Elephants of the Road: Chabon's Adventure Tale

In Michael Chabon's latest genre novel, Gentlemen of the Road, he attempts to revive the classic swords & sandals adventure tale. He does so by introducing the reader to a lost world of Jewish heroes, circa 950AD — in fact, the working title for the book was "Jews with Swords." While the book is a great attempt at reviving the recently quiet genre of adventure fiction, Chabon's writing style may be a little too much for what he's trying to accomplish.

The book, which was originally published in a serial format for New York Times Magazine, is a solid and fairly sprawling adventure tale. There's plenty of sword fighting, thievery, and traveling, but it's paired with a nice sense of wit and cleverness. The book fits with this subtle resurgence of wide-eyed, boyhood abandon in literature that started with the Dangerous Book for Boys. Maybe that's an over statement, perhaps it's not a resurgence across the literary world, but it is in my field of vision, as I find myself dipping more into pulp and genre fiction. The packaging for Chabon's book adds to all of this, with maps printed on the inside cover and illustrations by Gary Gianni, who does the Prince Valiant comic strip.

Gentlemen contributes, and takes away from, the sense of adventure and simple action that I've been craving. The story, which is a basic tale of two wanderers getting pulled into protecting a child and overthrowing a government, could have been written competently by any number of hack writers; but only under Chabon's watchful eye could it have been infused with the style, color, and subject matter that it has. Chabon's choice to make the story about "Jews with swords" is inspired, but also leads to lots of daunting jargon and complicated names. When you combine the names and titles with Chabon's already-challenging form of writing, the story takes a back seat to style. Chabon's use of metaphors and similes in the middle of what should be up-front, visceral action also dampens the excitement, causing the reader to slow down and ponder exactly what just happened. In the afterword, Chabon talks about how he's never written about action or weapons before, short of a 9mm pistol in Wonder Boys, and it shows. He manages to make gigantic, epic battles and sieges seem small and isolated, as if the entire thing is taking place in a literary fog of war.

The adventure novel that he's attempting to resurrect is something that should be simple, quick, and exciting. I liken it to the pulp short stories (from The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps) that I've been reading, which aren't high literature by any means. The beauty of the pulp is that it's immediately accessible, and Gentlemen isn't.

That isn't to say the book is bad; quite the contrary it's a fun, brief read. Chabon's style may be dense and elaborate, but it's always a joy to read, regardless of what he's writing about. The book, rather succeeding as one complete package, succeeds on two different levels. It's an entertaining romp through the Middle East, while at the same time filled with colorful, unique prose. It was an interesting experiment for Michael Chabon, and it's honorable that he's trying his hand at various areas of genre fiction. Perhaps the interest he's creating in these areas will spark other authors to follow suit.

In the mean time, I'm looking forward to starting his other new novel, The Yiddish Policemen's Union.