The Filipino Group discussion

Paul Auster's signature work, The New York Trilogy, consists of three interlocking novels: City of Glass, Ghosts, and The Locked Room; haunting and mysterious tales that move at the breathless pace of a thriller.

The New York Trilogy is comprised of three books:

City of Glass

As a result of a strange phone call in the middle of the night, Quinn, a writer of detective stories, becomes enmeshed in a puzzle puzzling than any that he has ever written.

Ghosts

Blue, a a student of Brown, has been hired by White to spy on Black. From a window of a rented room on Orange Street, Blue stalks his subject, who is staring out of his window.

The Locked Room

Fanshawe has disappeared, leaving behind his wife and his baby and a cache of extraordinary novels, plays, and poems. What happened?

Reading Plan

Day 1: City of Glass Chapters 1-5
Day 2: City of Glass Chapters 6-10
Day 3: City of Glass Chapters 11-13
Day 4: Ghosts
Day 5: The Locked Room Chapters 1-3
Day 6: The Locked Room Chapters 4-6
Day 7: The Locked Room Chapters 7-9

Day 1

The introduction was gripping and it instantly hooked me by introducing a character with interesting back stories and attributes.

The case of Peter Stillman is also interesting and I like his history plus the emerging villain also has potential. The inclusion of the femme fatale in the form of Mrs. Spillman completes this postmodern noir tale.

I must also mention the narrative potential of making Paul Auster a character in this book. Shadows of Ilustrado are already dancing in my mind and it makes me excited to think about the places that this novel may go to.

In a nutshell, I like where this is going.

Day 1

When I said that this would be a fun read, I wasn't expecting to be proved right, well, right from the get-go. Really, I'm having a lot of fun so far. I quite enjoyed my first and only other experience with Paul Auster, Travels in the Scriptorium. But this is shaping up to be lightyears more enjoyable in comparison.

I also like the history related to Peter Stillman's case. In fact, it led to an appropriately "postmodern" exchange with my flatmate, in which I pointed out that Robinson Crusoe was mentioned. And then he referred the foreign language film Tabu, in which a character reads Robinson Crusoe. And then I pointed out that Tabu was the name of the actress who played the mother of Pi, who, as it happens, is also a castaway, like Robinson Crusoe. And then he mentioned Lost, which I pointed out included a scene where a character reads The Invention of Morel, which, in turn, apparently inspired Holy Motors, which is also a 2012 foreign language film like Tabu. Haha.

Peter Stillman's case also led to my being reminded of Pi, Darren Aronofsky's first feature film, which deals with the search for the 216-letter name of God.

As for Peter's wife, I immediately imagined her as Christina Hendricks. Haha. Definitely looking forward to more femme fatale-ness on her part.

As for Quinn, his conscious decision to pose as a detective reminded me of the HBO series Bored to Death. That Quinn did what he did apparently out of sheer boredom only adds to the weirdness of the proceedings.

And as for Paul Auster, his metafictional self-insertion or intrusion, as it were, also reminded me of Ilustrado. I believe I even mentioned The New York Trilogy in my review of Ilustrado.

Oh, and just so you know, my name is Paul Auster. That is not my real name. :p

I liked the ending of the 5th Chapter. I wonder how Paul Auster felt when he was writing that. Hahaha.

And, come to think of it, the book also reminded me of Pi and Bored to Death. Hahaha.

Glad to know we're pretty much on the same page, if you catch my drift. Haha.

And were you as surprised and delighted as I was when Virginia suddenly kissed Quinn? To me, that's the most unmissable sign that City of Glass is rooted in hard-boiled mystery.

I was! I thought to myself that that is the affirmation that Virginia is a femme fatale.:D

Day 2

A lot of good things are happening. First, the chapter regarding Paradise and the Tower of Babel are really interesting especially the way that it deconstructed language.

Then the fact that Stillman has been outlining the letters of the Tower of Babel during his daily walks intrigues me very much and adds to the mystery.

Then there is the conversations between Quinn and Stillman especially those regarding H.D. and during the time that Quinn introduced himself as Stillman.

And, the cherry on top, the conversation between Quinn and Paul Auster. It's very self-aware and I love their conversation about Don Quixote. And the fact that the author introduced Siri (the real wife of Paul Auster) as a character really adds to the flavor of this postmodern soup.

I'm really loving it so far.

Day 2

Hear, hear! I also greatly enjoyed the entire chapter about Stillman's scholarly pursuit of Paradise, that he seemed to have been spelling out the Tower of Babel in his peregrinations, the bits and pieces (heh) about H.D., Paul Auster in the flesh along with his real wife and his real son (from his real previous marriage with Lydia Davis), and the wonderful passages about Don Quixote, which somehow recalls Borges's Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote.

