Reviews

An incredibly challenging book. A case could be made that it is technically brilliant. Finishing it like finishing a marathon.

I found it insufferably boring. Yes, it is a brilliant depiction of alcoholism but the inferiority of an alcoholic is — not — fun!

novabird's review against another edition

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5.0

After reading more than halfway through, I thought that I reached my limit of tourist inebriation with, Under the Volcano, and withdrew into my American chain hotel room and laid the book aside. From by brief outing into Oaxaca, I thought that I had had all that could have been soaked up from Mexico’s heat and my intimate encounter with a mescal worm infested mind and was thinking, “What’s the point in it?”

This torpor was brought on not by the style of stream of consciousness writing which did have a strong immersive effect, but was borne more by a fatigue of trying to incorporate a foreign language into my non-acculturated Wernicke center. It was almost impossible to just ‘go-with-flow,’ ignore as much as possible the interruptions in my narration building and keep the ‘faith,’ that my dedication would be worth it in the end.

This book is described as, “one of literature’s most powerful and lyrical statements on the human condition, and a brilliant portrayal of one man’s constant struggle against the elemental forces that threaten to destroy him.”

The above descriptive acclaim drove me on, to continue my on-foot journey. Quickly shifting before me though I find that I am on a bus made of the least of all metals and find myself amidst a myriad of interesting people, at times hurtling and always pressing onward to an unknown destination. At one stop, the discovery of a dead Indian is a very disturbing scene for its ordained, ‘non-action,’ don’t-interfere-with-a-dying- man-law. Next, the richly textured bullfighting arena segment offers more direct political allusions and gives the skeleton key to opening up the text. In other words, Lowry has finally and fully captured my attention and holds it to the end.

Lowry sought to write a book about an intelligent man against himself. In it he suggests the raison d'etre, for Geoffrey’s addiction is to both pacify and elucidate his heightened and cynical awareness.

“My equilibrium, and equilibrium is all, precarious—balancing, teetering over the awful unbridgeable void, the all-but unretraceable path of God’s lightning back to God?...Though it is perhaps a good idea under the circumstances to pretend at least to be proceeding with one's great work on "Secret Knowledge," then one can always say when it never comes out that the title explains this deficiency.”

Geoffrey soaks his jaded self-awareness into alcohol to soften the edges of his conscience, so that his breaches between contrasting worlds loses their boundaries and he can find some place that he fits.

“He was safe here; this was the place he loved - sanctuary, the paradise of his despair.”

Geoffrey’s heightened conscience is rudderless in a sea of guilt because of the non-place he finds himself in the world and despite the beauty he marvels at in his surroundings. He is an emigrant/expatriate disconnected from peers as he can find no one that he can truly relate his overarching ideas.

The Consul’s inability to adapt to his own changing nature of existence is his bane. His pride is the only thing that anchors him from this state of flux as interpreted as the ‘threatening elemental forces,’ that relentlessly press in on him from within and about. Yet, Lowry, paints both the dramatic physical landscape of Mexico and the inner landscape of Geoffrey with equal masterstrokes in order to play them off against each other, countering, and cushioning, but ultimately butting against realism and his unleashed and elevated intellect. Geoffrey understands only too well world politics, social hierarchy, history, war and the like and drunkenly and outwardly and explicitly revels in his knowledge thus sinking him into the depths of selfishness, manipulation and narcissism. His psychological insight comes and goes as fleetingly as brief episodes of hallucination, and temporary moments of desired rehabilitation. Geoffrey denies this softer side of himself, the less rational, which is epitomized by his refusal to open a year’s worth of letters from Yvonne during her absence.

Spoiler

At last Geoffrey’s conscience awakens amidst the chaotic thundering of a heavenly host of seven horses driving him towards a briefly illumined and enlightened lightning strike of mind on what matters most in the world just before death

Under the Volcano is a decade long fermenting mash of frenzy and languor that gives rise to an astounding breakthrough clarity of mind that pushes aside the absurdity of an unreliable author/narrator/character, weaves incredible complexity and stands as a testament to a truly great writer whose work can be interpreted in a multitude of ways.

jess_mango's review against another edition

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4.0

Let's call it 3.5 stars.

