Seven Types of Ambiguity

by Elliot Perlman

Paperback, 2005

Call number

FIC PER

Collection

Publication

Riverhead Books (2005), 640 pages

Description

At once a psychological thriller and a social critique, is a story of obsessive love in an age of obsessive materialism. Of impulse and paralysis, of empty marriages, lovers and a small boy, gambling and the market, of adult children and their parents, of poetry and prostitution, psychiatry and the law.

User reviews

LibraryThing member bookaholixanon
A magnificent book. If the overlap in the stories and points of view of the different characters, and the "ambiguity" about "what happened" this creates is going to annoy you, either check yourself severely, or read something else, but don't "project" your problems onto the book. Because of the way
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the story was told, I believe it was utterly necessary for the narrative, with each change-of-character's point of view, to pick up, not quite write the previous narrator left off, but somewhat prior to that. Doing this also enhanced the contrast – sometimes subtle, sometimes profound – between one narrator's perspective and another's. If different narrators are not to be permitted to describe "the same" events, how does the reader find out about the differences in their perspectives? It can't (or maybe shouldn't) be done solely through innuendo and indirection. (Remember, the word "ambiguity" is featured in the title of the book; why deny the author a full opportunity to develop said ambiguity?)

Amazing, too, that a book like this could have a "surprise ending", given the way it was structured ... but I'd have to say that it absolutely did: the fallibility of my memory notwithstanding, I've read this book twice and I was surprised by the ending both times.

Is it an "easy" read? Very few 640-page novels are. Is it a compelling read? I definitely found it to be so. The "secret" to appreciating this, to my mind, was my habit of persistently dwelling in the nuances of that key word, ambiguity, taking the book at its own pace (not insisting that it conform to mine), and reflecting on the potential implications of the different points of view of the different characters. Essentially all books have multiple characters with multiple points of view; very view are genuine artistic meditations on that theme, as this one is.
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LibraryThing member Esquiress
Amazingly complex. Practically Dickensian in how truly tied together all 7 of these characters are. Mind-exercising vocabulary. Compelling characters that are true-to-life - almost too much so at times. Truly a literary work of art.
LibraryThing member Didou
"Seven Types of Ambiguity" is a fiction about ambiguity in human relationships by an Australian writer Elliot Perlman. The book consists of 7 parts, each told the story and viewed what happened differently. Some of the views are from a psychiatrist (Dr. Klima) and a prostitute (Angelique) amongst
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the views of the central character Simon Heywood and his object of affection Anna.

What begun as an unrequited love grows to be an obsession and then a kid is suddenly missing. What happened? Who has done wrong? By the end of the book, the line between the protagonist and antagonist has blurred and you will find yourself questioning and changing your views about the situation or the character many times throughout.

Full of emotional, intellectual and moral dilemmas. This book is a joy to read. Although the 7 characters can be distingusihed clearly, they sometimes still appear similar, in that they have a similar inner voice. Nevertheless, the same situation never told the same. Each chapter always progress and put new insights into the situation itself and definitely not boring. You'll learn a bit about the market, gambling, prostitution, psychiaty and the law. Quite a thick book, but I really enjoyed reading it.
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LibraryThing member pdebolt
This is a truly remarkable book by an very talented Austrailian author. It is a multi-layered story told in seven separate sections by seven distinct characters. The main plot has issues that swirl around it in a dizzying assortment that are seemingly unrelated until the final chapter. It is
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impossible to put down this book; the concepts are thought-provoking and cover a vast range. It is more than 600 pages in length, but what I gained by reading it was well worth the time involved.
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LibraryThing member sainsborough
Before I begin, let me say that if it's possible to read a book badly, that's what I did. It took me months to read the first third of the book and I would be the first to admit that this would have affected my impression of it. However, it's also possible that the shortcomings of the book
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influenced how I read it.
Although there is no doubt that it is the product of a formidable intelligence, it is flawed. For all the skilled dissection of contemporary human dilemma, this transpires in a bland landscape with no atmosphere - there are no birds twittering, there is no water lapping at the river bank and there are no colours in the sky. There is no humour. All the voices are Elliot Perlman's - I've never met any women who think like his female characters. The interactions are like a tabloid article about some inner city drama, fleshed out by a journalist with uncommon powers of 'acuity', but for all the sophistication, this doesn't lift the dreariness.
At times, the reading felt like being forced to listen to an over-analytical, verbose and self-obsessed acquaintance. I didn't warm to the book. It has my respect but not my affection. Clever stuff, but not my thing.
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LibraryThing member ggodfrey
This novel takes its title and central theme from William Empson's classic textabout ambiguity in poetic language. Watered down, Empson believed that ambiguity--the possibility for differing interpretations of an openly structured text--was a mark of literary value, and Elliot Perlman applies this
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idea of ambiguity to human relationships.

The most central of the 7 central characters is Simon, who ranks with Dostoevsky's Prince Myshkin as one of the great morally admirable, intellectually brilliant, and yet pitiably naive fools in literature. Simon idealizes an ex-girlfriend so much that he becomes obsessed over her and descends into madness, eventually kidnapping her son in an attempt to renew their relationship. We get inside views of these events not only from Simon, but from his psychiatrist, his prostitute girlfriend, his ex-girlfriend, his ex-girlfriend's current husband, his ex-girlfriend's current husband's business associate, and finally from the daughter of his psychiatrist looking back on the events from much later.

