What Made Thee: A Sobering Tally by Willard Thurston
“Has anyone in this crowd thought much about — What made thee? What Made Thee? Not who you slept with last or why you put that chalk dust up your nose but — What made thee? Where did you, babe, dude or specialist come from? Why and how? Stuff like that. What made thee?”
These words, part of an odd, ranting schtick by an alcoholic stand-up comedian, form the setup for What Made Thee: A Sobering Tally by Canadian author Willard Thurston. It’s a scene that the comedian’s childhood friend, David Willardson, watches with some degree of pity as The Gryphon (nee Julian Wagner) is eventually escorted off stage, still ranting.
How did such a brilliant, articulate kid end up here, an aging performer, spouting his wry, erudite, drunken observations to a crowd only somewhat cognizant of what the hell he’s going on about? How did David himself wind up so disassociated from the modern world, where “normality, well-being, privilege, antipathy, dissolution — humans ravishing and revolting — had undermined his once serviceable equanimity, which he had imagined would ease his twilight years”?
What made thee, indeed.
AN ARTIST FINDS HIS MUSE AND COVERT ASSIGNMENT GOES AWRY
The Gryphon’s uncomfortable standup routine spurs David’s reminiscences of growing up in Burdock, Saskatchewan, the son of a doctor and a schoolteacher whose Methodist sensibilities were an impediment to his less practical, artistic sensibilities. An adolescent interest in the female form leads him down a path into art — sculpture and drawing, specifically — a talent he learns early on to hide from his parents, who disapprove of his “lurid” hobbies.
It’s precisely through his art, however, that he attains the admiration and companionship of new kid Julian Wagner, whose sister, Johanna, David sees as the epitome of the idealized female form. The Wagners become a key component in his subsequent coming-of-age experiences. But this tale isn’t the only one told in the pages of What Made Thee.
Yuri Sergeevich Vlasov, a Soviet KGB field agent on assignment to steal seeds from an experimental farm for use in reviving crops back in the homeland, stumbles upon David’s schoolmate, Vida Semple, playing piano in her basement late one night. The virtuosity of her playing would later amaze him even more when he discovers that the child is autistic. Vida would go on to become a distraction for Yuri, and eventually his salvation, though he doesn’t know it yet.
MASTERFULLY WOVEN PLOTS
The stories of these two sets of characters intersect tangentially, held together by Thurston’s subtle literary themes, the concept of “the ideal” chief among them. From the clay forms David learns to sculpt with an increasing degree of realism to the Frankenstein-like obsessions of a doctor whose eugenic theories date back to his time in the lab of a concentration camp, there is a preoccupation throughout the novel with exploring the “maker” and the “made,” sublime perfection and fatal imperfection, and the beauty — true beauty — that defies both.
Also worthy of note is the fact that this novel is a sort of spin-off or perhaps companion piece to Thurston’s Fail Safe (stay tuned for our review), in which David plays a secondary role (and Julian, as The Gryphon, makes an appearance there as well). I imagine it’s only one avenue of many backstories Thurston could have wandered into from that novel, but it makes for a rich and imaginative tale full of his trademark language play, unforgettable characters and ambling approach to storytelling that at first confounds and later delights as the pieces come together.
This is a pre-publication review; meanwhile, learn more about the author on his website.
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About Willard Thurston:
Willard Thurston lives in British Columbia. One of the Sixties “floaters” … eventually a photographer and printer (retail advertising), illustrator and writer. He holds a degree in English and Early European History from the University of British Columbia.
