Ambivalence by Brian Dillon review – the odd man out | Autobiography and memoir

Brian Dillon lost his first parents, his mother when he was 16, his father when he was 21. He writes about them in passing here, as he did in his first book. In the Dark Roombut it shows a little sadness. Told in the third person, young Dillon was removed he not distracting Methis does not remember the cry of orphans. It describes instead his difficult studies in Dublin, where he struggles to identify himself and to reconcile his interest in avant garde music and literature within the academic field.

He grows up surrounded by books acquired by his father, who left school early and went to university late. He reads them with interest and adds them to borrow from the library and buy his own. But, to begin with, his main connection with music magazines is David Bowie, whose interesting sexuality is similar to his own. His father talks about work – homework, weekly mass and finding a good job. But his commitment is to do so happinessif they can find it.

His memories of his youth and 20s are amazing. Without a diary or sketchbook, the only memory is “an anxious re-reading of my MA and PhD essays”, he writes down the books he read, the books he bought, the gurus who inspired him, Virginia Woolf, Roland Barthes and Walter Benjamin great among them. At the age of 17 he is reading Jean Genet, Michel Foucault and Tristan Tzara. By the 24th he seems to have read everything. Can he like anyone who doesn’t like Derrida? No.

He is anxious to be called an independent, and has the privilege of liking any writer, musician or philosopher who has been dismissed as a liar. His teachers and parents call him brilliant, and in his own way he is learning how books written by outlaws can “solve everything”, or change lives. But he hasn’t done much school work since his mother’s death, spending long hours in a lazy and happy mood. His confidence is shaken. And they are disgusted with the way teachers treat education not as learning but as listening.

In one year of college for the disaffected university students they go forward, creating an aesthetic that celebrates androgyny and “undecidability”. And at University College Dublin he finds a group of like-minded criminals and an inspirational teacher, Thomas Doherty. Even the sudden death of his father does not leave him; Instead, he offered £8,000 even before he and his two brothers sold his family, enough to keep him going for a few years, he decided on a fool’s errand. His test results are good, too, although he feels “like he’s been paid for intelligence rather than learning”.

All is not so well, however. Away from the university, and sometimes disrupting his behavior there, his life is “absurd, shameful, terrible”. He has a violent fight with one of his brothers, P (wisely, most of the characters in the book are capitalized; even he is just B). He ends potential relationships, suffers from tremors, drinks heavily and is affected by “the great demands of his loneliness”. Although he gained his knowledge intellectually, by accepting a critical theory, which for him is more beautiful than poetry or fiction (“B’s unquestioned mantra: Always think! “), it is clear to him that his professional writings are a kind of biography.

On the face of it, a book about 10 years of academic study has little interest. But when he’s not poring over a series of “library breaks” Brian Dillon is an inspiring intellectual fellow, quietly courageous in his determination to “live in words and ideas”, yet in his mature optimism he’s lazy and restless. The book ends with him organizing a conference, getting a job at RTÉ radio and moving to Canterbury to continue his PhD. A story of success, you think, but, pausing as usual, he sees differently, seeing that his unfinished idea has cost him a pound a word.