Allan Stein by Matthew Stadler

Matthew Stadler didn’t give me much reason to read another one of his books after the flamboyant but hollow mess of The Sex Offender, but this book had a far better concept, tied to actual historical figures. It is the story of a teacher who loses his job after allegations of molesting a student (an idea that hadn’t occurred to him until he was accused, but which he actually undertakes once he knows he’s going to lose his job anyway, his attentions being ironically what turns the surly and miserable adolescent that his parents assumed was being abused into the happy boy they always wanted). His friend who works in a museum, Herbert, is interested in some paintings of Gertrude Stein’s nephew Allan, who may be the boy who modelled for Picasso’s famous ‘Boy Leading a Horse’, but isn’t very eager to go to Paris chasing it and agrees to let his friend go in his place, assuming his name. But the host family in France includes a beautiful fifteen-year-old boy called Stéphane, who is enchanting.

The first half of this book is really outstanding. The florid and poetic prose of The Sex Offender is hung around a clever, solid and believable, if highly ironic, plot. You realise that although portions of the book are indeed ‘pure pornography’, the boys are peripheral, filtered, objectified, much like Lolita: the adult seducing the youth tries to force them to be something they are not and they resist. At first, it is frustrating, reading about these supposed love affairs that are little more than sex and patronisation, with no actual connection between individuals, no love, but you soon realise that is the point, that it is the flaw of our protagonist, and the way Allan is peripheral and controlled by the desires of others and thus ends up a fairly pitiable figure reflects directly on what happens to the boys in the story.

However, in the second half the idea meanders. The actual scenes of seduction are fairly laughable, especially the one with the guitar. Ultimately, while showing hollow love affairs makes a strong point, they are uninteresting to read, and everything else in between, the abortive attempts to chase an obscure historical figure, feel like padding.

A gifted writer and a very good idea, but ultimately the story falls short of its potential and ends in a way that may be quite clever, but which is ultimately unsatisfying.