By John Irving

Rs 599

In a town called Little Sister in Vermont a 13-year-old boy is taken to the town library by his soon-to-be stepfather. The young boy Bill, who has a secret crush on his mother’s boyfriend, asks the librarian for a book on crushes on wrong people.

This is year 1955. The visit to the library is a moment of awakening for Bill and Miss Frost, the librarian, becomes the centre of his awakening for the next seven years.
Spoiler alert: It is impossible to write about this book without giving away the best, early surprises. After all, the story hinges on a process of discovery and acceptance of sexual choices. John Irving is not the writer for those who blush at the word sex. Draped in Irving’s words, sex and desire are powerful, unapologetic and unrestrained. So watch your step!
In One Person is Irving’s 13th novel. The story, as narrated by a bisexual male, is as much about sexual differences and tolerance as it is about his personal life and experiences. From being the story of a boy and a transgender the novel takes the whole town and several boys and girls who are “different” in its wake. It grows further, crossing cities and continents, attempting to become the voice of a period and of a silent battle for recognition.
As a young boy Bill has crushes on several people: his stepfather Richard, his school senior Kittredge, his best friend’s mother Martha Headley and not to forget the librarian Miss Frost. Bill hasn’t seen his father and is dolled out conflicting stories about his birth. His mother, he learns in due course of time, is somewhat sexually naïve. His aunt Muriel and grandmother Victoria are prudes who feel everyone else is below them. (Aunt Muriel keeps fainting at every mention of the word sex). Bill’s grandfather, who is a lumberman, competes with his daughter Muriel for female roles in the town theatre productions. Surprisingly, he is often preferred over Muriel. Cross-dressing grandpa Harry’s performances are loved by many but also equally reviled.
The Favourite River Academy, is a boys’ boarding school with its typical homo-hating culture. School psychiatrist Dr Grau tells the boys they are in “a polumorphous-perverse phase” and that they were experiencing “pregenital libidinal fixations”. The much-hated Dr Harlow, on the other hand speaks to them about “treatable afflictions” including “an unwelcome sexual attraction to other boys and men.”
While Bill’s life at the boarding school is occupied by his conflicting crushes, it is also occupied, in equal measure by theatre. Bill is cast in the role of “sexually mutable” Aerial while his nemesis Kittredge is Ferdinand and grandfather Harry is a female Caliban.
Bill has a speech difficulty. While The Tempest is being played, he is unable to say “Thou liest” or later the word “shadow” in King Lear. Miss Frost helps him with these two effectively but his difficulty with the word penis stays till the end. Kittredge, the seemingly alpha male, is the cause of much distress to Bill. He is a great wrestler and an equally good actor but he is also a bully. He calls Bill “Nymph” and is effortlessly mean to both Billy and his friend Elaine.
Bill is forced to come out with his sexual differences after a scandal that follows Bill’s discovery of the one-time unbeaten wrestling champion Big El. Soon after, Bill also cracks the puzzle about his missing father Franny Dean. Bill is barred from meeting Miss Frost who is suspended from the library and forced to relocate. Miss Frost leaves, but not before teaching Bill a wrestler’s “duck under”, preparing him for the fight he was yet to face. In 1961, Bill’s school life ends after a brief Europe tour with Tom Atkins who constantly yearns for Bill’s attention. Bill never sees Miss Frost again. But Kitteredge and Atkins resurge later, both with their pack of secrets and tragedy.
The story branches out into Bill and Elaine’s numerous experiences. In the 80s, “the plague” strikes. Bill loses several friends to AIDS. While Larry, once his professor-lover, toils to help the ailing, Bill watches from a distance. It is only when Larry falls ill that Bill takes charge and owns up responsibility to those like him.
Irving gives it the perfect ending with Bill resolving the most crucial and yet unexplored aspect of his life. The story is told in a tragi-comic light. While it is not what one would call a “simple story”, the humour brings in the sense of simplicity in a complex world. The cliché-encumbered grandmother, the aunt who doesn’t want to be stared at, the Norwegian lumberman who has a passion for drama or the “damaged” mother who is easily seduced, provide the essential breathing spaces.
In the novel, sex is crucial and bold. While it is kept between two people; man-man, man-woman, man-transsexual; sex here is more about individuals and their specific requirements and responses. Irving is not short of words while writing about sex, but in each case his purpose is clear. Far from being either comic or gagging, the sex scenes make you sit up and savour, irrespective of who is involved.
The ending sees a somewhat heroic return of Bill. He does for a “work-in-progress” girl what Miss Frost had done for him. A revolution comes of age as the girl introduces herself “Gee will do for now… but I’m going to be Georgia someday.” Moreover, its not just LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender), but also a Q for questioning.