The result is a challenging and interesting look at the workings of relationships between people and how expectations and subjectivity can cloud and distort reality. Are all relationships commercial? Are they more than just practical bonds? Is the whore/client relationship the purest of all? Is there a difference between such relationships and lawyer/client doctor/patient--even husband/wife bonds? There's lots to digest here in 600+ pages, and at times the characters lose their individual voices and become mouthpieces for the author's opinions about politics, academe, and other writers. But these are minor faults--despite its failings Seven Types of Ambiguity is worth the time, and perhaps deserves re-reading. Interesting stuff.
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LibraryThing member ilovejfranzen
Man I am sooooo disappointed in this book! I used a precious book voucher to buy it because it said that Pearlman was Australia's answer to Jonathan Franzen.

I can't remember reading a more contrived and annoying novel than this. All the characters are interconnected - the central character, Simon
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is obsessed with his ex-girlfriend. The ex-girlfriend's husband sees a prostitute, who is Simon's girlfriend. Simon's psychiatrist campaigned against managed care and caused the ex-girlfriend's husband to lose a major stockbroking deal. The ex-girlfriend's husband's colleague also falls in love with Simon's prostitute girlfriend and is seeing Simon's pyschiatrist. Simon's lawyer is having an affair with his psychiatrist - Why? Why? Why?

Perlman also goes into excruciating detail about things that don't go anywhere, just to show off it seems - we are subjected to long boring treatises on poets and poker that don't add anything to the authenticity of the characters or story. No one knows that much about one thing and if they do, they don't spout it in an almost unbroken monologue that is Perlman's literary tool of choice.

Am I missing something????
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LibraryThing member jawalter
I know it's not fair to judge a book by the blurb on its cover, but as I was reading it, I kept coming back to the quote from the New York Times Book Review calling it "Rashomonian." Because what struck me about Rashomon is the idea that when events are explored from the perspectives of multiple
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involved individuals, discrepancies will emerge not just in questions of opinion or motivation, but in matters of fact. In other words, it's not just 'why' that's up for grabs, but also 'who,' 'what,' 'when,' and 'where.'

And therein, fundamentally, lies my problem with Seven Types of Ambiguity, because, for the most part, there's not nearly enough ambiguity. Because Perlman never asks us to grapple with questions of fact, we're left with a story where questions of emotion and opinion will basically only wind up with one possible answer. Those answers will differ from reader to reader, perhaps, but there's no ambiguity here; either you like a character or you don't. Either you buy into their reasoning and justification, or you don't.

For me, personally, I found most of the characters either pretentious and boring or cartoonish buffoons. In part, this is due to the fact that the narration, despite jumping from character to character, shares a single, consistent voice. Taken out of context, almost any sentence in the book could have been uttered by any of the narrators, despite different emotional perspectives. But even more to the point, neither Simon nor Anna ever seem worthy of the pedestals upon which they are placed, and in a book which revolves so heavily around the obsession with which others react to them, this is a major flaw.

The book isn't all bad, however. I was intrigued by the ways in which all the random puzzle pieces gradually came together, and I wanted to hear more from Angela and Mitch, both of whom seemed far more deserving of a more central role than Simon, Alex, or Anna. More than anything, though, I wish this was a book I could come back to and rediscover in some wholly new way, rather than just running through the same emotional gauntlet.
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LibraryThing member whirled
I really enjoyed this book....for a while. About 200 pages in I started to feel as though I was reading Perlman's journals; that is, rambling - and sometimes cringeworthy - private musings. He goes off on lengthy tangents about psychology, prostitution and cheating at blackjack, among many other
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topics. Overall, it's an average novel with occasional flashes of brilliance.
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LibraryThing member grudknows
I bought it, mostly, because I loved the title. I enjoyed it... a story told from seven different perspectives/people - each story overlapping at some point. The descriptions in some of the book were fantastic, making you want to savour every word.
LibraryThing member NotSunkYet
I thoroughly enjoyed this work. Being the only work I’ve read in this format, the story being written from seven different characters perspectives, it made me stop and think about all the times in my life where I’ve had problems (read: communicationally challenged) with others and never really
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stopped to think that they may have had a totally different perspective, no matter how cut-and-dried I thought the issue was. It humbled me from that perspective. It’s made me have a much deeper curiosity now about what people in my life may really be thinking and feeling, not just the superficial stuff that people let others see. Yes, this book got me thinking.
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LibraryThing member Bookmarque
Even though it took me 6 weeks to finish this, I count it as one of the best books I’ve read all year. Ironically, I can’t really decide why. Maybe it’s the 8th type of ambiguity. I didn’t find this to be a thriller exactly, but it did have definitive psychological elements and lots of
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social critique/commentary. It looked inward without the overbearing smugness of say, The Corrections. It also featured characters that, while flawed, weren’t entirely unlikeable as they were in Franzen’s nightmare.

