Üc

by Ann Quin

Üc

Genres: Fiction, British Literature, Literature, Literary Fiction, 20th Century, Novels, Classics

176 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1966

About the author

Ann Quin (1936-1973) was a British writer noted for her experimental style. The author of Berg (1964), Three (1966), Passages (1969) and Tripticks (1972), she committed suicide in 1973 at the age of 37.

Quin came from a working-class family and was educated at the Convent of the Blessed Sacrament. She trained as a shorthand typist and worked in a solicitor's office, then at a publishing company when she moved to Soho and began writing novels.

Despite a complete re-print of her works by the Dalkey Archive Press, Quin's work has yet to see the critical attention many people claim it deserves.

Reviews

[Guille · Rating 4 out of 5]

⭐⭐⭐⭐1/2

Me encanta Ann Quin, me fascina, y ello pese a (o quizás gracias a) su dificultad, su cripticismo, su radicalidad formal, más incluso en esta que en su anterior novela, Berg.

“Tres meses ya viviendo con dos personas y ni siquiera más cerca, más cerca. Las tácticas naufragan antes incluso de iniciarlas. Tres no parece la respuesta. Y sin embargo…”

La historia de base es sencilla: una joven, S, se recupera de una operación en la casa de un matrimonio de mediana edad ejerciendo de algo así como de dama de compañía para ambos. Esta joven desaparece y se sospecha que quizás pudiera tratarse de un suicidio (“Encontrada la barca bocabajo. Identificado el abrigo. También una nota en el bolsillo, parece un suicidio”. Ann Quin se supone que también se suicidó, aunque nunca se supo con certeza, adentrándose en el mar. No es la única coincidencia con S. Quin luchó durante toda su vida contra una enfermedad mental y ambas estudiaron en instituciones religiosas). El matrimonio formado por Leo y Ruth se cuestiona esta sospecha y su posible papel en el suceso repasando unas grabaciones y un diario que S dejó. El matrimonio se encuentra en un punto bajo de su relación, ninguno recibe aquello que requiere del otro sin afrontarlo. Quizá la aparición de esta joven pudiera servirles de catalizador (“La consciencia de que había alguien que compartía con él algo a lo que yo no había sabido llegar”).

“… una situación en la que anhelo adentrarme si es posible hasta los límites mismos de la imaginación. Subir otro nivel, una dimensión adicional, preferiblemente llevándome a los dos conmigo. Aunque ¿hasta dónde pueden llegar las emociones? Sin embargo por el momento no pido nada más que estar, vivir como viven ellos”

Lo que no es tan sencillo es el modo de contar la historia. Hay capítulos en los que se entrelazan en un continuo las palabras de Leo y Ruth con la voz narrativa sin apenas signos de puntuación, sin nada que nos avise quién dice qué. Lo significativo de estos diálogos y descripciones, lo menos, está desperdigado entre incesantes y repetitivas conversaciones banales de ellos o apuntes del narrador sobre sus actos cotidianos, lo más. Hay dos capítulos con la transcripción de las cintas dejadas por S, que, ya les digo, van más allá del diálogo interior, tremendamente crípticas, páginas y páginas del tipo:

“Ella lloraba. Él callado. Sobre las rocas
Chapadas en plata. Inmóviles.
Observar
Escuchar. Habitar las noches con una figura de cartón.
Pender de hilos de cera. Un escenario diseñado para dos.
Sus cuerpos
Sus manos
Revolotean. Unidos. Separados. Vuelta a empezar. En una hora
Arrinconada
Por la expectación. En el aire quieto”

De estas grabaciones, y de sus diarios, que tampoco brillan por su claridad, quizás puedan entresacar pedazos de su niñez y de su juventud, de sus opiniones sobre el matrimonio, de las tensiones sexuales, reales o quizás imaginadas, que se establecen entre los tres, de sus ¿fantasías eróticas?, alguna con un claro carácter masoquista.

"Quiero follarte en las escaleras, en cabinas telefónicas, en espacios públicos. Atarte y que todos te vean, que te follen, que hagan lo que les plazca, y que te azoten, te laman y te follen otra vez. Que te follemos una fila entera, como un tren que se precipita en la oscuridad."