Also, I guess we're finally realizing the meaning behind the title, The City of Glass, what with Stillman claiming that he's trying to put the pieces of a world in fragments back together. And I like that he's apparently doing so in New York because it is "the most forlorn of places, the most abject. The brokenness is everywhere, the disarray is universal."

Reading the second five chapters of The City of Glass is as fun as it gets, not least because it raises a lot of intriguing questions.

What of Stillman's supposed doppelgänger? Is the fact that Stillman points out the fact that Quinn rhymes with, before anything else, twin bear any significance?

Is The City of Glass an uncredited source material for Bored to Death? It has to be. I rewatched the first episode of Bored to Death this afternoon and was amazed at the similarities between the two. In particular, both book and TV series had their protagonists pursuing someone in a hotel and bribing the person at the front desk. What's more, the room numbers of the pursued are quite similar: 303 in The City of Glass and 313 in Bored to Death. Then again, it may very well be that just like Quinn, I am seeing things only because I want to see them. A case of pareidolia, maybe?

Finally, does the fact that Daniel Quinn and Daniel Auster (Paul's son) share the same name relate to the fact that Peter Stillman and Peter Quinn (Daniel's son) do as well? "And around and around it goes." Infinite regress, anyone?

Reading the second five chapters of The City of Glass is as fun as it gets. That we have only three chapters left is both exciting and saddening. Haha. I hope Ghosts is even more fun and intriguing.

I liked that line about New York too. It really gives you a feel about how broken New York is.

The doppelganger is one that I am most curious with. After finishing City of Glass, he has only appeared once. Is there something I am not seeing?

I also rewatched Bored to Death and I also see the similarities. There's also the postmodern twist since the main character of BtD is also the creator of the TV show.

Regarding the Quinns, the Austers, and the Stillmans. Maybe there is something that Auster is telling us about the duality of things especially since there was a doppelganger that appeared out of nowhere.

Day 3

The end is without a bang but, for me, that does not diminish how good City of Glass is. Of course, I would be lying if I said that I expected a more bombastic ending but I must remind myself that Auster is not a flamboyant author.

City of Glass ended with a quiet note and it brings more questions than answers. What happened to the Tower of Babel, to the Stillmans, and to the doppelganger? They just disappeared into the air like Daniel Quinn did. Is Daniel Quinn a part of the broken citizens of New York since he descended into madness?

However, it must be said that Paul Auster owns New York in a different way than all the artists that have made it their canvas. I liked the part where he described Daniel Quinn just moving through New York and chronicling his notes and observations on his notebook.

Overall, I like City of Glass very much. It has many things in common with Man in the Dark especially when it comes to deviating from the reader's expected trajectory of the story. I am looking forward to Ghosts with postmodern goosebumps.:D

Day 3

Indeed, City of Glass ended, to borrow T. S. Eliot's words, not with a bang but a whimper. Compared with our preceding set of chapters, this, our last, was so quiet as to be almost uneventful. I had actually finished reading hours ago, but I thought I'd sleep off my mild disappointment at the ending.

Yes, I was mildly disappointed at the seeming lack of resolution for all that supposed buildup, what with the thrilling "revelations" about Stillman. In hindsight, though, I nevertheless liked City of Glass. Very much at that.

I guess I was disappointed only because Auster, to borrow your words, deviated from my expected trajectory of the story. But that's not to say that I disliked what he did lay out for the story.

At least basing from what little I've read of him, I agree that Auster is not a flamboyant author. But that doesn't make him any less interesting. On the contrary, it makes him more intriguing.

I am intrigued by what awaits us in Ghosts. :)

He is indeed intriguing. He doesn't follow a conventional plot structure and thus it makes his novels unpredictable.:D

Just finished Ghosts, which, predictably, is unpredictable. :D

As with City of Glass, will mull Ghosts over in my sleep. :p

Day 4

Reading Ghosts in practically one sitting was a splendid idea. It certainly augmented the palpable urgency of the story.

I thoroughly enjoyed Ghosts for a number of reasons, which I'll try to enumerate here.

First, there's the story's fixation on color. There's the declaration later in the story that "Everything in the world has its own color." Obviously, it's also manifested in the characters' names: Blue, Black, White, Brown, Gold, Gray, Redman. Presumably, these are no more than code names. But then we come to the point when Blue comes across a copy of Walden, whose publisher is revealed to be a certain Walter J. Black. So, are they but code names or not? More importantly, does it matter if they are or aren't? In any case, I appreciate the resulting wordplay between "Black and Blue" and "Black and White."

Speaking of Gold, Gray, and Redman, I really liked the mini-stories with which Auster peppers the main narrative. There's also the irony of John Roebling and the marvel of his son Washington. I also enjoyed reading the synopses of Out of the Past and, to a much greater extent, Hawthorne's Wakefield, which apparently influenced the ending of Ghosts itself.