First, I liked the structure. Multiple point-of-view novels always fascinate me, but this one had a progression that stepped each narrative along a bit in time. Sure, each section covered much of the same ground, but also advanced the story both in linear time and in our knowledge of what happened. Each narrator has something to add, even if it isn’t immediately clear. A lot of explanation comes from another perspective and things click into place. I liked that a lot. It kept things fresh which is sometimes hard when retelling some of the same information.

Secondly, I liked that the author was able to give each storyteller a different voice. From the delivery style to the choice of words, I felt as if many people wrote this instead of just one. Remarkable. Unfortunately in the end, there was one last party I would have liked to have heard from; Sam himself.

Third is the story itself. It's not a thriller exactly, but it is relatively tense. It offers a lot of insight without getting smug or smarmy. The author makes no judgements about the characters he creates. He's just telling the story; with sensitivity and a sense of progression and the need for consequences. Nicely done.
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LibraryThing member davidroche
A quite extraordinary novel. Top 10 ever again. You must read this ridiculously well kept secret
LibraryThing member CarolynSchroeder
This is a hard novel to review in that it is so incredibly groundbreaking. That said, it's one of the best books I've ever read. The characters resonate long after the novel is finished and it makes you wonder if the things you see people do are real. It's a fascinating account of seven people's
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views of a set of circumstances. Despite its length, I soared through it. It has elements of a mystery, a crime novel, fascinating forays into psychiatry and just interesting character studies. I felt the chapter on Mitch/Dennis was pretty misplaced, he just didn't seem to matter or fit that well into the tapestry as the others did. But it's a small complaint. Great novel. Highly recommended.
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LibraryThing member davidroche
Re-read. Still fab.
LibraryThing member kirstiecat
This story is really engrossing and has to do with how one event is seen from seven different angles. Even when it is slightly redundant though, it is different in the way that each perspective perceives the event (written from alternating first person points of view) And of, course, each time we
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read about the incident through the eyes of someone else, our view is changed and we realize as the reader, we are removed from any state of mind considering objectivity. It's quite experimental in this way though not in terms of the actual writing style. Very difficult to put down until the end...
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LibraryThing member tcskeptic
Outstanding. A single narrative told progressively from seven different points of view. As the story unfolds your understanding of the facts lurch and change, go into and out of focus.
LibraryThing member elmoelle
At its most basic level, this book is about a man who kidnaps the child of his college girlfriend, whom he hasn't seen in ten years, and who is tried in court for this crime. However, that description doesn't really do justice to the grand ideas lurking in every nook and cranny of this amazing
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novel.
The story is told in seven sections, from the point of view of various players in the drama of the kidnapping. Each section brings new information to the story, adding bits and pieces to clarify the motives behind each of the players. At a later point in the book you may learn something that completely changes what you thought earlier about a certain character or a certain event. This slight of hand did not leave me feeling tricked by the author, but instead made me impressed with the scope of the universe he had created. If the story was told from only one point of view, it would seem quite basic, but the varying points of view add a significant depth. I found it most interesting that the subject of the kidnapping, Sam, is never given his own voice and it is only through those who care about him that the reader has any understanding of him. Of course, because each of the other characters are shown to be quite different from the way they are perceived by others, it is quite interesting to speculate as to how Sam experienced his life.
The theme running through all of the action in this story is the failure of humans in modern society to have any real compassion or empathy for their fellow humans. We have been compelled by forces all around us---corporations, government, media---to only care about ourselves, what possessions we can obtain and how successful we can be that we have lost all sense of community. Each of the characters in this book have their own struggle with this theme, ranging from a man who clearly sees this failure and is unable to function in society because of it to a man who thinks he has mastered the new dynamic, only to see himself emerge as cannon fodder.
I would highly recommended this book to anyone interested in people's interaction with society and the economy or to anyone interested in reading a very unique thriller.
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LibraryThing member lesleynicol
I was about to write a review saying how much I enjoyed this book and then I read the review below by Elmoelle 09 Aug 2013. A terrific review which really says everything I would have said, so please read it. All that I can add is that we see things from our own point of view but walk awhile in
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someone-else's shoes and you acquire a completely different viewpoint.
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LibraryThing member jonfaith
It is surprising that I hadn't included this previously. There was at the time of its publication a certain buzz about the book, one hued all Franzen-like and I found out that it was availible in a local library outside of our county (this was before reciprocity) and I arranged for a friend to
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check out the novel and i quickly read such in the wake. It was very bleh; authorial wrinkles, people living suburban lives with a thoughtful poet at the core. Okay.
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LibraryThing member sbenne3
I was a bit intimidated to start this one, but when I did I was intrigued all the way until the end. Somehow the author managed to advance the story in a thoughtful way through so many characters' viewpoints without diluting the story or taking an unnecessary turn. To me, this book was about mental
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health and how it impacted the lives of so many people manifesting itself in so many (7 perhaps?) ways (substance abuse, depression, abuse, etc.). I am always critical of a lack of character development in a book - this one had it in spades!
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Awards

Miles Franklin Literary Award (Shortlist — 2004)

Pages

640

ISBN

1594481431 / 9781594481437

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