Todo en la relación triangular es inquietante, ambiguo, como puede ser observar lo que ocurre en la casa de enfrente (algo de ventana indiscreta también aparece en la novela) a través de unos visillos que solo nos dejan ver apuntes de escenas maritales, donde todo queda insinuado u oculto pues no todo ocurre en la sala iluminada y allí muchas veces solo atisbamos a ver débilmente el después o el antes, actos a los que les damos un significado inseguro, sobre los que construimos un relato incierto llenos de “quizás”.

“Una náusea reconocible provoca en mí el deseo de llegar a ser algo en sus vidas, cualquier cosa. Todo. Pero ¿a quién le toca mover?”

Entre ellos parece existir una necesidad mutua: el matrimonio admiraba su libertad, su espontaneidad, su frescura, su atractivo; ella quizás haya en ellos el calor de la familia que nunca tuvo, el contexto en el que encontrar un peso, una consistencia de la que cree carecer. Sus grabaciones y sus diarios muestran una obsesiva fijación por la pareja, a quienes observa minuciosamente, a los que esconde sus sentimientos disfrutando del engaño.

“Sus estrechas dimensiones me atrapan en un letargo espantoso, cuando cualquier cosa sería bienvenida como una liberación. Se zarandean mutuamente contra paredes, que los repelen y los devuelven al interior de cada uno”

También hay varios capítulos con los diarios de Leo, leídos secretamente por Ruth, y de Ruth, leídos por Leo en un descuido de ella, en los que ambos tratan sus problemas de pareja, graves problemas, sin que tales descubrimientos les empuje a sincerarse. Prefieren refugiarse en el cultivo de orquídeas, él, y en su gato, ella, odiando las orquídeas, ella, y el gato, él.

“Solo le preocupa alcanzar su propio orgasmo y yo me niego en redonde a ser explotada de ese modo. ¿Ha sido diferente alguna vez desde que nos casamos? Qué difícil es recordar sentimientos pasados. Que fui pasiva demasiado pasiva me doy cuenta de que me hizo serlo. Y en todo aquello el deseo de complacer satisfacer lo que pensaba que él más quería pese a querer yo algo distinto otra cosa”

El ambiente se enrarece aún más con unos extraños juegos de máscara entre los tres y con la existencia de unos actos vandálicos que se producen en la casa de veraneo que tiene el matrimonio cerca de una playa. En ningún momento se aclara el objeto o la causa de estos actos. Quizás se deba a algo que se menciona en el inicio de la novela, un papel poco honorable que Leo pudiera haber tenido durante la guerra.

“Cuando regresé, la casa estaba a oscuras. Al abrir la puerta, ir hacia mi habitación, me sentí una mera intrusa. Pero qué hay que pueda robarse más allá de lo que han dejado como debo para distraer del objetivo principal. Al fin y al cabo ahora me he convertido en la víctima, y ya no hay vuelta atrás”

Quizás alguno de ustedes lea novela y, quizás, el último quizás, la novela sea para cada uno de ustedes algo muy distinto de lo que aquí he dejado escrito. Así es Ann Quin.

[L.S. Popovich · Rating 4 out of 5]

Composed of alternating styles in the form of a diary, recordings, jottings, and near stream of consciousness, Three will likely be very different from anything you have read before. Starting with Joshua Cohen's idiosyncratic introduction, in which he outlines the major conflicts, the love triangle, and overviews the appeal of the interplay of plot and form. The experimental format of the novel proper conveys the interior tensions at play within the central relationships, the cramped emotions of the characters, clustering voices, administrating ablutions, solitary or entwined in subtle psychological tension.

Deliberate ambiguities intrude. Quin is freely dismissive of formal conventions. Her liberated style will appeal to fans of Kavan, Carrington, Emshwiller, and more radical departures from the norm.

Discernible through the exact details are the facets of lives, accumulating into an avalanche of text, interiority sublimating into exteriority. Erratic variations in tone and voice lend it a jazzy, back and forth, improvisational feel. Suggestive onslaughts of narrative are choked off prematurely, leaving the reader aching to grasp at the loose ends. Characters convey ceaseless restless interaction with the environment.

It might put you in mind of W. S. Burroughs' cut-up method, the scattered collage comprising a coherent fictional space. It describes minutely the accrued actions which constitute living. These everyday images make way for impressionistic stylings in due course, with hints of surrealism, pointillism, narrative poetry, composite conglomerate manipulations of form, suffused with a pleasing, compressed dreamlike aura.

