I enjoyed The Fortress of Solitude, but the book was a bit ragged in parts; then again, that may be part of its charm. For those who don’t know, the novel borrows its title from Superman’s secret lair (and the Superman comic borrowed the Fortress of Solitude name and idea from the Doc Savage pulps of the 1930s). In Jonathan Lethem’s novel, the main character, Dylan Ebdus, grows up in North Gowanus, a neighbourhood in Brooklyn. The novel explores themes of racial tension, comic books, music, the process of maturing, neighbourhood sub-cultures, Graffiti, drug use, and gentrification. The novel’s central character, Dylan Ebdus, grows up on Dean Street (his Fortress of Solitude), within the North Gowanus neighbourhood, which undergoes gentrification, eventually changing its name to Boerum Hill.
The novel is semi-autobiographical; Jonathan Lethem grew up in the area described in the novel, and Lethem’s father, like Dylan’s fictional father in the book, is an avant-garde artist. Additionally, when Lethem was thirteen his mother passed away from a brain tumor; and, in the novel, Dylan’s mother abandons him: although the two circumstances are vastly different, the feelings felt by an awkward, teenage boy may be quite similar.
The reader is steeped in the character of Dylan Ebdus (as a child in third person, as an adult in first person) as he encounters many eccentric personalities (acquaintances, friends, and even a lifelong enemy), but it is his intermittent best friend, Mingus Rude, who is the great, unheralded hero.
The story includes a magic ring that some critics found gimmicky, but the ring is an important symbol; in the novel, it purportedly imparts the ability to fly and become invisible, but it is also a symbol of the lasting relationship between Dylan and Mingus, even when they are apart. And the ring can be viewed as a metaphor for a comic book aficionado’s imagination, and drug use. The ring may also be a device that allowed the author to step into the story, particularly as an invisible character; as Dylan, but using his own memories within the fictional construct to tell the tale. Ultimately, the ring may have a more powerful effect than flight and invisibility: the power to extract truth.
I’ve also read Jonathan Lethem’s Gun with Occasional Music, As She Climbed Across the Table, and Motherless Brooklyn: Motherless Brooklyn is still my favourite, but The Fortress of Solitude may be a better novel, albeit with a less charismatic protagonist.
Recommended.
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db johnston
almost falling 