THE ACCIDENTAL: Everything you ever dreamed of

“I’m everything you ever dreamed”, says one character at some point in Ali Smith’s award winner “The Accidental”. And the person who proclaims it is right. This line can refers both to the character and to the novel itself. This book can blends comedy, drama, romance and tragedy -everything in one combo, and everything satisfyingly executed. Moreover, the writer’s domain of her media in order to set a crescendo is remarkably.

Smith belongs to the tradition of British writers who are not very interested in easily labeled books. And in telling the story of “The Accidental” in “Rashomon” style enables her to toy with many sort of narratives in one single book. Sometimes we can see the same event more than once, but it is never redundant, the `repetition’ has something new to add, a new fact, a new point of view or a new aftermath. That is what makes the book addictively readable.

But, usually, addictively readability does not make great pieces of literature – which hardly the case here. Not only is Smith’s novel bewitching but it also displays her major talent to convert story into images – what makes her novel very filmic. The first reference one can think of is Pasolini’s “Theorem’, but once one reaches the end and digs deeper it is possible to find a strict relation to Lars Von Trier’s “The Idiots”. Both movies and book are dealing with outsiders charming regular people and changing them. It is a one-way street, since this character does not get anything from the people he/she changed.

Smith is more or less the same as her character Amber, the mysterious girl who invades the Smart family life and breaks them into something else. It was not by chance that the writer picked that surname for the family – she points out that people are not as smart as they claim to be. And the subversion of this `happy’ home is the main agenda of “The Accidental”.

However not every segment is as good as the others (Michael’s is the weakest one, but not bad), “The Accidental” is a great book as whole. One of those that keeps reader thinking long after he/she has finished it. The novel does not bring answers. As great art, it poses questions, it brings lights to the dark corners, and leaves the reader wondering what is on the other corners of the room.

Originalmente publicado em www.Amazon.com em 09/08/06