I suppose I'm more introspective during the colder months of the year and gravitate towards literary fiction. I'll be found with dark academia novels, emotional masterpieces, and classics for the month of December. Along the way, I decided to try something I found a bit intimidating. After hearing its name for years, I finally decided to pick up The Secret History by Donna Tartt.
Overview of The Secret History
The Secret History was written in 1992 but became especially popular in the last several years. It's a defining novel, too, in the subcategory of dark academia.
The novel follows our main character, Richard Papen, as he transfers to a college in Vermont, trading the sunny skies of California for a more bitter environment. Having some experience with language, particularly Greek, Richard seeks to learn more about the elusive classics department. After some convincing, the classics professor, Julian, accepts Richard as the sixth student in the course of study.
This decision to join the classics department is a moment that changes his life, which we spend the novel understanding.
An Ongoing Process of Analysis
One of my biggest appeals was the narration. As mentioned, we follow Richard's point of view, but it's a version of Richard reflecting on these events. It's a clever tactic to gain the facts of the events with additional insights about where to pay attention. More so, I like that we have an unreliable narrator since it makes the whole story even more contemplative about what's truly accurate. Just like how the classics are somewhat outdated and distant, the students are incredibly distant from Richard, since he is an outsider due to his social standing. So for a good portion of the novel, we have a romanticized version of the others because Richard is seeing the mystique and prestige. When reflecting back on the narrative, Richard has a semblance of love still for some of them, so even when their various cruelties are laid bare, it's done in a way that diminishes it or glosses over it. The themes of disillusionment and isolation really shine in Richard's narration to showcase his perpetual status as an outsider and the way he sees others more clearly over the course of his narrative.
Richard gets swept into the beauty of his classmates, the classics, and the air of privilege he becomes associated with. Yet, from an outside perspective, the beauty he saw in these things was surprisingly hard to find. For example, Richard admires his professor Julian because of his charisma, knowledge, etc., but Julian's presence on the page is surprisingly lacking, so the audience can't see what Richard sees. This continues with actual insights into the classics that they study. The novel sacrifices characters and academia to focus on its critiques of elitism and classism. While it has interesting things to say, the novel never quite finds a balance. Characters and experiences outside of Richard lack the same dimension and nuance that he's granted. Because of this too, the novel can be difficult to read at some points. The novel consistently doubled down on being dense and pointed. Likewise, the other classmates are relentlessly flawed in insufferable and unlikable ways with little room for development. The narrative becomes so focused on Richard's experience with this main mystery that it can be found lacking with things to say in other interesting areas.
While I see the appeal of The Secret History in its mysterious plot and descent into chaos, the lack of balance in character and thematic exploration detracts me from the full marks of the novel. There were things I found interesting and things I certainly didn't like or think necessary, so this is one I'm still contemplating.
Conclusion
Overall, The Secret History is a complex story. It's dark and atmospheric and delves into the worst nature of people. At the same time, I think the emphasis is less on academia, and more on classism, elitism, and the resultant spoiled adults. While it's also an interesting look into isolation, consequences, and messy entanglements, I felt like the only character who benefited from these themes was Richard, as he was the only one to seemingly have learned something.
While not necessarily my personal favorite novel, this is one I don't think I'll be able to forget.