Building a Story

When I finally finished House, even though I knew where it would end up, I was still glad that we got there safely.  Even with stories where the outcome is known, we still want to find out what happens next.  On House's cover, there are quotes from reviewers. People Magazine said the book was "a suspenseful, gripping tale!" The New York Times declared it "the stuff of real drama." Such comments would seem to describe a novel rather than a non-fiction narrative, but it's the book's novel-like features, I think--the way it's crafted to resemble a fictional narrative with plot, characters, setting, conflict, point of view--that make it compelling reading. 

Crafting shows up in a variety of ways: the author may have changed events to fit a more compelling plot, or he might've manipulated details to present a person in a more or less attractive light.  Often, dialogue that is not recorded or witnessed must be approximated or imagined, and people's feelings and thoughts described as if the author were privy to them the way a fictional narrator would be. Unfortunately, each of these techniques might make a narrative diverge from, as Anita puts it, "the literal truth" (comment to 12/28 post).  So we can't blame the book's real people (whose names, as the author tells us in his acknowledgments, have not been changed) if they fret over how they and their story are portrayed in a book that millions of people will read.

I must say that I think Tracy Kidder has "authored" these people to a certain extent in that he has subtly shaped our perceptions of them as they progress through the construction of the house. The builder Jim Locke opens the first chapter, and indeed, he and his carpenters do seem to be the protagonists of this story.  At the same time, the Souweines and the architect, Bill Rawn, slowly emerge as the antagonists. The conflict between these two opposing groups is what propels the action of the plot, and what keeps us reading. 

And because we are meant to see the builders as the "good" guys and the architect-owners as the "bad" guys, we are not given a balanced view of either group.  Early on, I noticed myself getting irritated with the wealthy owners and their attempts to get the builders to relent on price and materials, while feeling warm and fuzzy about the honest, hard-working builders; I'm sure that was no accident. 

The author helps create that feeling by how he describes the people in the story.  Each person gets a little biography and a description of his or her appearance and personality, habits and philosophy, but I noticed that the builders get more paragraphs, and that what we learn about them is more positive.  Again, not by accident, I believe.  Not until close to the end do we get a little more personal information about the Souweines, some of it quite sympathetic. Perhaps by then Kidder feels confident we are involved in the story and he can risk a bit more compassion for the "enemy."

Of course, that's just my take on the book.  And the bias, once I caught on to it, really didn't detract from my reading pleasure. I still found House a rich, compelling narrative.  And I learned a lot about building a house from scratch, something that isn't done much anymore. Even the giant McMansions that are built today are standardized, not unique, not custom-made just for their owners.  Custom housebuilding could be a dying art, unlike the art of writing, which Tracy Kidder seems to be perfecting with each new book.