EsquireUK-June2018

Culture

69

My Friend Dahmer words by Emmét McGonagle | Warlight words by Rachel Fellows

Warlight (Jonathan

Cape) is published

on 7 June

W h a t w e d o i n

the shadows

Michael Ondaatje’s new novel

is a masterclass in suspense

and understatement

We probably can’t conceive

of what warlight would look

like. Not really. Not in this

era of constant and relentless

illumination, with its headlights

and tail lights and billboards and

shop windows and smartphones.

But nighall in wartime

London was dark. Properly

murky. With only the muted

glow of emergency vehicles

making their way through

town. It is to this that Michael

Ondaatje, esteemed author

of The English Patient, alludes

with the title of his new novel:

a hushed world of shadows,

in which all manner of

surreptitious activities

can be obscured.

Much like William Boyd did

with his 2006 novel Restless,

the Sri Lankan-born Canadian

writer — who has picked

up a Booker Prize and Order

of Canada in a career that

has spanned 40 years and

counting — questions how it

would feel to learn, well ater

the fact, that your parents

had been involved in espionage

during World War II. Would

previously perplexing details

suddenly start to make sense?

Would it give you a sense of

relief, or of anger?

We follow Nathaniel,

an archivist with the Foreign

Office, as he recollects his

adolescent years and tries

to piece everything together,

starting when his parents

absconded in 1945 leaving

him and his sister Rachel to

the care of their mysterious

lodger, about whom they

feel certain of litle other

than their nickname for him

(“The Moth”, based on his

“shy movements”) and that

he is some form of criminal.

Other enigmatic figures

punctuate their existences,

which Nathaniel reconsiders

with the benefit of hindsight

and the classified documents

to which his job affords

him access. But none remains

more so than his mother,

whose shadowy life and death

Nathaniel compulsively

atempts to understand.

Ondaatje’s novel flits from

period to period, remembering

with that war-lit haziness which

blurs out general detail for the

specific. (This kind of focused

but fragmentary remembering

is also, it should be noted,

a symptom of trauma.) We

rarely know what anybody

looks like other than an outline,

nor can we picture the

buildings or objects, except

those that pierce the

membrane of Nathaniel’s

memory: carpets in an empty

house he snuck into with

a girlfriend, or the sardines

that he was given for dinner

one evenul night.

Warlight is a subtly thrilling

story. Not, despite its setting,

because it seeks to grip like

a spy novel, but because of

the powerful atmosphere

Ondaatje invokes of unease,

disquiet and the unknown. It’s

a masterful book, even if those

looking for answers might,

like Nathaniel, have to accept

a more subtle resolution.

Opening with a cat carcass on

a country road in Ohio, writer

and director Marc Meyers

doesn’t shy away from the truly

disturbing urges that ripple

through the mind of soon-to-be

murderer Jeffrey Dahmer, aka

“The Milwaukee Cannibal”, in

his new film, My Friend Dahmer.

Yet despite what you might

expect of a film about a boy

who would go on to use the

skull of one of his murder

victims as a masturbatory aid,

these twisted moments are few

and far between. Instead, My

Friend Dahmer brings empathy

and pathos to the circumstances

behind the inner-workings

of a sociopathic recluse, and

the emotional tailspin that led

him to murder 17 men and boys

before his arrest in 1991.

Based on the bestselling

black-and-white graphic novel

by the killer’s high school

classmate John “Derf” Backderf,

the film follows Dahmer (Ross

Lynch) as he atempts to fit in —

despite his obsession with dead

bodies — briefly finding solace

as the mascot for a group of

tearaways (including Backderf)

who deem themselves “The

Dahmer Fan Club”. However,

his dependency on alcohol,

brought on by the breakdown

of his parents’ marriage,

exacerbates Dahmer’s

transition from strange

to sadistic as he struggles

with his murderous urges.

Young Dahmer functions

as more of an extra than

antagonist for much of the

film, though the brilliantly

docile Ross Lynch still

commands atention as he

hovers uncomfortably in the

background. If you’ve come

for gore and gristle, prepare

to be disappointed: that era

of Dahmer’s life begins ater the

end credits roll. Instead, Meyers

offers a meticulous portrayal

of a deeply disturbed teenage

recluse on the brink of a normal

life that will ultimately and

definitively elude him.

—

My Friend Dahmer is out

on 1 June