Crash
by J.G. Ballard
Reviewed by Ted Gioia
This disturbing novel is often classified as science fiction, though at
first glance the label may seem unjustified. The most advanced
technologies described in this book are cars and airplanes—and very
conventional ones at that. Unlike other Ballard books, such as The
Crystal World or The Drowned World, with their apocalyptic sci-fi
scenarios, Crash describes a world that apparently is just like our own.
Well, on second thought, maybe not. The technology in Crash may be
familiar, but the people can hardly be from
this planet. At the opening of the book, the
narrator (named Ballard in the novel)
describes his recently deceased friend
Vaughan, who had a bizarre erotic
obsession with car crashes, automobile
injuries and motorway mishaps of the
most violent sort. This might be plausible,
but when we find that the narrator
Ballard is also fixated on the sexual
potential of car crashes, the reader is
doubtful that there are two such sickos in
the same town. But then we are introduced
to Ballard’s girlfriend Catherine, who also
finds auto collisions to be an oh-so-heavy-
metal aphrodisiac. And don't let me forget
to mention Ballard’s sometime mistress Helen Remington (they met
when he killed her husband in a traffic accident) who also gets aroused
by—yes, you guessed it—car crashes.
No, these are not believable characters. I have spent a lot of time
driving on the roads over the years, and I can attest that you are more
likely to find a hobbit, a Hogwarts alum, and two Dune sandworms in
the car next to you, than this unlikely foursome. By sheer Darwinian
logic, people who need to slam their vehicle into a bus in order to get
aroused do not propagate. Heck, they're lucky to live beyond the
expiration date on their DMV learner's permit.
These odd characters and their strange inter-relationships are what
give Crash the aura of a futuristic book. And their envisioned
Armageddon—or “Carmageddon,” as Ballard prefers to describe it—
may be as creepy as an attack by Triffids or a virus from outer space,
but it is the people themselves, and not their technology, who make us
uneasy. The characters here represent something new in fiction; the
nihilism of, say, Bazarov in Turgenev's Fathers and Sons looks like
Mister Rogers in comfy slippers by comparison.
But the technology is the focus of the writing, and no author has ever
lavished more sensually-charged adjectives on the various parts that
make up a typical car. The words of devotion that Petrarch aimed at
Laura, Dante at Beatrice, are here targeted at steering columns, toggle
switches and radiator grilles. Much of this prose is unsettling, even
sociopathic. Then again, some of it is quite lovely. No matter what
your objections might be to the values espoused by this novel—and if
you have no objections, don’t expect to date my daughter—you will be
forced to admire the sheer sweep and daring of the writing.
Of course, you will probably also get nauseous from time to time
before you have reached the grand finale of this paean to a crash test
dummy philosophy of life.
Here is a taste: The lungs of elderly men punctured by door-handles;
the chests of young women impaled on steering-columns; the cheek of
handsome youths torn on the chromium latches of quarter-lights. To
Vaughan, these wounds formed the key to a new sexuality, born from
a perverse technology. The images of these wounds hung in the
gallery of his mind, like exhibits in the museum of a slaughterhouse . . .
. Or how about this: The car crash is a fertilizing rather than a
destructive event. And how about a nice aphorism to append to your
emails: They bury the dead so quickly. They should leave them lying
around for months. No, these are not isolated passages taken out of
context (trust me, the context only makes it worse), but rather typical
extracts from a very atypical novel.
If you like edgy, this is definitely edgy. Even so, a sociopath is a
sociopath, no matter how well he writes. And the character named
Ballard who narrates this story is sick in the head, and needs some
treatment. I won’t pass judgment on that other fellow named Ballard
who wrote Crash. Maybe he is just offering us an oblique critique of
contemporary mores. But it wouldn’t surprise me if he had a screw or
two loose too.
This article originally appeared on Blogcritics.
by J.G. Ballard
Reviewed by Ted Gioia
This disturbing novel is often classified as science fiction, though at
first glance the label may seem unjustified. The most advanced
technologies described in this book are cars and airplanes—and very
conventional ones at that. Unlike other Ballard books, such as The
Crystal World or The Drowned World, with their apocalyptic sci-fi
scenarios, Crash describes a world that apparently is just like our own.
Well, on second thought, maybe not. The technology in Crash may be
familiar, but the people can hardly be from
this planet. At the opening of the book, the
narrator (named Ballard in the novel)
describes his recently deceased friend
Vaughan, who had a bizarre erotic
obsession with car crashes, automobile
injuries and motorway mishaps of the
most violent sort. This might be plausible,
but when we find that the narrator
Ballard is also fixated on the sexual
potential of car crashes, the reader is
doubtful that there are two such sickos in
the same town. But then we are introduced
to Ballard’s girlfriend Catherine, who also
finds auto collisions to be an oh-so-heavy-
metal aphrodisiac. And don't let me forget
to mention Ballard’s sometime mistress Helen Remington (they met
when he killed her husband in a traffic accident) who also gets aroused
by—yes, you guessed it—car crashes.
No, these are not believable characters. I have spent a lot of time
driving on the roads over the years, and I can attest that you are more
likely to find a hobbit, a Hogwarts alum, and two Dune sandworms in
the car next to you, than this unlikely foursome. By sheer Darwinian
logic, people who need to slam their vehicle into a bus in order to get
aroused do not propagate. Heck, they're lucky to live beyond the
expiration date on their DMV learner's permit.
These odd characters and their strange inter-relationships are what
give Crash the aura of a futuristic book. And their envisioned
Armageddon—or “Carmageddon,” as Ballard prefers to describe it—
may be as creepy as an attack by Triffids or a virus from outer space,
but it is the people themselves, and not their technology, who make us
uneasy. The characters here represent something new in fiction; the
nihilism of, say, Bazarov in Turgenev's Fathers and Sons looks like
Mister Rogers in comfy slippers by comparison.
But the technology is the focus of the writing, and no author has ever
lavished more sensually-charged adjectives on the various parts that
make up a typical car. The words of devotion that Petrarch aimed at
Laura, Dante at Beatrice, are here targeted at steering columns, toggle
switches and radiator grilles. Much of this prose is unsettling, even
sociopathic. Then again, some of it is quite lovely. No matter what
your objections might be to the values espoused by this novel—and if
you have no objections, don’t expect to date my daughter—you will be
forced to admire the sheer sweep and daring of the writing.
Of course, you will probably also get nauseous from time to time
before you have reached the grand finale of this paean to a crash test
dummy philosophy of life.
Here is a taste: The lungs of elderly men punctured by door-handles;
the chests of young women impaled on steering-columns; the cheek of
handsome youths torn on the chromium latches of quarter-lights. To
Vaughan, these wounds formed the key to a new sexuality, born from
a perverse technology. The images of these wounds hung in the
gallery of his mind, like exhibits in the museum of a slaughterhouse . . .
. Or how about this: The car crash is a fertilizing rather than a
destructive event. And how about a nice aphorism to append to your
emails: They bury the dead so quickly. They should leave them lying
around for months. No, these are not isolated passages taken out of
context (trust me, the context only makes it worse), but rather typical
extracts from a very atypical novel.
If you like edgy, this is definitely edgy. Even so, a sociopath is a
sociopath, no matter how well he writes. And the character named
Ballard who narrates this story is sick in the head, and needs some
treatment. I won’t pass judgment on that other fellow named Ballard
who wrote Crash. Maybe he is just offering us an oblique critique of
contemporary mores. But it wouldn’t surprise me if he had a screw or
two loose too.
This article originally appeared on Blogcritics.
conceptual
fiction
fiction