Biographers appear to be an odd breed; they either love their subject beyond all reasonable doubt or hate them to an unnatural degree. So the resulting volumes tend to read as stomach-churning acts of love or as score-settling vendettas. The first and most obvious thing to say about this surprising biography of Saul Bellow, the 1976 Nobel Laureate for Literature, is that it reads as neither defence nor attack. It is about as impersonal as a thorough examination can be.
The second of many things to note, is that it is a brave book; tough, harsh, certainly uncompromising and, well, if I were Bellow I would rather have the coolly relentless James Atlas as a friend than an enemy. That said, Atlas does not make too many excuses for Bellow - and several times throughout this big, detailed, well-written book he exposes not only the worst aspects of his subject's personality and behaviour, but, at times, comments in the tones of a fair-minded if disapproving head boy. The humour is subtle, and so is the style, but the instincts are shrewd. If it is possible for a biographer to be fair and truthful, Atlas has achieved it. The fact that Bellow is still on speaking terms with him says something about both men.
It is certainly a help that, like his subject, Atlas is a Chicago Jew with an understanding of a sub-culture that goes far beyond gangsters and mean pockets of tribal hates. Atlas correctly sees Bellow as the Jewish writer who, by jumping the fence, made himself and those who came after him truly American. There is a strong physical sense of Bellow's world, not only of Chicago, but of the temporary apartments, jobs, casual affairs, hellish marriages, rivalries and the feeling of being inferior in a WASP literary scene. In common with many biographers Atlas has made a veritable study of his subject's sex life. Normally this proves an offensive and obtrusive aspect of biography. In the case of Bellow, serial husband and habitue of divorce courts, it is so much part of the man and the writer, it is unavoidable - though it should be pointed out that Bellow's private life, as described by Atlas, does resemble a Phillip Roth novel starring Bellow as a ruthlessly selfish sexual predator.
Atlas has set out to chronicle the man, and as Bellow has lived beyond the age of 85 to father a fourth child there is a great deal of adult living to record, so the boyhood is covered without an enormous amount of detail. Unlike most biographers, Atlas does not strain to recreate the early years. Yet what does emerge is vital: Bellow, the Montreal-born youngest son of Russian immigrants, has always been an outsider within his society, within his own family "at once chosen and reviled". Neither his father, Abram (sic) Bellow, nor his two older brothers - later to become crooked Chicago businessmen and stock characters in Bellowland - had much time for his obsession with books. Atlas detects Bellow's anger early in this account and pursues this rage like a hunter stalking his prey.
From the publication of Dangling Man in 1944 up to his most recent novel, Ravelstein with its explicit portrait of critic Allan (sic) Bloom, Bellow has sustained weighty measures of rage and ego equalling even his genius. Be warned, admirers of Bellow - among whom I would include myself - this book often leaves the reader gasping, even embarrassed on behalf of the novelist. Also as a close reader of the fiction I have to admit I had never realised it is quite so autobiographical. Bellow has angered Blacks and women by his portrayals; his political views have caused outrage, as has his more recent conservatism. But wives, friends, enemies have appeared in his novels like so many ducks in a shooting gallery.
Above all, there was always his ambition, his frustrations. Early in his study, Atlas makes it clear he has cracked his man. Bellow has always seen himself as a passive victim - yet, whether from wives, lovers, children, friends or rows, he usually walked first. His only loyalty has been to his art. Bellow, it must be said, gave US fiction not only its urban, European multi-racial street voice, he also conferred an intellectualism. In truth it could additionally be argued the central thesis of his work has always been that the cleverest people do the dumbest things. In relationships, Bellow has.
Atlas, biographer of the American poet Delmore Schwartz - the real-life model for Bellow's eponymous tormented genius in Humboldt's Gift - came to Bellow following an abortive attempt at writing the life of Edmund Wilson. Fate appears to have directed him to a novelist of rampaging intellect, passion and hunger, as well as to a man of bewildering contradictions who thrives on confusions. Bellow proves a dangerous combination of philosopher and street fighter, of hero and coward, of lively wit and complete jerk. Atlas is able for the entire carnival. For much of the book Bellow is described as handsome, irresistible to women and far more interested in sex than companionship - and always ambitious.
As a writer he is as insecure as only the supremely confident can be. Atlas is very good on the fiction, acknowledges the greatness of Seize the Day (1957) sees Herzog (1964) as the pivotal book and consistently displays an understanding of Bellow's art while also showing all sides of critical opinion. He is also lucky in that many who knew Bellow - the enemies as well as the friends - spoke to him. The wives, all five of them, have a role. So does John Updike, as one of his harshest critics. Atlas appears to be unafraid of speaking his mind. Bellow can be very funny as well as petty, and Atlas captures this. On a larger scale, Atlas has also been true to the dazzling, frenetic circle Bellow moved in. He hears the clever, quick, appalling voices of the people; writers, literary critics, discarded women - so do we.
For all the sex and bravado, Bellow sniping at his publishers, the kamikaze marriages, there are sensitive aspects. Bellow probably never recovered from his mother's death at 50, nor did he reconcile his desire to please his father. Included in the book is a touching note from Abram, written in immigrant's English, finally praising his son the writer. Elsewhere, Bellow writes an affectionate note to the dying John Cheever. James Atlas has conferred an element of immortality on Bellow - which, indeed, the writer already feels. "I've reckoned with death for so long that I look at the world with the eyes of someone who's died . . . "
It was always going to take a big book and an intelligent, streetwise, dogged biographer to capture the elusive, human, cocky and vulnerable genius called Saul Bellow. James Atlas has not only caught Bellow; he has explained him to us, and perhaps to Bellow himself.
Eileen Battersby is the Literary Correspondent of The Irish Times
