Sabina Murray. (2016). Valiant Gentlemen: A Novel. Grove Atlantic.

Sabina Murray. 2016. Valiant Gentlemen: A Novel. Grove Atlantic.

Sabina Murray, Valiant Gentlemen: A Novel. Grove Atlantic, 2016.

Sabina Murray. Valiant Gentlemen: A Novel. Grove Atlantic, 2016.

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   • fileAs: Murray, Sabina
   • bioText: Sabina Murray grew up in Australia and the Philippines and is a member of the MFA faculty at the University of Massachusetts. She is the author of Slow Burn, A Carnivore's Inquiry and The Caprices, which won the 2003 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. She was recently awarded a Guggengheim Fellowship.
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Valiant Gentlemen

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A New York Times Notable Book from the PEN/Faulkner Award–winning author. “An imaginative exploration of the tragedy of lost friendship” (Los Angeles Times).
 
In prose that is darkly humorous and alive with detail, Valiant Gentlemen reimagines the lives and intimate friendships of humanitarian and Irish patriot Roger Casement; his closest friend, Herbert Ward; and Ward’s extraordinary wife, the Argentinian American heiress Sarita Sanford. Valiant Gentlemen takes the reader on an intimate journey, from Ward and Casement’s misadventurous youth in the Congo—where, among other things, they bore witness to an Irish whiskey heir’s taste for cannibalism—to Ward’s marriage to Sarita and their flourishing family life in France, to Casement’s covert homosexuality and enduring nomadic lifestyle floating between his work across the African continent and involvement in Irish politics.
 
When World War I breaks out, Casement and Ward’s longstanding political differences finally come to a head and when Ward and his teenage sons leave to fight on the frontlines for England, Casement begins to work alongside the Germans to help free Ireland from British rule. What results is tragic and riveting, as both men are forced to confront notions of love and betrayal in the face of the vastly different tracks their lives have taken.
 
Reminiscent of the work of Peter Carey and Michael Ondaatje, Valiant Gentlemen is a uniquely human account of some of early twentieth century’s larger historical figures from a “ravishing” (O, The Oprah Magazine) and “brilliant” voice in fiction today (The Boston Globe).

