Word: aikens
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...certainly no cardinal sin and hardly a unique characteristic in twentieth century literature. But when plot development stalls in Wolfe and Durroll, their brilliant use of language sustains our interest. The language in Eliot's poetry is hypnotic even when rational comprehension of his writing eludes us completely. Aiken, however, lacks the stylistic mastery of an Eliot or a Wolfe...
...Aiken's virtue as a novelist is not the way he writes, but the way he sees. Durrell has asked, "What is life but the way we interpret the silences around us?" Aiken interprets the silences of our lives and compels us to feel their pain. "Psychological novel" would be the term to describe the type of book Aiken writes, but no academic categorization or paraphrase can capture the poignancy and depth of his perception...
...part of Blue Voyage a man and a woman sit and talk about nothing in particular. No action: yet under Aiken's incisive eye the scene comes alive...
Such piercing introspection is Aiken's greatest talent, as well as the framework on which he hangs his personal Weltanschauung. For he believes that the real nature of human existence manifests itself not in overt actions but in painful silences...
Throughout Aiken's writing we witness the human tendency toward self-destruction. "We specialize in smash-ups," says Andren Cather, the drunken hero of Great Circle. "If there's anything we dearly love, it's a nice little smash-up." This aspect of life is sharply portrayed in Blue Voyage. The hero, Demarest, speaks of a love he will never recapture: "There's no concealing the suffering it has brought, that frightful and inescapable and unwearying consciousness of the unattainable...