At some points in the story, I'm taken back to Auster's Travels in the Scriptorium, which Ghosts predates by a couple of decades. (view spoiler)[That moment when he surveys his room and contemplates the necessity of words: lamp, bed, etc.? A similar thing happens in Scriptorium. And that moment when he discovers that the papers he has stolen from Black are none other than his own reports? A similar thing also happens in Scriptorium. (hide spoiler)]

Unsurprisingly, I'm also taken back to City of Glass by some occurrences in Ghosts. The idea of duality is also brought up in Ghosts. As Walt Whitman supposedly said, "Every man has his double somewhere." And there's also the idea of speculating, of spying, as an act of mirroring, which is given credence by the ultimate revelation about Black/White. Also, similar to my question at the end of City of Glass: Who's the narrator in Ghosts?

Finally, I also liked Ghosts because of these magnificent lines:

"The present is no less dark than the past, and its mystery is equal to anything the future might hold."

"This is strange enough—to be only half alive at best, seeing the world only through words, living only through the lives of others."

Day 4

You have said it all regarding why Ghosts is such a great part of the trilogy but let me add own list:

I like the twist at the end when it was revealed that White was Black. There is a certain thing about the duality of the two colors that gives the twist more meaning. The colors, instead of becoming stuck in the background, are a part of the main plot.

The mini-stories were masterful. Especially the one about the boy that died without identity. And Auster made me want to read Hawthorne.

There is a similar thing regarding without language in City of Glass so I feel that I now know what the thematic connection between the three books are.

I love the quiet nature of Ghosts and how it deviates from the formula of mystery novels. The narrator is a mystery and it's one of the few times that I want to know who the narrator is.

And, of course, I love the same lines but I want to add this:

"Something happens, Blue thinks, and then it goes on happening forever. It can never be changed, can never be otherwise.”

I've just read half of Hawthorne's Wakefield. Haha. I liked how the first paragraph of Wakefield practically gave the whole story away. And we only get to read the nitty-gritty in the succeeding paragraphs.

Day 5

So, another story, another mystery. Or another mystery-about-mystery, to be more precise.

City of Glass begins with someone who is about to reappear (Stillman). Ghosts begins with someone who is already there (Black). Now, Locked Room begins with someone who has just disappeared (Fanshawe).

Fanshawe has a bit of a role in Scriptorium, but exactly what it is escapes me now since it's been over a couple of years since I read the book. Anyway, Fanshawe's sudden disappearance instantly reminded me of Wakefield. Wonder if he too has just begun living in an apartment around the corner. Haha. And is the private eye Quinn whom Sophie first hired supposed to be Daniel Quinn? I don't think so; Auster probably just put it there to tease us of Locked Room's connection with City of Glass.

Speaking of connections, minor ones are made to City of Glass again and Ghosts with the mention of Robinson Crusoe and (Dennis) Walden. And, of course, there's the evocation of the idea of identity, duality, and subjectivity with that bit about one of Fanshawe's earliest stories being about the "confused identities of two sets of twins."

The recollections of the narrator (again: who is he?) regarding Fanshawe is reminiscent, to me, of The Sense of an Ending. It's also curious, to me, how in both Locked Room and The Sense of an Ending the protagonists/narrators receive something from their respective erstwhile friends, who, in a manner of speaking, are both missing.

And my favorite line so far is the last line of the first chapter, referring to the two suitcases containing Fanshawe's manuscripts:

"Together, they were as heavy as a man."

Day 5

I was also wondering about the Wakefield connection between him and Fanshawe. Maybe Fanshawe is just trying to observe the events that he himself has put into motion?

I was also wondering about Daniel Quinn. I think Auster is just using the character as a tease but you never know. There might be a reveal at the end. Hahaha.

All three books have the same themes. Obsession and the self being the primary ones.

My favorite line would have to be the one in the cover of Locked Room:
"Death is something that happens to us everyday."

I finished the book. I loved it. But I am still unaware of some of its messages. Particularly the Stillman and the Quinn connections between City of Glass and Locked Room.

It appears that the narrator of all the three books are the same because of the fact that the narrator mentioned that all three are the same stories.

Do you have any idea what happened? This book is totally calling for a reread in the future.:D

Yes, the narrator of Locked Room says as much, that he is also the narrator of City of Glass and Ghosts.

Honestly, I'm just as clueless as you are. But, boy, was it a fun read or what? It definitely warrants a reread, and I'd be glad to revisit this thread if ever we decide to go along for the ride again. Haha.

So, what's your favorite among the three? Mine's the middle. :D

Ghosts is also the one I liked best.:D

So, shall we prepare for another mindfuck that is Borges's Labyrinths? Haha.

Sure.:D