Want
This year I tried to tussle with my “I don’t like it, but maybe I like it” stance toward “popular books.” (In fact, I’m currently writing a blog post about The Vanishing Half [very popular] and The Glass Hotel [normal, somewhat understated popular].) Want by Lynn Steger Strong – which, by the way, was named a top book of 2020 by NPR and was also included in The New Yorker’s ‘Best Books We Read in 2020’ [but does that mean it’s ‘popular’?] – provides an excellent framework for this loop-de-loop thinking.
Unlike so many “popular books” that want to set out and tackle hefty themes, Want is one of those books that does the same, but in a sly, I-didn’t-know-this-was-happening manner. This compact novel is underpinned by a thirty-something woman – married with two young daughters and grappling with the crazy way that NYC makes one feel overeducated, under-employed, and also arthritic because of a combo of lack of “normal American conveniences” coupled with toting young children around without said conveniences (been there, done that). Want is about privilege (racial, socioeconomic, the list goes on) without actually being blatantly *about* privilege. The main character (who is not named until the end) wants a lot: to reconnect with a childhood friend (internal nod to Margaret Atwood’s novel Cat’s Eye here), to have a peaceful relationship with her parents, to have a different job (maybe) – maybe have a different life? But at the same time, maybe she also *doesn’t* want all of that. What are you supposed to want when you grow up privileged, are acutely aware of that, and maybe want to try out life in a different way?
{PS: Read Want because it’s an excellent book, but read it also for a built-in reading list. The main character, in addition to teaching at a charter school, has a PhD in English and teaches as an adjunct. Gerald Murnane, Penelope Fitzgerald, Nadine Gordimer, plus several unknown (to me) authors are named.}
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