A tad like Molly's soliloquy if you ask me. Forms of hysteria are subtly infused into the text, as the main characters sort through the literary remains of the absent secondary narrator. The odd approach of the novel works for its drama and elusive, elegiac quality.
It combines strong evocations of the time and place it is meant to capture, expresses a push toward individuality and explores the loyalty inherent in any romantic relationship. The quibbles and accords of realistic, i. e. flawed, individuals, the recurring ways in which we blame the other person in the relationship for momentary unhappiness, the discomfort and miniature betrayals which result, and a pervasive, repressed passion.

Overall, an intriguing experiment.

[Jan-Maat]

Claustrophobic really does not do justice to the intensely unpleasant atmosphere (images of a Hamster in a cage and of two gold fish in a bowl watched by a cat are entirely appropriate, a rare (and hopeless) image of escape and freedom comes from seeing a train full of commuters rolling their dreary way back and forth, and when the cat manages to get outside it returns with it's ear chewed; enclosure is not life, exposure is death!) that Quin succeeds in creating in this little book which I stress does not increase the sum of human happiness. Caveat lector: if you are looking for cheering or encouraging literature, look elsewhere. It was the kind of book that I was glad to finish, but then my mood was not particularly cheerful when reading - April is the cruellest month as the poet wrote forgetting that an earlier poet told us that when the sweet showers of April pierce the drought of March it is the time to go on pilgrimage the holy blessed martyr for to seek, which only goes to show that Plato was right to ban poets from his ideal republic, plainly they are unreliable sorts.

A young woman has been living with a married couple, early in the novel we learn that the young woman has been found dead, whether a case of murder or suicide or indeed if in this case there might be any difference between the two is not clear, nor is this the point of the story, it happens to foreshadow the fate of the author and perhaps that is relevant.

The young woman's death allows the couple to go through her belongings, read her diary, and to listen to audio recordings that she made; the two also watch little films that the three made together, mostly of the three performing little mime plays that they created together - this put me in mind of the film within a film in Le Melpris, though as it happens a bit of the film features the young woman emerging naked from the sea resemblance or otherwise to Brigitte Bardo is not mentioned, mind you a mention of fishermen pulling in their catch reminded me of the ending of La Dolce Vita , not that the English setting of the novel is redolent of Italian shores, but there is for me something similar in the atmosphere of those films and this book

Still a better approach to explaining this novel is to share with you Andrei Rublev's film, which like the film Rocky is mostly about making a film (or creativity in general) .

The novel consists of some descriptions of the home movies, transcriptions of the audio tapes, sections of the diary and dense sections of prose in which the couple interact with each other or do things separately. We see that as in Andrei Rublev's picture they were and are all watching each other. It appears though that the motivation may have been in part sexual, and or an attempt by the young woman to recreate her childhood dynamic with her parents. The young woman went to a Catholic convent school which in an argument for ending religious schools or at least Christian ones seems to have left her sexually transfixed by the idea of the Trinity. But as she was obsessed by the couple they, witness their eager reading of her diaries and listening to her recordings, were obsessed by her.

Possibly this is the kind of book that would repay a second reading. The style for me was more impressive than the content, I felt for a more successful sexual Trinitarian obsession you really need a same sex set up, possibly that is incestuous in nature, while here we have god the husband, god the wife and god the holy lodger.

Trigger warning for this book include: Alcohol, alcohol, marital rape, alcohol, being assaulted by people painted to look like statues, wanton abuse of orchids, alcohol, and a cat being kept indoors.

[Hugh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have just remembered I still have five reviews to write, of which this is the one that has been waiting longest, so I'll keep it short. Ann Quin's second novel is perhaps not as striking as Berg, but it is still formally innovative and intriguing, not least because S, the enigmatic lodger at the centre of the menage a trois disappears while swimming at sea in a way that uncannily prefigures Quin's own suicide.

The other two characters are a married couple and their parts of the story are set in the aftermath of the disappearance, in an odd mixture of dialogue and third party narration in which the boundaries are never quite clear. S's contributions take the form of notes they found left behind, and are fragmentary and almost poetic in places. A book that would probably reward closer analysis.

[S̶e̶a̶n̶ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Three displays a growth in complexity of both form and theme from Quin's first published novel Berg, while also laying the stylistic groundwork for her third novel Passages. Here, a middle-aged married couple, Ruth and Leonard, reflect on their relationship with a woman S who came to live with them after having worked briefly for Leonard, a translator, and has since died, perhaps a suicide, perhaps not. S has had a deep effect on both the couple as a unit and as individuals. In order to illustrate this, Quin takes the formal inventiveness of Berg up a notch, joining third person narrative that melds dialogue and description into single paragraphs with audiotape transcriptions and journal entries from the three characters.

