Review: Ali Smith - There But For The

The first full-length fiction for four years, from a writer who can mix critical acclaim and popular appeal, many people considered it strange that Ali Smith’s There But For The was omitted from the Booker longlist when it was announced in July. Ironically, the book itself deals with strange absences.

Ms Smith is a writer with a gift for wordplay and puns, and her work successfully straddles the line between whimsicality and feyness. There But For The begins with a fairytale motif (‘There once was a man…”), and Smith’s most perspicacious character is a precocious child, able to cut through adult obfuscation. This gentle tone disguises the story’s sharp, satirical edge, as Smith explores the strange disconnections of modern life through the motif of a mysterious interloper in a suburban spare room.

The novel hinges around a strange, unsettling tale. A dinner party guest, Miles, a friend of a friend, slips off before dessert, and barricades himself in the spare room, refusing to leave. He communicates with the outside world only through notes passed under the door. This conceit allows Smith to dwell on the fractured nature of modern middle class existence. She portrays ‘rueful adulterers’, minimalist interior décor, individuals hiding behind meaningless job titles, skilfully describing the discomfort which occurs when silence descends.

For Smith, the resonant connections formed in childhood carry far greater weight than the atomised world of adults can offer. Her characters rely on the soothing nature of possessions, property providing far greater comfort than inscrutable human behaviour can offer. Even social occasions become resolutely futile. None of her characters are willing to move beyond their self-imposed cultural parameters. Communication is simpler than ever on a surface level, but this convenience appears to reduce all discourse to its most banal form.

At first, the silent stranger in the home brings disquiet; the Pinter-esque presence broods over the host family, the husband moves out, the wife reduced to a sobbing wreck, indulging in petty cruelties (passing ham under the door to the vegetarian Miles) before realising that her situation can be exploited. Television crews are invited into the home, to document the strange situation, and a range of merchandise is produced. Crowds gather, hoping for a glimpse of this neo-Hermit, and mediums charge £30 a go for ‘messages from Milo’. Smith allows us glimpses into the minds of the characters who have become part of Miles’s story – much of the novel focuses on memory and internal monologue. We realise that the child has the greatest understanding of the goings-on, and the most honest connection to Miles.

While reading There But For The, I was reminded of a nineteenth century novella, Bartleby the Scrivener. In this, a clerk brings disquiet to his co-workers with a similar form of quiet rebellion, manifested through the phrase ‘I would prefer not to”. Like Bartleby, Miles opts out of the bourgeois world into which he has been invited, and his simple rejection of his hosts’ values is enough to cause chaos.

There But For The is a highly enjoyable novel, with real literary merit. Like Booker favourite Alan Hollinghurst, she writes a good party, and demonstrates a confident mastery of prose, teasing the reader with her light-hearted word-play. This novel may not have the scope of The Stranger’s Child, but it is a very effective satire, puncturing many of the assumptions of the modern middle class. It is a shame the Booker judges have overlooked Ali Smith on this occasion, but hopefully readers will not make the same mistake.