reviews

1. • premium: False
   • source: David Leavitt, New York Times Book Review
   • content: "A novel as vigorous, audacious and unpredictable as Casement himself . . . [Murray] translates the past into a present as immediate as it is unnerving."
2. • premium: False
   • source: Brock Clarke, Boston Globe
   • content: "Written beautifully, from the point of view of a writer who cares deeply . . . That the novel can be so despairingly honest about a writer's limitations while still be so entertaining says a lot about Murray's considerable talent."
3. • premium: False
   • source: Michael Upchurch, Washington Post
   • content: "A big, ambitious book . . . [with] intelligence and sly prose . . . Murray is canny in tracing the near-imperceptible stages by which Casement and Ward land on opposite sides of bitterly divisive issues . . . She has a knack for alluding to the era's public events and concerns in a manner that lets us understand their impact and influence without her laboring over their details--an indispensable gift for a historical novelist . . . [A] wise, illuminating novel."
4. • premium: False
   • source: Siobhan Fallon, New York Journal of Books
   • content: "Expansive . . . Nimbly shifting continents, decades, and political alliances, Sabina Murray does a brilliant job imbuing grand chunks of black and white history with color-breathing fire. Yet there is a haunted feel to the novel . . . Valiant Gentlemen recreates an entire, magnificent era, exploring identity, friendship, marriage, love, and grief, tracing the days of two great men from passionate youth to disenchanted old age. Upstanding men who chased ideals that would never be realized, who never viewed themselves as valiant or worthy enough for the age in which they lived. Men who Murray has, through the power of her keen writing and sweeping insight, resurrected, letting the heroism of their lives outshine their small and human frailties."
5. • premium: False
   • source: Los Angeles Times
   • content: "[Murray] ingeniously links two young friends . . . ultimately the novel is an imaginative exploration of the tragedy of lost friendship."
6. • premium: False
   • source: Washington Independent Review of Books
   • content: "A rich, compulsively readable story of friendship, colonialism, and the burden of moral ambiguity . . . an engrossing novel, by turns dark and funny, incisive and tender--an I-can't-talk-now-I'm-deep-in-Africa kind of read . . . Murray's language is gorgeously devastating, succinct and muscular, hefting multiple meanings . . . Virtually every word vibrates with under- and overtones. Images are nuanced; verbs surprise and delight . . . Murray shows perfect pitch in dialogue, along with an uncanny ability to define character, provide exposition, and develop the plot, sometimes all within the same sentence . . . a leisurely, penetrating rumination on loving relationships, on loyalty, on the meaning of valor, on betrayal, on the nature of civilization, and on the excruciating fun of storytelling itself."
7. • premium: False
   • source: Toronto Star
   • content: "Richly researched, Murray's epic rendering of [this] story takes a deep dive into [a] volatile era."
8. • premium: False
   • source: Dallas News
   • content: "This book reveals an impressive breadth of research, which Murray naturally weaves into her vibrant scenes."
9. • premium: False
   • source: VICE
   • content: "What Murray's novel does very well is recreate the surprise and fascination of these men's lives."
10. • premium: False
    • source: Winnipeg Free Press
    • content: "Murray's meticulous attention to historical detail . . . is an engaging read filled with vivid characters and edifying perspectives. It will appeal to history buffs as well as readers of literary fiction."
11. • premium: False
    • source: Missourian
    • content: "A fascinating, moving and epic account of the friendship between two men over 33 years . . . With a wide canvas of history before her, Murray explores the notions of national identity, foreign rule and resistance, love, personality, friendship and betrayal, social justice, suffrage, cruelties suffered by indigenous peoples, and of course war. It's a difficult trick to allow your characters to age and wrestle with self-doubt and the disappointments of the world. Murray carries this off convincingly."
12. • premium: False
    • source: Publishers Weekly (starred review)
    • content: "Brimming with exquisite detail and clever humor . . . [Murray] maintains an impressive balance of historical accuracy and dramatic momentum, crafting a stellar fiction that shows how the grand course of history can be shaped by the smallest disagreements between friends."
13. • premium: False
    • source: Library Journal
    • content: "An affecting novel about the unraveling of friendship under the buffetings of history. It's wise enough and good...
14. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      Starred review from August 22, 2016
      Brimming with exquisite detail and clever humor, PEN/Faulkner winner Murray’s wondrously written historical novel ferries a vivid cast of characters across continents and decades, from the sweltering jungles of 19th-century Africa to cosmopolitan Paris in the wake of World War I. Here the close-knit avatars of history are Roger Casement, an Irish revolutionary, and Herbert Ward, a former circus performer turned devoted husband and father. Early chapters follow the two friends into cannibalistic villages and Manhattan’s earliest gay bars, along the Continental Railroad and speaking tours of the West Coast, eventually to Ward’s marriage to Sarita Sanford, a headstrong Argentinian-American heiress. The cracks in the central friendship fissure at the advent of the Great War, with Ward fighting alongside his son for England, Casement lending his talents to the Germans, who promise to free Ireland from British control. As in Tales of the New World and The Caprices, the author maintains an impressive balance of historical accuracy and dramatic momentum, crafting a stellar fiction that shows how the grand course of history can be shaped by the smallest disagreements between friends. Agent: Zachary Shuster Harmsworth, Zachary Shuster Harmsworth Literary Agency.

15. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      A long yarn recounting the life of Irish revolutionary Roger Casement and real-life best friend Herbert Ward, the British writer and artist.It won't be a spoiler to note that Casement was executed for treason by the British government, having traveled to Germany during World War I to solicit help for the cause of Irish independence. Did personal motivations underlie his devotion to that cause, perhaps connected to his guarded but evident homosexuality? ("Someone was saying at dinner that you're like Wolf Tone," one interlocutor says. "Maybe he liked boys?") Certainly, Murray (Tales of the New World, 2011, etc.) recounts, Casement's friendship with Ward was unusually deep; in a closing moment, Ward finds a photograph that Casement has folded in half to exclude two other figures, so that "it appeared that they had been photographed as a couple." But there is another love at play once Ward and Casement emerge from their career-defining adventures in the wilds of Africa: Sarita Sanford, a fetching heiress savvy enough to know that taking up with Ward is a fiscal risk that will pay off in "a loss of innocence"--to which she appends the dismissive thought, "How romantic." Though the novel is populated with other characters, the essence of the story is the triangle formed by Sanford, Ward, and Casement; of the three, Sanford is the most interesting. Murray casts inevitable tragedy ("She feels a grip--a chill--and wonders why of all things she's feeling this: the pull of grief"), but while she has a good eye for character, some of the energy of the story melts away in pointless chatter. The storyline could stand some tightening, too, though it resolves nicely. Not at all bad, but given that Mario Vargas Llosa covered much of the same ground in his superior 2010 novel, The Dream of the Celt, Murray's version of the Casement story seems superfluous. COPYRIGHT(1) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

16. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      September 1, 2016
      Murray (Forgery, 2007) returns to historical fiction with this account of the 40-year friendship of writer and sculptor Herbert Ward and Irish patriot Roger Casement. The two meet in 1886 as young men working and gallivanting in the Congo. Ward uses this experience as inspiration for his artistic pursuits, but Casement, haunted by the treatment of the tribal people, turns to a life of humanitarianism, while also fighting for Irish independence. They go their separate ways, Ward marrying Argentinian-American heiress Sarita Sanford, who proves to be a scene-stealer, and Casement gets further involved in politics heading into WWI. They remain friends until political differences lead to betrayal and tragedy. Murray has clearly done her homework and aptly shows not only the larger-than-life personalities of her protagonists but also their quieter, interior lives. Historical-fiction fans will be captivated by this highly readable account of British colonialism and political intrigue couched in the very personal story of the friendship of two remarkable men.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

17. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      June 1, 2016
      

      Just as the centenary of the Easter Rising swings Ireland freshly into view, here is a retelling of the lives and friendships of Irish patriot Roger Casement, close friend Herbert Ward, and Ward's wife, the Argentine American heiress Sarita Sanford. The book opens with the two men enjoying youthful misadventures in the Congo, then moves to Ward's marriage to Sarita, Casement's undercover homosexuality, and, as World War I explodes, the battle to free Ireland from British rule, with Casement and Ward forced to acknowledge their very different politics. From PEN/Faulkner Award winner Murray; with a five-city tour.

      Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

18. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      September 1, 2016
      A long yarn recounting the life of Irish revolutionary Roger Casement and real-life best friend Herbert Ward, the British writer and artist.It won't be a spoiler to note that Casement was executed for treason by the British government, having traveled to Germany during World War I to solicit help for the cause of Irish independence. Did personal motivations underlie his devotion to that cause, perhaps connected to his guarded but evident homosexuality? ("Someone was saying at dinner that you're like Wolf Tone," one interlocutor says. "Maybe he liked boys?") Certainly, Murray (Tales of the New World, 2011, etc.) recounts, Casement's friendship with Ward was unusually deep; in a closing moment, Ward finds a photograph that Casement has folded in half to exclude two other figures, so that "it appeared that they had been photographed as a couple." But there is another love at play once Ward and Casement emerge from their career-defining adventures in the wilds of Africa: Sarita Sanford, a fetching heiress savvy enough to know that taking up with Ward is a fiscal risk that will pay off in "a loss of innocence"--to which she appends the dismissive thought, "How romantic." Though the novel is populated with other characters, the essence of the story is the triangle formed by Sanford, Ward, and Casement; of the three, Sanford is the most interesting. Murray casts inevitable tragedy ("She feels a grip--a chill--and wonders why of all things she's feeling this: the pull of grief"), but while she has a good eye for character, some of the energy of the story melts away in pointless chatter. The storyline could stand some tightening, too, though it resolves nicely. Not at all bad, but given that Mario Vargas Llosa covered much of the same ground in his superior 2010 novel, The Dream of the Celt, Murray's version of the Casement story seems superfluous.

      COPYRIGHT(2016) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

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In prose that is darkly humorous and alive with detail, Valiant Gentlemen reimagines the lives and intimate friendships of humanitarian and Irish patriot Roger Casement; his closest friend, Herbert Ward; and Ward’s extraordinary wife, the Argentinian American heiress Sarita Sanford. Valiant Gentlemen takes the reader on an intimate journey, from Ward and Casement’s misadventurous youth in the Congo—where, among other things, they bore witness to an Irish whiskey heir’s taste for cannibalism—to Ward’s marriage to Sarita and their flourishing family life in France, to Casement’s covert homosexuality and enduring nomadic lifestyle floating between his work across the African continent and involvement in Irish politics.

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