By Ethan Li
A man sits in his seat after the final curtain of a musical, quietly sobbing. The woman sitting next to him pulls him into a hug to express her empathy for the man’s state of emotional distress, presumably caused by deep, deep pain. However, the true answer is much clearer. “Nothing happened to me,” the man thinks, “Nothing happened to me. I’m just a homosexual at a Broadway show.”
How could I not love this book?
That man is Arthur Less, and that book is Andrew Sean Greer’s novel Less, the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for the Novel winner and—no point in beating around the bush—my favorite book ever. In a succinct 261 pages divided into different countries the titular protagonist travels to, Greer paints the picture of an aging, gay man running away from his problems. If this all sounds too hopelessly melancholic and queer (or, as Greer puts it in the novel, “spoony”), fear not: balanced with the pangs of love is a hilarious tease at the stereotypes of traveling Americans. So fasten your seatbelts and pretend to pay attention to the informational video: Less is taking us on a trip, in our favorite commercial airplane, soaring through life.
After a tone-setting cold open introducing us to the title character —he sits in a hotel lobby, too fixated on a broken clock to notice the clerk looking for him— the novel’s central conflict is explained to us: the 50-year old man’s past lover is getting married and, rather than decline the invitation, Less decides to accept a variety of literary and social invitations to “skip town”. We are led through Less’ escapades by the novel’s initially-unknown narrator, who adds heart and character to even the exposition. First: New York City, where Less cries in the theater and interviews a retching science fiction author much more famous than himself. Less then travels to a variety of locations:Turin, Italy, Morocco, and Japan, to name a few.
All throughout, Greer infuses the book with humor surrounding Less’ struggles with life: a particularly engaging section occurs when our protagonist, faced with confusing directions and “icy” workers, hopelessly attempts to receive a tax refund on his purchases. Ridiculous things that happen to Less are consistently referenced later in the book, creating delightful narration and recurring jokes. However, this is not to say the heart is lost. In France, Greer takes us through an intense yet, like the tax refunds, doomed meeting between Less and a handsome party guest with touching and sympathetic diction, furthering the novel’s motifs of unasked questions and the unrelenting nature of time. In Morocco, Less meets Zohra, a friend of a friend. Glass of marc in hand, sitting in leather chairs at a ski resort, Zohra decries happiness as she laments the loss of her partner, connecting with Less as two aging LGBTQ+ adults.
Journeying through Less’ life, I was never bored while reading Less. As a book, it’s the funniest I’ve read, and not at all lacking in human emotions. As a Pulitzer Prize winner, it’s incredibly approachable—Greer’s diction is simple yet precise, the book comes in at a relatively short 261 pages, and the story is more concrete than the other more metaphorical and dense I’ve read. Although the book seems difficult to relate to, especially for students who typically aren’t middle-aged gay men, Greer truly writes about the human experience (which students typically are), and even if the themes aren’t relevant, the raucous humor still makes Less a worthwhile read.
When I first started looking into Pulitzer Prize winners, I never would have expected to find such a funny book as Less. And as this series comes to a close and the school year ends, I’d like to encourage everyone to look into new experiences. Even in the books I didn’t like, the ones that did feel just like the stereotypical “academic” book, I still found something to enjoy, a new aspect of humanity to be absorbed in. And so, with a year of reporting on these prize winners, I am eternally grateful for these books for letting me experience so much, and for the readers for following me on this journey. And I hope these readers will also take a leap of faith and decide to follow Less on his journey.