This book has been included on at least a few lists: 1001 Books to Read Before You Die, 1000 Books to read, Modern Library's 100 Must Read Novels... The book was first published in 1947. I had not really heard much about it ahead of time and decided to tackle it anyway.

This is the story of a former British Consul, Geoffrey Firmin, living in Quauhnahuac, Mexico and sinking deeper and deeper into his alcoholism. There is lots and lots and LOTS of tequila drinking going on here. Quauhnahuac is a town located between two volcanos. Firmin's life is about as destructive as a volcano. He's destroying himself and his relationships with others. On the Day of the Dead, his estranged wife, Yvonne arrives in town to try to save Geoffrey and their failing marriage. Hugh, Geoffrey's brother also shows up.

Lots of wallowing and malaise in this book. Geoffrey and his wife both yearn to save their marriage but it seems that Geoffrey has sunken too far into the downward spiral of his drinking. Not a happy and uplifting tome, to be sure. The writing is definitely high quality. I didn't really care for any of the characters in the book so it didn't pull me in as much as other novels have.

maxcarwile's review

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challenging dark mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

aja_'s review against another edition

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1.0

This was not an enjoyable read. Soberly witnessing the Consul's drunken romp is exhausting. While the novel feels very real, it is not a kind of reality that makes for compelling fiction -- at least for me. The Consul's drunkenness gets in the way. Of his marriage. Of himself. Of he plot.

Under the Volcano was adapted from a short story and it shows. Of the novel's 450 pages, perhaps only 50 constitute the "story." The remaining pages consist mostly of flashbacks and half-conscious ramblings with the occasional tourism brochure, newspaper article, restaurant menu, or wrestling flyer thrown in. While these passages do build out the world, the characters, the mood -- they fail to make them worth knowing more about. Lowry's version of Mexico -- despite the imposing volcanos from which the novel derives its name -- is flat. It's inhabitants are capable of three things: looking ugly, being poor, and speaking broken English. The land itself feels characterless. Any novel that owes its title to its setting must make me care about the setting. Cather's prairie, Hardy's heath, Michener's... everything -- these are places that actually exist. Quauhnahuac feels like a sepia filter put over a blank canvas.

The Consul, Yvonne, and Hugh are all unintelligble.

The Consul is often literally unintelligible. Throughout the novel he is just barely hanging on to consciousness. And, when he isn's aimlessly repeating himself, the one-sided arguments he goes through with his inner self always result in the same thing: drinking more. Every moment I spent with him, I felt trapped.

Considering how desparately I wanted to get away from the Consul, it became difficult to understand why Yvonne equally desperately wants to rekindle her relationship with him. Why she wants to do this, I could not tell you. Perhaps some distant form of idealism compells her to try to convince a man with seeingly zero good qualities to take her back. In an effort to hedge her bets, she actively flirts with his half-brother.

Hugh is, for me, the most compelling of the three. His past is colorful. His personality has depth. He can explain himself. This, however, is all underscored by the novel's obsession with telling a much less interesting story.

With all this negativity, I do want to highlight one moment that I thoroughly enjoyed. The Consul, drunk as always, reads a sign in Spanish. I roughly translate it using my very loose sense of the language. A few lines later, the Consul offers his interpretation. It doesn't match mine in important ways. I looked it up online, and it turns out we are both wrong. Lowry intentionally has the Consult misinterpret the sign (and my Spanish sucks). That was the one time I felt any sort of connection to anything happening in the novel.

cloudbulb's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

cindypepper's review against another edition

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1.0

“Must you go on and on forever into this stupid darkness?”

The above quote is what Yvonne says to her ex-husband with regards to his alcoholism, but holy shit, does it perfectly encapsulate my entire experience with reading this book. The stream of consciousness does little for me, and while I get that it captures the murk and haze and fever of alcoholism (and on a grander scale, the human condition,) I don't really care for Geoffrey Firmin, despite Lowry's attempts to romanticize him as a tragic hero, or any of the characters. Geoffrey's inner monologues are mired in so much self-pity and self-absorption, even if you cut past all the lucidity and wordsmithing. So, yeah, I don't know why I went on and on forever into this stupid darkness of navel-gazing. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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