The Sabre Squadron by Simon Raven Nine out of 10

 The Sabre Squadron by Simon Raven

Nine out of 10

 

 

Having been enthused by the first two volumes of the roman fleuve Alms For Oblivion, respectively Fielding Grey http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/09/fielding-gray-by-simon-raven-10-out-of.html and Sound the Retreat http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/09/sound-retreat-by-simon-raven-10-out-of.html , yours truly has been less enthusiastic about The Sabre Squadron, perhaps or surely on reasons of too high expectations…there is a positive psychology rule or exercise that prompts one to lower one’s expectations.

 

It is very likely that the under signed has missed the greatness of this volume and he can only hope that the magic, glory of the first two instalments will be regained with the fourth part, The Rich Pay Late, which should be finished in about ten or twelve days’ time, given that the cherished books are spaced out, so that je ne m’etouffe with so much pleasure, but it could also be that the plot of the Sabre squadron seems quite farfetched…that last makes me pause, for we look at the world around and we need to stop saying this or that is impossible – unless, of course we consider those stupid conspiracy theories peddled by the members of the cult of the Very Stable Genius and the fool himself, regarding Qanon, the pandemic…these are monsters and the ultimate hypocrites, who had refused to even hear the Obama nominee, with eight months before the elections, and now that there are less than two months would go ahead and try to replace the notorious RBG in the next few weeks and I hope they fail.

The hero of this third part of the Alms for Oblivion is Daniel Mond, a phenomenal mathematician, with a German mother and a Jewish father (which would not make him Jewish for the ultraorthodox, since it is the mother that counts), who travels to Gottingen in Germany, in spite of apprehensions – indeed, he has a superior, very rare intelligence but he is a very tense, quite nervous individual…the fervor, anxiety probably goes along with that Beautiful Mind – to study the work of a deceased professor Dortmund, whose symbols and papers have not been successfully analyzed, but if deciphered by the very young protagonist, they could help him obtain his recognition and throw light on the research of others – one argument in his favor is that mathematicians do their best research when very young, before the age of 28, something I had heard before, maybe in the film Proof, with Anthony Hopkins and Gwyneth Paltrow (before her descent into strange endeavors, with her Goop brand)

 

He has to convince Roger Constable to approve his departure to Germany, the one who had been crucial in Fielding Grey, where he had appeared to encourage the main character of that first volume, that reapers here with the Sabre Squadron, only to let him down, after accepting his enrolment, because the mother would press frantically and viciously for his exclusion, following a gay affair which constable is not very interested in, but he nevertheless dislikes the treatment of the parent and finally lets Fielding Gray out in the cold…something that he looks like regretting at the time when this third piece takes place, in 1952…

 

Once in Germany, the hero meets with Aeneas von Bremke, the man that would supervise the department and keep an eye on Herr Mond, eventually we would find about his role as a two faced figure, the one that had tried to find the significance of the symbols and the research made by the late Dortmund without success, telling the visiting mathematician about his efforts and at one point warning him that the deceased had become very ill at one point and at least the second part of his work could well be meaningless, just the result of the wondering mind of a very sick scientist…though even this warning we would find is the result of psychological insight, meant to encourage the young guest to find ambition and determination within himself and readiness to prove Bremke wrong and solve the difficult mathematical challenges

One issue that this reader has had with the plot is that, though explained in simple terms, it is still difficult to grasp the significance of that the hero is doing, if not wholly incomprehensible – and it must be noted that the undersigned, out of the game as he had been for a few decades, since he had changed his career, had still been one of the best in mathematics, entering the Geophysics department of the university and for the first year when enrolled – furthermore, the idea that others had known about the Dortmund papers and had somehow anticipated that Daniel – winner of the Spinoza Prize as he was – would be very likely to solve the puzzle and thus they concoct a scheme to catch him looks somewhat preposterous to this reader.

 

Again, once such a statement is made, there is a rebound and then I think of the symbol of the age, the leader of a cult of Deplorables, the one who could have been called the leader of the free world, if he were not such a total disaster, and the sheer fact that he is up there and what, sixty million idiots are ready to vote and if he does not win, to take their many guns and kill for him is the Paradigm of the impossible that we can see, manifesting itself daily, with ever more ‘impossible’ insults, abuses, idiocies and more…

When he arrives in Gottingen, an American student of history, Earle Restarick, is there and he becomes very attached to Daniel Mond, to the point that the under signed thought we will have another homosexual story, like in Sound the Retreat or maybe something similar to the narrative from Fielding Gray, only here the initially kind, emotional American disappears and when he returns he seems to have changed dramatically…quite soon, he explains that he works for some mysterious patrons, who want to know what the young mathematician has found, especially when it becomes clear that the young hero has succeeded in the first stage and then, with the meaning of the symbols understood, he can move to the next stage and eventually, clear the problem, which we now see that it is of great interest to Americans, British and other major powers, much like the work of other scientists brought about the atom bomb.

 

Only the hero has left leaning inclinations – another reason for this reader to be less than sympathetic to him – and he does not want to share this with the group that is pressing him and spying on him…enter the stage some British well-wishers, represented by one Rupert Percival, who turns out to be a Secret agent, who says give us the secret and we will protect you from the other side – if there are two sides here remains to be seen – Fielding Gray becomes a friend of the main character and he will try to help, albeit in the process he might make things worse, unintentionally, offering a card for the malevolent agents…