Books: “In Paradise” by Hania Yanagihara
Those who read the paper edition of the Sunday NYT will know of T, the special magazine supplement that highlights fashions few of us will ever wear, and houses that even fewer of us will ever afford.
What most readers may not know is that the deputy editor of T is a Hawaiian-born New Yorker, Hania Yanagihara , a novelist who chooses to write books featuring gay men.
“In Paradise,” her latest magnum opus (and at 704 pages it really is magnum), is actually three books in one. Each is set in the same townhouse in Washington Square, Greenwich Village (Henry James-style), each features three protagonists named David, Charles, and Edward, and each features gay male relationships that are, shall we say, troubled.
In Book 1, set in 1893, New York is a city within the “Free States,” an imaginary grouping of six “blue” states carved after the end of the Civil War. In the Free States, same-sex marriages are permitted but as this is still 1893, they are often “arranged” by a third party—in this case, young David’s grandfather, between the troubled David and an older man named Charles.
Book 2 propels us 100 years forward to 1993, when this David has acquired an older husband named Charles, and he and his gay circle are threatened by AIDS. Book 3 takes us another 100 years forward into 2093 (stopping at a few years in-between) when New York’s parks have been paved over, all American states (and their populations) have been ravaged by a series of 21st-century pandemics, and gay marriage, worst of all, has been banned.
Hmm. On the one hand, respect is due Yanagihaea, whose prose is at times lovely (if a bit overwrought) and whose imagination is immense. On the other hand, trying to navigate 704 pages of these time and place shifts can make one head for a daybed and a brief lie-down. In short, “In Paradise” is a labor of love, but you really do need to love laboring through this book to get through it.