The Magus
by John Fowles
read: 2019
Modern Library #93, Guardian 1000 Novels
I haven't been blogging much over the last year-plus because I haven't been reading much. I had a lot of space in my life a few years ago to read, between not having kids, long train rides, etc. That's not to make excuses; I just need to do a better job carving out time to read, and I haven't done it. And there haven't been too many books that grabbed me and insisted I not put them down.
Until The Magus, that is. Some of it was circumstance, having time off around the holiday, but some of it was a just ludicrous insane plot that kept me wondering and guessing through the end of the novel and beyond.
At some level, I was aware I was being manipulated, not unlike protagonist Nicholas Urfe. The older, mysterious Maurice Conchis, the titular "Magus," embroils Nicholas in a series of situations where it's unclear who people are, what they want, who is in league with whom, etc. It became nearly impossible to track the lies, double-crosses, alliances, and identity switches that comprised the bulk of the novel. This manipulation wreaks havoc with Nicholas. At some point, I realized that author John Fowles was manipulating me, the reader, in the same fashion. If Nicholas had any self-respect, I thought, he would end this insane pursuit. But then, I wasn't stopping reading, was I?
When I wrote about The French Lieutenant's Woman, the other Fowles novel I've read, I criticized the ambiguous ending as a cop-out. In The Magus, Fowles explains his preference for ambiguous endings, and it makes a lot of sense:
An ending is no more than a point in sequence, a snip of the cutting shears. Benedrick kissed Beatrice at least; but ten years later? And Elsinore, the following spring?