The present narrative of the couple Ruth and Leonard anchors the text, allowing for multiple digressions via the couple's tandem and individual investigations into the documents S has left behind. Instead of burning off the mist of this mystery, though, these documents only thicken it further, offering up only vague hints in the staccato poetic prose employed by S in her audiotapes and her more straightforward, though no more revealing, journal entries. At the same time, diary entries written by Ruth and an audiorecording made by Leonard, happened upon and read/listened to without the other's knowledge, illuminate the couple's deepening divide, which lies hidden beneath the banal cloak of their constant day-to-day chatter. At the heart of this rift is a knot of sexual tension that Leonard persistently seeks to untie even as Ruth is pulling the ends tighter. Their individual surrogates—Ruth's cat and Leonard's orchids—each repel the other person, as if the two, perhaps subconsciously, each resent the beneficiary of the other's repressed passion. However, throughout the book, it is the ghostly presence of S that most loudly signals the couple's utter failure to meet on mutually pleasing sexual terms. Union with S could have been the culmination of a fantasy for both of them, or perhaps S may have just shown them what was possible when lives commingle to the point of full immersion. She herself clearly felt drawn to both of them in different ways, and seemed to struggle with how to cross their boundaries, both collective and individual, in order to fulfill her own desires, some of which are alluded to in her recordings and journals. The bisexual theme is clear, and in interviews Quin alluded to her own bisexual feelings, as well as her belief that all people are inherently bisexual. She also spoke of her fantasy of being with both another woman and a man. So these themes she explores in Three were certainly of personal significance to her.

While I found it a bit slow to get into, the book grew steadily more intriguing and I found myself wanting to reread parts of it in order to confirm suspicions or remind myself of prior allusions. As with Passages, it merits a complete reread in order to fully move through the text and capture all the signal markers. There are many secondary plot points I don't touch on above. For example, there are certain scenes that crop up more than once in the various forms of recollection Quin uses. In one scene in particular, Leonard is attacked by a menacing group of men while he, Ruth, and S are performing one of their mime plays (another point of interest) in the back yard. These men and other trespassers reappear at different times as revelers in the yard and on the beach, at one point trying to attract S's attention when she is out rowing. There is also the question of S's suicide and if that is really what happened to her. Quin has strewn hints and possible red herrings throughout, taking readers to the brink of what I found to be a very satisfactory conclusion.

[Kansas · Rating 5 out of 5]

https://kansasbooks.blogspot.com/2025...

“Ha surgido entre nosotras ciertas intimidad, una que no se da cuando L está presente. Tanta que he descubierto deseando que pase más tiempo fuera. Como si R interpretara un papel cuando él está con nosotras. Aunque me pregunto si no interpretará algún papel conmigo, cuando estamos a solas.”


Tres es una novela que me ha gustado incluso más que la que leí en su día de Ann Quin, Berg, que ya de por sí me impresionó muchísimo por esa faceta tragicómica de la vida y por el paisaje de la ciudad de Brighton entre lo sórdido y lo grotesco, aquí en esta novela noto que estas facetas se han interiorizado incluso más, y durante la lectura me pregunté hasta dónde habría llegado Ann Quin de no haber fallecido tan joven. “Qué fácil para un cuerpo dejarse arrastrar atrapar en una corriente, y que no lo encuentren jamás, que nadie pueda tener nunca la certeza. Ahora no es el mejor momento. Hay que sobrevivir al verano. De alguna manera. Con ellos. Es cierto que hay momentos en los que me pregunto por qué he aguantado tanto. ¿Había esperanzas al principio?” En Tres también hay una vena muy satírica e incluso grotesca sobre todo en lo que se respira de la falsedad de las costumbres sociales, del mundo de las apariencias y lo que se deja vislumbrar tras este brilli brilli es un enorme vacío, una tremenda carga de tristeza. Donde en Berg había un tono medio burlón, aquí en Tres veo una sordidez mucho más palpable. Los personajes, y me refiero concretamente al matrimonio de Leonard y Ruth están interpretando papeles y están disimulando una realidad, la de sus vidas, unas vidas que por lo menos a mí me han transmitido una especie de terror existencial, y a la larga incluso se convierte en un texto muy claustrofóbico porque además Quin sugiere muy bien esta atmósfera incómoda a la hora de que puedas esperarte cualquier cosa de sus personajes, una imprevisibilidad amenazadora, y por momentos podría funcionar como una novela de suspense...¿qué se va a revelar en cualquiier momento? ¿cómo van a reaccionar los personajes? Es como si algo inquietante y turbador acechara tras los rincones de la casa o incluso en el exterior, en la piscina, en la playa. En Berg, Ann Quin se burlaba de esta obsesión por las apariencias, en Tres “abre el melón” de lo que hay más allá, en el interior de unos personajes tan desesperanzados como desesperados: con la llegada de alguien esta desesperación se reconvertirá y los hará vivir ¿esperanzadoramente? durante un tiempo.


