Straight but not narrow


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Straight Man
By Richard Russo

I became a Richard Russo fan after reading "Empire Falls," which was his version of a big, epic, multigenerational saga -- the kind of book that wins big prizes. Indeed, it did. "Empire Falls" won the Pulitzer. After I had read a couple more of his books, "Nobody's Fool" and "Mohawk," I started to see the recurring patterns, settings and character traits in Russo's fiction.

His novels have a lot of humor, but they are often built around themes that are kind of depressing. They are usually, if not always, set in a decaying, Rust Belt town in the Northeast. The characters are either working class or just barely middle-class, in a time when their town doesn't have much use for people like them anymore. Some have been to college and their educational status makes it harder for their old chums to relate to them. Usually, they are unlucky in love. Often, there is a character who is a real rascal, and he is the funniest character in the book. In "Empire Falls," this is the aging father of the main character, in "Nobody's Fool," it's the aging main character. Paul Newman must like these characters: He played one in the movie version of "Nobody's Fool" and another in the TV version of "Empire Falls," which Newman also produced.

In "Straight Man," the rascal is the narrator, William Henry Devereaux Jr. Look at the first and middle name and you'll see part of the reason I like this book so much. Also, the French-derived family name is another Russo motif, by the way. But beyond that, "Straight Man" is quite different from the others. Devereaux is not the owner of a diner, he's a middle-aged creative writing professor at a middling Pennsylvania state university. Rather than being a working class guy always on the edge of poverty, he has tenure. Rather than being lonely, he has a lovely wife whom he doesn't appreciate as much as he should. When a threat to his security comes along -- in the form of budget cuts, imagined infidelities, or even the possibility of a cancer diagnosis -- it seems to energize him in a way that his comfort does not.

I did not initially find all this promising. It seems like every time a writer publishes a well-received novel, he or she then gets an assignment teaching at some university and the next thing we know, he or she is writing about a writing teacher at some university. It's not necessarily a bad move: Zadie Smith did good work with it recently in "On Beauty." But it is sort of the literary equivalent of the rock band that gets successful and then writes songs about how hard it is to be a successful rock band.

"Straight Man" is an academic satire, but Russo is wise to emphasize the satire. This isn't a story about a dirty old academic lusting after a much younger woman. Or it isn't just that, anyway. In fact, it's pretty light on plot altogether. Like the other Russo books (with the possible exception of "Empire Falls"), it's more of a character study.

Devereaux, or "Lucky Hank," as some call him, is the kind of guy who makes a joke out of every situation. The title of the book "Straight Man," refers not to sexuality, but to the comic device; Devereaux treats every earnest utterance from his colleagues as a setup to a punchline. This makes him great fun as a narrator, and I think this is Russo's funniest novel. But in the context of the other characters, it makes him an amusing acquaintance, but a little frustating as a close friend, and a real pain in the ass if you work with him. If you work with him in an academic setting, where people take themselves very seriously, and he happens to be chair of the English Department, you may want to smack him.

That's exactly what happens as the book begins. Of course, this being Russo, we don't witness the smackdown as it happens. Instead, the book begins with Devereaux's nose all bloody and fills us in on the details later.

Fifty years from now, if there's such a thing as a Russo scholar, "Straight Man" will probably be considered one of the author's minor works. But I think it may be my favorite book by one of my favorite authors.