friend and I frequently have heated discussions over the character of Ivan. My opinion (I have one???) has changed significantly upon the reread. Please let me know yours!