"Los dedos de ella. Planean. La boca fruncida. Una sonrisa secreta. Abrir una carta en una calle abarrotada.
Decisiones. Meter las emociones como un par de zapatos bajo la cama”.


Tres fue la segunda novela de Ann Quin y aquí se cuenta la convivencia de tres personas, tres personas que en el momento en que comienza la novela una de ellas ya ha desaparecido, y sin embargo siguen siendo tres porque la presencia de S., la desaparecida, es constante. Ruth y Leonard es una pareja que en su momento acoge a una joven, S, que después de un tiempo de convivencia desaparece pero la casa se queda impregnada de su presencia (ausencia). Se describen las vidas rutinarias de Ruth y Leonard (en 3ª persona), él refugiado en sus orquídeas, ella en su gato, que sirven como catalizadores a ese terror doméstico. Aparentemente y argumentalmente no hay más, y sin embargo tras esto Ann Quin nos sumerge en lo invisible, en lo que el ojo no capta a primera vista, en la interioridad de estos personajes. S. que había vivido durante un tiempo con ellos, da un cierto sentido a esta convivencia. Se sugiere que Leonard conocía a S. del trabajo y que a raíz de tener problemas la acoge en su casa, así toda la novela son posibles intuiciones que puede tener el lector sobre lo que ha pasado, pero que no se explican, aquí todo debe ser interpretado por el lector: son ráfagas que va lanzando Ann Quin con esa prosa elíptica tan fascinante, también se puede entrever una cierta autojustificación continua por parte de la pareja ante la desaparición de S...


“Tres meses ya viviendo con dos personas y ni siquiera más cerca, más cerca. Las tácticas naufragan antes incluso de iniciarlas. Tres no parece la respuesta. Y sin embargo…”


El matrimonio reflexiona sobre lo que podría haberle ocurrido a S. y estos diálogos pueden incluso sonar a absolución, ¿no era feliz allí con ellos? S. ha dejado algunos diarios y grabaciones y aquí es donde la novela se revela en su estructura fragmentaria y elíptica porque funciona en tres niveles: el del matrimonio en tercera persona en tiempo presente, y por otra parte el de los diarios y las grabaciones que ha dejado S., que ya sería la voz en primera persona de S, que contiene monólogos, reflexiones, alguna alusión a su vida pasada, pero sobre todo es una primera persona poética, fragmentada y lúcida, muy aguda también en su reflexión de las vidas que llevan Ruth y Leonard. Esta estructura narrativa lo que está reflejando es la vida interior de estos tres personajes: por una parte la del matrimonio que aunque a priori parecen una unidad, realmente la llegada de S. los ha enfrentado a sí mismos como individuos separables del otro (“¿Cuándo empezó a tambalearse todo esto, qué día, que noche sentí esta espantosa separación, una cierta pérdida de identidad? Quizá entonce, sí quizá la consciencia de que había alguien que compartía con él algo a lo que yo no había sabido llegar”), y por otra parte, el papel que juega S. como catalizador emocional. Al leer y escuchar estos fragmentos de diarios y grabaciones, Ruth y Leonard parecen tomar conciencia de que ambos guardan perspectivas diferentes, no solo de los momentos compartidos con S., sino de sus propias vidas en común. Hay también una carga sexual en la que S. se convierte en el receptáculo de sus carencias vitales, pero también una gran carga de violencia sexual que deja intuir algo que va más allá de lo que se ve a simple vista.


