flâneur

Every Novel Is Boring—Until It Isn’t - Public Books

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With almost every novel I read, I go through the same arc. At first the novel bores me. Then, suddenly, it becomes the most interesting thing in the world. Suddenly, I have made it through the part that was creating my investment in the novel—and now it is all payoff. Now the novel is not just something whose artistry I can appreciate, but something I first order want to keep reading. I call this point in a novel its volta. The term comes from poetry, where it denotes a shift that sonnets exhibit between their opening octave and concluding sestet or between their first 12 lines and final couplet. At this juncture, the speaker of the poem adopts a new perspective on whatever he has been discussing. (In Italian, one meaning of volta is “turn.”) Rather than a shift in perspective, the volta in a novel is a shift to visceral enjoyment. Even as someone who loves novels, I rely on my expectation of a volta to keep me going. I push through unpromising beginnings, even middles, trusting that e

With almost every novel I read, I go through the same arc. At first the novel bores me. Then, suddenly, it becomes the most interesting thing in the world. Suddenly, I have made it through the part that was creating my investment in the novel—and now it is all payoff. Now the novel is not just something whose artistry I can appreciate, but something I first order want to keep reading. I call this point in a novel its volta. The term comes from poetry, where it denotes a shift that sonnets exhibit between their opening octave and concluding sestet or between their first 12 lines and final…

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