bookgazing: (i heart books)
bookgazing ([personal profile] bookgazing) wrote2011-11-07 10:57 pm

'The Night Watch' - Sarah Waters: fan-girling about characters

As ‘The Night Watch’ has such a twisty, turny, time slip structure it’s impossible for me to discuss my feelings (such strong feelings) about two of the main characters Kay and Duncan and the ending of the novel without spoilers. I avoided watching the BBC adaptation until I’d read the book because I wanted to be surprised, you might be fine with spoilers. The cut tag let’s you decide.



Duncan: The ‘ending’ of Duncan’s story in the 1947 section, is where I realised that ‘The Night Watch’ had the potential to hurt my heart. What do you mean there’s no more after that? Duncan and Fraser 4EVA, do you hear me book?! FOREVER1 . I need to spend a lot of time talking about my favourite character Kay, but let me squee quickly about Duncan’s storyline and his involvement with Fraser, his dreamy ex-prisoner buddy. The 1947 bit where they go to the pub near the river! The 1944 bit where Fraser is afraid of bombs and has to get in Duncan’s bed! Fraser’s constant ‘I’ve been with loads of girls, bravado’! The constant doubt in the 1947 section about whether Duncan will escape his creepy, stunted life with Mr Mundy and whether Fraser will end up courting Duncan’s sister, Viv is especially intense, because as I may have stated Duncan+Fraser...well you get the idea. The 1947 ending, where Fraser creeps in through Duncan’s window is both hugely relieving and sure to set me on a ‘bring me all the fan-fic’ grabby hands rampage of doom. The 1941 ending, made me sad, because now I’m imagining Alec in hell alone and the guilt that follows Duncan everywhere.

Kay: Theory - Kay is the very best character in 'The Night Watch'. Agree, or disgaree?

In the 1947 section, the reader first meets her as a woman crushed by loss. Knowing the whole story of ‘The Night Watch’ it’s tempting to see Kay, as a character whose story actively contorts itself to expresses wider female and queer disenfranchisement, just because she is a woman who wears trousers, a lesbian and drives an ambulance during the war (yay for this kind of heroine by the way). My first impression was that the war had given her a sense of purpose, as well as the ability to fit into mainstream society, which she had lost in peace time and that was why she seemed so sad. The war gave her an opportunity to revel in her natural personality and appearance, while passing as normal in the eyes of society. Women everywhere were dressed in trousers and overalls. More women were taking on active jobs that were usually reserved for men. In the 1947 narrative it at first feels like the loss of her job and the way she now stands out is what drags her mood down, at least that’s what I initially felt her little encounter with a shop keeper who comments on her clothes was designed to show:

‘‘Don’t you know the war’s over?’ the man behind the counter in a baker’s shop asked Kay.

He said it because of her trousers and hair, trying to be funny; but she had heard this sort of thing a thousand times, and it was hard to smile. When he caught her accent, anyway, his manner changed. He handed over the bag, saying, ‘There you are, madam.’ But he must have given some sort of look behind her back, because, as she went out, the other customers laughed.‘


That would be a common enough story. Women who had become used to employment and more freedom to behave as they wanted during WWII were dealing with confused feelings as they happily welcomed the end of war and the return of soldiers, but found themselves stranded, expected to be content with traditional female roles and dreams. When Kay visits her friend Mickey, in the 1947 section, however we learn that Kay has lost someone and this fuels her sadness:

'Kay sat back and turned away, in disgust at herself. ‘It’s no more than happened to thousands of us. Who didn’t lose someone, or something! I could walk on any street in London, stretch out my arm, touch a woman or a man who lost a lover, a child, a friend. But I – I can’t get over it, Mickey. I can’t get over it.’

This comment seems to suggest that Kay’s depression stems from the personal loss of someone close to her. Her story still contains moments where her individual happiness is adversely affected by society’s restrictions on lesbian women, for example when she tries to meet a woman it must all be done covertly in ways that Kay finds rather grubby. These restrictions probably contribute to her inability to move on and connect to a new love, as it seems Kay is searching for a romanticised ideal of love and nothing less will do. However, her depression seems to mostly centre around the absence of someone she loves and her inability to get through pain about her personal circumstances, rather than societal oppression, but it’s tough to really pull the two apart. Even if Kay doesn’t express special feelings of sadness about society trying to stuff her back into a box after the war, the ambiguous allusions to what she has lost in the 1947 section seem to hint at all the different things women were losing during this time. At least, that’s the vibe I was getting.