“Las emociones son resquicios para las expresiones personales, si los demás están dispuestos a seguir el juego, se vuelve comparativamente sencillo. Días de júbilo, salvo instantes de sentimientos encontrados. ¿Cómo explicarlo, revelarlo todo, llegar a algún tipo de claridad? Suplantar estas áreas inmensas de pensamientos nunca expresados. Sus voces. Deseos satisfechos...¿venganza)”.


Es una pena que Ann Quin se fuera tan pronto porque el potencial en apenas dos novelas que he leído suyas es apabullante. Es una autora que no solo se limita a contarnos una historia, que existe y está ahí, sino que realmente y a través de esta fragmentación narrativa nos hace sumergirnos completamente en la intimidad de estos tres personajes, ambiguos, oscuros y a la vez luminosos. En el texto de Ann Quin no sobra nada y es muy accesible incluso dentro de esta fragmentación. Elige las palabras justas, y al mismo tiempo convierte el texto en una pieza muy poética que hay que descifrar. Realmente conozco a pocos autores como ella, tan directos y al mismo tiempo tan líricos. En apenas tres trazos nos ha definido a estos tres personajes: el matrimonio de Leonard y Ruth, que simboliza de alguna forma el conflicto entre las expectativas sociales y sus propios deseos reprimidos y S., que aunque real, se convierte para ellos en un espejo en el que se ven reflejados como actores de cara a la galería. El lector llega a situarse en la misma posición que Leonard y Ruth, examinando y reflexionando sobre la ausencia/presencia de S., intentando dotar de entidad a su fantasma, e incluso llegando a ciertas conclusiones, variables dependiendo de la imaginación de cada lector. Y quizás cómo mejor representa Ann Quin estas corrientes subterráneas emocionales contrapuestas es a través del paisaje: “En la piscina vacía un globo vagaba entre estatuas rotas, como un planeta fuera de órbita.”


"El otro lado. Un paisaje lleno de marjales. Carroñeros aguardan en tocones muertos
ramas
brazos flácidos
cuelgan. Carreteras que no llevan a ninguna parte. Mosquitos que zumban sin cesar. Donde el agua engulle el sol. La tierra una masa flotando de vegetación. Ramas de árboles incrustados
fango solidificado. Con partículas de hojas
plumas"

♫♫♫ Disconnection Notice - Sonic Youth ♫♫♫

[Mayk Can Şişman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Peş peşe 4 roman yazdıktan sonra henüz 37 yaşında hayatına son veren İngiliz yazar Ann Quin’le epeydir tanışmak istiyordum. ‘Üç’, Everest’ten yayımlandığında çok heyecanlanmıştım ama sonbahara yetişmedi kitap tabii. Hızlıca ‘Berg’ de yayımlanınca haliyle ‘Üç’ü öne çektim.

Ann Quin’le tanışma kitabım olan ‘Üç’ yer yer beni heyecanlandırsa da beklediğim kadar sarsmadı. Romanın karanlık tarafını çok sevdim. Samanta Schweblin’in ‘Kurtarma Mesafesi’ kadar okuyucuyu diken üstünde tutmasa da yazar heyecanlandırmayı başarıyor. Kafanızda bir şablon oluşuyor, yazar da farkında bunun. Derhal onu yıkmak için objektifi başka bir yere çeviriyor.

Yazım kurallarına biat etmeyişi, dilinin standart okuyucu için biraz deneysel kaçması, biçim bazında muğlaklığı bile isteye seçmesi ve özellikle ‘Ben böyle uygun gördüm’ gibi bir tavır içinde olarak varlığını hatırlatması gibi detayları sevmedim.

Evli bir çiftin evinde yaşamaya başlayan S adlı kadın karakterimizin başına gelenler ve çiftimizin ruh halleri merkezimizde. Bana birilerini fena halde android olan o çift gerçekten muazzam ete kemiğe büründü. Yazarın karakter yaratma becerisi bence gayet başarılıydı. Fakat S’nin dünyasına dahil olduğumuz kısımlardaki deneysellik beni metinden epey koparttı.

Genel hatlarıyla fena bir tat kalmadı aslında kitaptan geriye. Ama çok da değmedi, değemedi tabii.

