Fifth Business in Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge

Dec 02, 2009 Jeff Scott rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 1001books, fiction, world-war-i, classics, re-read

In Robertson Davies book, The Fifth Business, the author is trying to something unorthodox. What if the main character of a book is not the hero (as Dickens’ David Copperfield would ponder), but an extraneous character. Not an insignificant one, but a catalyst to action?

Dunstan Ramsey grows up in the small Canadian town of Deptsford. The narrative, by Dustan, is written after he has retired as a teacher from a local school, upset by his characterization as someone ordinary. We follow his story In Robertson Davies book, The Fifth Business, the author is trying to something unorthodox. What if the main character of a book is not the hero (as Dickens’ David Copperfield would ponder), but an extraneous character. Not an insignificant one, but a catalyst to action?

Dunstan Ramsey grows up in the small Canadian town of Deptsford. The narrative, by Dustan, is written after he has retired as a teacher from a local school, upset by his characterization as someone ordinary. We follow his story from boyhood, to World War I hero (where he is a hero, but is left maimed), to a teacher at a local school. As a boy, a fight with Percy Staunton (later known as Boy Staunton) ends with a rock snowball hitting the pregnant wife of the local Baptist minister. This incident results in a premature labor, the wife, Mary Dempster, to become “simple-minded”, and unleash a life-long guilt over the incident for Dunstan. Dunstan becomes obsessed with Mary, who he claims is his fool-saint when she later commits three miracles. The result is catastrophic for all characters involved (Mary, Dunston, Percy, and new-born Paul), who reconnect at the end of the book in a mysterious way.

I felt the beginning and the end of this story to be very compelling, but the middle-part seemed to drag on. I also found the concept of the Fifth Business a bit tedious. Dunstan lives an unremarkable life after his service ends in World War I. Is this character to really spend most of his life in the most unremarkable way only to serve as a catalyst at the very end of the story? It did have great parts about myth-making and personal mythologies, but overall it made for a bit of a dull read. I was a bit disappointed as I had been looking forward to reading this for some time.

Favorite Passages:
"He was one of those people who seem fated to be hurt and thrown aside in life, but doubtless as he knelt by Mary's bed, he thought himself as important an actor in the drama as any of the others. This is one of the cruelties of the theatre of life; we all think of ourselves as stars and rarely recognize it when we are indeed mere supporting characters or even supernumeraries." p. 13

"Life itself is too great a miracle for us to make so much fuss about potty little reversals of what we pompously assume to be the natural order." p. 162

"My own idea is that when He comes again it will be to continue his ministry as an old man. I am an old man and my life has been spent as a solider of Christ, and I tell you that the older I grow the less Christ's teaching says to me... Everybody wants a Christ for himself an those who think like him... All Christ's teaching is put forward with the dogmatism, the certainty, and the strength of youth: I need something that takes account of the accretion of experience, the sense of paradox and the ambiguity that comes with years!" p. 163

"That is your privilege, you pseudo-cynical old pussy-cat, watching life from the sidelines and knowing where all the players go wrong. Life is a spectator sport to you. Now you have taken a tumble and found yourself in the middle of the fight, and you are whimpering because it is rough." p. 208

"Whom the Gods hate they keep forever young." p. 228

"One always learns one's mystery at the price of one's innocence." p. 245
...more

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Oct 11, 2010 Ellen rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: book-group-selection

Obscure saints, card tricks, and karma keep this book together and I think it's going to be an interesting book to discuss. ...more

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Jan 31, 2008 Cari rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: best-of-the-best

First read this my last year in high school at my mother's suggestion and loved it. Then I forgot it, except the memory of loving it. In 2007, my mom gave me the entire Deptford Trilogy anew - and I loved it again! ...more

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