The Secret History- Donna Tartt Review (Spoilers Free)

 I have recently gotten more into reading the dark academia style of books, as I enjoyed the criticism of academic elitism as the exploration of the systems that allow some to join the elusive privileged groups that seem to run the show. While I really enjoyed Kuang’s ‘Babel’ (full review is on this blog), Donna Tartt’s ‘The Secret History’ did not sit well with me at all. Unfortunately, I struggled to even get through this novel and I simply cannot recommend it. I have read ‘The Goldfinch’ by the same author and while they share some flaws (that now I can see are probably just aspects of Tartt’s writing I do not like) I did find meaning and beauty. That is a lot more than what I can say for ‘The Secret History’ that I even included in my list of overrated books popular on bookstagram.

The plot of the novel takes place in Hampden college, a small liberal college in New England. The surroundings are painstakingly described by the narrator, Richard Papen, newly arrived at the school, as breathtaking and beautiful, and I would say that these passages are probably the most successful. After a seemingly accidental encounter in the school library with a group of privileged and eccentric students, all studying classic Greek led by the almost infamous professor Julian. However, throughout the course of the book, the only consequential lesson given by Julian is that of bacchanalian parties thrown in Dionysus’ honor that other members of the group, excluding Richard, take too seriously. This decision unravels to the point of return, changing their lives and lives of the small village they are in upside down.

Right off the bat, I really heavily disliked almost all of the characters in the novel. While I understand Richard is supposed to be a fish out of water character who is from a poorer family than the rest and is idealizing Julian and other students, his passivity and inability to confront anyone in his life slowed down the novel to the point I found it extremely dull. A lot of conflict in the novel would have been resolved much quicker and in a more convincing way if Richard did literally anything of any importance. Instead, he is a messenger and a lackey for others, occasionally refusing to do their bidding, but ultimately completing all their requests. Julian was described in the summary of the novel as a much greater influence on the young minds than he really turned out to be. I expected a more mentor-mentee relationship, but instead Julian often fell into the background and until the end, he was not even mysterious, he was just a husk of the character.

The main group of the students consists of Henry, Francis, Bunny, and twins Charles and Camilla. I hated every single one of them and found them so unbearable that I almost did not finish this book because I could not stand to listen to them drone on about another stupid topic. Henry is idealized by almost everyone to the point I had to read him as a parody, because there is no other way to even have a slight believability in him. Francis is your typical tortured sensitive gay man, while Charles and Camilla are just super weird with each other and others to the point that the only personality trait is that they are weird twins. Bunny is different from others in the sense that he was obnoxious in a different way. Although it was explained that part of the reason he is like that was because of his family, I thought it came a bit too late in the novel to really change the perspective on him. There were plenty of other characters in the novel, but they only showed up for a scene or two and were so not important that I did not bother to even try to remember them all. 

The main plot was acceptable at best and convoluted at worst. I could understand the cause and effect these characters would cause and the mess they bring upon themselves because of their issues. While there was a lot that was left unsaid about the whole situation, I can understand it. However, the biggest issue with this book and Tartt’s writing in general was pacing. Out of 600 pages of the novel, probably somewhere close to 400 was spent on long descriptions of drinking, taking pills and talking about drinking and taking pills. There was almost nothing about their lectures or any academic life. If the college they are in is so well respected, how on Earth do they spend so little time actually studying their majors and more time getting drunk and losing their minds? At one point, it goes from 0-100 in one chapter, while before that there is nothing of substance happening.

As we were told what the big plot twist is in the first sentence, Tartt took a huge risk in not letting the readers figure out the mystery by themselves. For the most part I would say it paid off, as I was interested to find out why and how it happened. In fact, that is what kept me reading it. However, after we catch up with it in the book, the rest of it is just so incredibly slow and honestly pointless. I kept trying to understand if the form should be following the content of long days and nights full of guilt and trauma characters would face, but I did not see how it was related. Those are the moments where I felt like Tartt is one of those authors that know she can write beautiful sentences and that she just enjoyed her own writing a bit too much for my liking. Plenty of words have already been written about her indisputable writing talent so I will not go on about it too much. I will just say that it is obvious this is Tartt’s debut novel, as she really wanted to show us how well she can write and how educated she is, hiding all the reference in plain sight. It just did not work for me, maybe a bigger classic fan than me would enjoy this more.

After somewhat of a climactic ending, the prologue felt quite unnecessary, but it did wrap the story somewhat. None of the characters really moved from where they started, and I felt like I just wasted a week of my life finishing this novel. I did not find it beautiful enough in terms of language and structure to find the purpose of it in its beauty and the plot and characters simply did not work for me. If you are interested in dark academia themes like I am, I am open to hearing more recommendations in that genre. I know I will not be reading Tartt anymore as I feel like her style simply does not suit me.

I rated this ⅖. Please let me know what are your thoughts on this novel and Tartt’s writing in general. Did you like it? Is there somebody similar to Tartt that I might enjoy

source: goodreads.com