[Julie Kuvakos · Rating 5 out of 5]

“A change was admittedly known. But recognised only by myself. For others the pattern is set which they refuse to alter. Soon one believes that is oneself and the change settles into corners. Roused only in moments say by stimuli or objects. Smell. Sound. That remind. Then the image topples. But still no one notices. Least of all those living the most close to you. Least of all ... Then there's subterfuge and one goes on automatically complying being doing. For that is the easiest way. Besides one soon forgets. Habits take over, the pain becomes an object looked at from a distance.”


This book was such a unique experience and one I am looking forward to digging deeper with a reread sometime relatively soon but for now I’ll give some initial thought and try to not get into too many rabbit trails.

Ann Quin was put on my radar thanks to the wonderful literate @luis.panini whom I have discovered late last year and since become obsessed with scanning his book posts (talk about rabbit trails)!

When I looked up Ann Quin I knew immediately she was the kind of author I was looking for during this time of my literature journey… yet she remains this dark enigma in my mind even more so after finishing this book. The little bit I’ve read up on regarding her life story seems to be this mysterious and peculiar shadow that casts even more intrigue with me.

Because you can literally look up the synopsis of this book on goodreads in the flash of lightning I will spare you this.

The first half of the book I was really enjoying the “flow” in which she writes… much of which really gives this cantabile like trance when read out loud. The structure of her writing changes and quite abruptly at that too. Commas and periods are missing and instead you must use the inflection of your own voice to help carry you through. But it’s this exact kind of flavoring that I adored so much in her writing. Is it a script? Is it poetry? Where is the dialogue? The way in which she shifts moods and scenery is like seeing color for the first time.

By the end of this book I was left wondering so much. But like a good piece of art it’s that sense of unspoken or mysterious theme that leaves you breathless and inspired.

There is so much to be discussed regarding the title of this book - the introduction at the beginning by Joshua Cohen quotes Aristotle regarding the origins of trinary logic that I think encapsulates the theme so perfectly: “It is necessary for there to be or not be a sea-battle tomorrow; but it is necessary for a sea-battle to take place tomorrow, nor for one nor to take place - though it is necessary for one to take place or not to take place.”

[Romy]

Ik hecht te veel waarde aan interpunctie om hiervan te kunnen genieten.

[Antonio Jiménez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Insólito, sugerente, extrañamente hermoso. Desolador, también.

¡Viva la elipsis, no muera el brutal estilo, perduren la estructura y escritura anárquicas!

[Ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read Three right after I finished Berg, also written by Ann Quin, both disturbing, with violence and sexuality closed intertwined and themes of power and impotence explored. While Berg is Quin's best known and most popular work, I was more drawn to Three, perhaps because of the (to me) more interesting relationships--both amongst the three and the various configurations within that as well as to the larger society, the macrocosm of early 1960s-1950s "respectability" and the disruptive voice of a freer agent, and the ways in which this illuminates and mirrors the larger society, particularly in terms of patriarchal power.

In Three, L. and R. are an outwardly successful middle-class couple in Britain. R. desperately wants a child; however, she no longer wants physical contact with her husband, L. S comes in as a disruptive voice, a freer agent, less constrained by the social constraints and hypocrasies of the time.

The writing is innovative, using a variety of styles: indirect discourse with voices often overlapping without attribution. There is straightforward narrative, as well as the use of diary entires, tape recordings, and poetry.

I found the work fascinating. And while in some ways it was challenging, I also found myself drawn into its claustrophobic, threatening (beneath the surface respectability) world. The ending was surprising and illuminated in many ways the entire novel.

[Joey Shapiro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Started off being indifferent to this and put off by how difficult and dense it is for such a short book, but as I went on and adjusted to the way it's written I found myself really really moved and in love with it! This is probably the only Ann Quin book that's ever struck an emotional chord with me, probably because it's the one with the most focus on a coherent linear narrative. The core of it is about a middle-aged married couple who lost their passion decades ago—Ruth, who's repulsed by intimacy and cold to her husband even though she's secretly very lonely, and Leonard, who is frustrated that his wife lost interest in their relationship and craves more excitement in his life. Half of the book is blocks of text filled with unpunctuated, unattributed dialogue, the other half is made up of flashbacks in the form of tapes, films, and diaries left by a younger woman referred to only as S, who stayed with them last summer and who they've just found out recently drowned in a possible suicide. Dialogue is mixed in with action, perspective changes without being announced, and the form abruptly shifts between Leonard and Ruth's (comparatively) straightforward exchanges in the present and S's impressionistic, fragmented diaries and records in the past. Super challenging but ultimately such an incredible, rewarding read that I can see myself returning to over and over again and discovering new details that eluded me on this first read. Without a doubt my new favorite by Ann (and I've now read all her books! wahoo)

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

A middle-aged couple from the late 1960s, Leonard and Ruth, husband and wife, mull over their literally and figuratively sterile marriage after the apparent suicide of a recent house guest, a young woman, who also served as the couple’s emotional cipher, upon whom they privately projected their fantasies of a contemporary woman, alone and single, and what that might mean. It also reminds them of the child they’ve never had and the reasons for that.

