4 3 2 1

Paul Auster

Faber & Faber

Otago Daily Times, 2017

“Such an interesting thought”, the narrator says to himself early on in Paul Auster’s mammoth new novel 4 3 2 1,  “to imagine how things could be different for him even though he was the same. The same boy in a different house…the same boy with different parents. The same boy with the same parents who didn’t do the same things they did now.” And thus we are presented with four alternate lives of Archibald Isaac Ferguson from their birth in 1947 until the death of Ferguson 1 in early 1970.

The alternative Fergusons are initially very similar, but as they age and develop along separate trajectories, the points of similarity and difference become increasingly marked. This allows Auster to explore a number of his favourite themes, including the importance of language in the establishment of meaning and identity, and the way in which random events and personal relationships can alter the course of a person’s life. The presence or absence of his father through death or estrangement plays a defining role in Ferguson’s sense of self, while his mother’s unconditional support and understanding is a necessary constant in all four narratives. Similarly, writing is a central aspect of Ferguson’s life, but the form it takes varies from poetry to prose, journalism to translation. 

But 4 3 2 1 is more than just a story, it is a work of meta-fiction with the authorial hand very much in view. Ferguson and Auster share the same birthday, and other semi-autobiographical details appear throughout the book. Ferguson 2 writes the story of his childhood that we have just read. Ferguson 3 informs us that life resembles a tale “that began at page 1 and pushed forward until the hero died on page 209 or 926” (or, in this case, pages 184, 709 and 809) and – spoiler alert –Ferguson 4 is eventually revealed as the author of this fictional behemoth.

Despite the narrative complexity, events are relatively easy to follow. The alternate time-streams are presented in parallel and (mostly) contemporary blocks with enough references to prior events to keep the timelines straight, and the self-referential cleverness is entertaining up to a point. But four lifetimes take a long time to play out and the narrative eventually started collapsing under the weight of its 866 closely typed pages.

Despite the later parts of the book playing out in one the most turbulent decades in recent American history, Ferguson is untouched by external events unless they impact on his love life, and I grew tired of his sexual, creative, and existential angst. Similarly, the amusement value of Auster’s game-playing palled to the point where the recursive cleverness of the conclusion left me feeling strangely cheated. 

Perhaps I missed a critical detail somewhere along they way that would have transformed it from an anti-climax to a revelation, or maybe my sense of terminal dissatisfaction was the point. Either way, I’m not quite sure it was worth the effort.