Barnes’ The Man in the Red Coat is a delight, doubly so.
First, because it is really very witty, and surprises and delights with an entertaining anecdote and a well turned epigram on every page. And, secondly, because it treats of perhaps the last era — La Belle Epoque they call it in France — during which the now extinct animal, the connoisseur, was still alive. Indeed, it takes as its heroes three connoisseurs, and starts with their “aesthetic and intellectual shopping expedition” to London.
It is of course, significant, that two of the three were actively unemployed, i.e. had the time and the resources to devote to appreciation of art and culture. It takes years of devoted hard work to build familiarity with the extant oeuvre of any classical art and therefore years to develop the eye and ear, it takes a lifetime to master several. Which is why the connoisseur practically requires social injustice — not just unequal but unmeritricious income distribution. The connoisseur is not idle, but he is not productive.
The third of the three, the red-coat-man of the title, was unusual, in that he was a very busy and productive professional (surgeon, teacher, hospital director) with a packed social calendar and an active love life. Was he a connoisseur, also? His collection — auctioned off after his death; and the invitation by the other two to join them on the expedition to London; suggests he could at least play the part. But then some people are like that, their day seems to have many more hours than that of an average mortal.
As one reads, following the heroes’ interests has one constantly looking things up in wikipedia and art museum sights: painters, composers, poets, sights, the connoisseur’s reading par excellence. Delightful.
As the book progresses, it begins to draw into its narrative more and more famous French, English and American people – indeed, it is interesting that most of them were at one point featured in a sort of celebrity collecting card of the day. And as the cast of characters increases one begins to notice that, except for the poetry and prose they wrote, or music they composed, or art they consumed, these people were really not very different from my high school classmates. They were preoccupied with social standing, popularity and sexual gossip. Could it really have been all that exciting to be present at one of their salons?
Above: some paintings by Odilon Redon: I did not know this painter.
Julian Barnes, The Man in the Red Coat
Oltre Mare 