The fuzzy edges of Kay’s storyline in this first section may have much to do with why I love her character. Her story is so subtly told most of the time and she’s a character who is never fully knowable. There are lots of blanks left for the reader to fill in with their own interpretations and the end of the reader’s interaction with Kay in 1947, is incredibly open ended, even for this novel which avoids giving definite answers. Readers might be left wondering what will happen to the relationships of the other characters at the end of their 1947 storylines, but at the end of Kay’s story they’re left wondering what happens to Kay, out there on her own. What does the return of the ring mean to her and will it signal a significant change in her emotional state?

I’m still not sure what it means. I want to believe that Kay can change and overcome her need for any partner to fit a particular gender stereotype (the wife who waits) and fit in with Kay’s ideas of supreme romantic pageantry. I think Viv’s return of the ring offers that chance to her. It’ impossible to gather whether she will take it, as Kay’s perspective never appears in the novel again after Viv gives her ring back. The reader is denied a character revelation, which is interesting as it’s common to see objects from the past prompt such reactions (good and bad) in fiction. The lack of a symbolically prompted epiphany keeps the text much more realistic and balances Kay’s first meeting with Helen, in the 1941 section, which does feel a little sentimental and miraculous. Kay’s 1941 storyline contains a great flash of a fated romance and her 1947 storylines ends in a much more ordinary way. A ring that is, as far as the reader knows, just a ring given unadvisedly to a stranger who needs it, is returned. It’s not a symbol, or a sign, it’s just a simple ring to Kay, despite being an object that has meant so much to someone else.

The ending: When I first finished the book I was disappointed that the ring wasn’t somehow ‘more’. In fact when I first finished the book I thought Waters had fluffed the ending of the 1941 section. There’s this huge build up of anticipation for the reader, as they assume they’re being led towards a meaningful conclusion that will explain everything. The significant events which led to small details will finally be revealed, hurrah! And then, the chronological beginning of each character’s storyline comes out and...oh, somehow the events just don’t live up to the magnitude I’d been imagining in my head. Surely there should be more to Viv’s initial meeting with Reg, to make it so enduring? Shouldn’t Duncan’s relationship with Alec have been more explicit, to make Alec’s death mean more to the reader? Only Kay’s first meeting with Helen seemed extraordinary and I found it, like I said, a little sentimental. And, hey shouldn’t the ring, have been some kind of special object in 1941, to add resonance to its return in 1947? In comparison with all the detailed life the other two sections, the 1941 section felt a little flat and ordinary.

A day later and I had totally changed my mind. I wouldn’t want the ending any other way. Now I think Waters avoids making the 1941 ending/beginning become the only important thing about the novel. By stripping the 1941 character storylines of real high drama and tense build up to disaster, the novel shows how easily a complicated chain of life events can be begun, with an impulsive suicide, or a chance decision on a train.

I also liked that the 1941 events, the ones that ‘began’ each character’s story, are kept from swamping the importance of all the details readers have picked up over the book, enhancing readers connection with the whole story. In other novels I might have raced ahead to hear the secrets that were being concealed from me. In ‘the Night Watch’ I wanted to stay in the story forever. Every detail, every relationship felt important and just as interesting as any secrets I might see unearthed if I rushed onwards.

See, is how to do a secret narrative right authors, none of this relentless foreshadowing and ‘but first we must talk about the day before the secret thing ve-ry sl-ow-ly’ delaying tactics nonsense. Give me an engaging story to follow, so that I barely even notice your hands poised on the trap door levers ready to give me the shock of my life. Take extensive notes, please.


This is the squeeing, spoiler filled companion post to my much more sensible post about the structure of ‘The Night Watch’. No spoilers there.
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[identity profile] thingsmeanalot.com 2011-11-16 09:27 pm (UTC)(link)
YES, Duncan and Fraser FOREVAH! If you find some good fics feel free to send them my way :P

And this: "By stripping the 1941 character storylines of real high drama and tense build up to disaster, the novel shows how easily a complicated chain of life events can be begun, with an impulsive suicide, or a chance decision on a train. " Yes, yes, absolutely. So well done. Oh Sarah Waters <3
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Re: Spoilers for those who haven't read it

[identity profile] thingsmeanalot.com 2011-11-18 03:37 pm (UTC)(link)
I kind of imagine them splitting up because the relationship seemed so completely exhausted at that point. But I like how Sarah Waters kept that ambiguous, as it avoids the "cautionary tale" readings it might invite otherwise.

Duncan meeting Kay! Someone ought to write that as a fic :P