S, as the house guest is referred to, left behind written and audio diaries, as well as some film footage, all done during her time with the couple. Separately and together Leonard and Ruth look through these documents, ostensibly to find clues to why S might have committed suicide. After a while, it becomes apparent to readers that they are trying to see how each of them was seen and understood by her, and if hints of infidelity (with S or others) could be found.

While S’s record remains ambiguous on the latter point, it roils within Leonard and Ruth the long pent-up resentments they have for each other. The resolution to those marital ills perhaps hints at why S might have committed suicide. An update perhaps, if any were needed, of Kate Chopin’s The Awakening.

For more of my reviews, please see https://www.thebookbeat.com/backroom/...

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very strong 4.5/5 - didn't pack the same punch as Berg.

[Claire Steele · Rating 4 out of 5]

A deeply claustrophobic, compelling novel about obsession and a triangular relationship that collapses following the death of one of the three. The narrative voice moves like a spool of magnetic tape, now his now hers now the other's, which makes the experience of reading seem strangely voyeuristic and puzzling - the tape is glitched, voices overlap each other, it's not easy to tell who is being plaintive now and who amusing. Parts of the novel are visual, again like a home movie or a silent film textured by flashes of light and scratches.
Original and complex in which reading becomes a vaguely sullying experience, as though we had chanced upon the notebooks, or private diaries of some unhappy person.

[Tom · Rating 3 out of 5]

tfw when ur too dumb to read it

[Herman · Rating 4 out of 5]

****1/2

[Rita · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tre började som tre och slutade som fem. Tänkte först fyra. Denna ansträngande, flytande, vaga, ostrukturerade, skruvade, vardagliga, uppslukande skrivstil gjorde att man till slut drogs in helt i mystiken och i deras värld som man betraktar, försöker förstå, begripa, (ibland hatar) men som är helt deras egen, som inte ens de förstår helt och hållet. Visste inte att denna för mig okända författaren skulle lämna mig så fascinerad och förundrad över det minst effektsträvande språk och berättarstil. Den vill inte vara något eller förklara för/imponera på läsaren, den bara är. Det gör den så mänsklig och genial. Klaustrofobisk på ett lockande sätt. Speglar kanske även författarens psyke. Man fastnar om man ger den ett (eller två) försök!

[Robert Wechsler]

I just couldn’t get into the rhythms of Quin’s sentences or her mind

[Virgil · Rating 4 out of 5]

The literary equivalent of getting drunk and staring at the moon

[Eugene · Rating 3 out of 5]

a fascinating but subtly disappointing book, ann quin’s THREE is a formally radical novel. arguably more daring in form than her contemporary b. s. johnson--with whom she’s often lumped partly because they committed suicide in the same year--she’s here also more cagey and unfortunately more predictable.

the style innovations are daring. the book consists of several modes: a line-breaking poem-like stream of consciousness; a fast-cutting, alternating POV style that reminded me of donald breckenridge’s 6/2/95; and, reminiscent of both sarraute and gaddis, a skillful use of dialogue alone to reveal character.

and yet this book, which focuses on the bizarre love triangle of one airless bourgeois marriage and an interloping free-spirit femme fatale, somehow rang hollow. maybe because it was unclear how much of it was a critique of the malaise of middle-class marriage and how much of it was a self-pitying confessional narrative from that state. or: somehow it’s central content–which did seem central, not auxiliary–crippled the serious play of its language games. so i was left with a dull feeling, a disappointment at unfulfilled potential.

course i could be wrong. and the destabilized, unreliable narrative and narrators might have hidden reward which alluded me. plan to try her BERG soon down the line. despite what disappointed–another review called its style a “muted lyricism”–it’s definitely worth checking out.

a good overview of her work.

and, from an interview quoted here:
“Form interests me, and the merging of content and form. I want to get away from the traditional form. . . . I write straight onto my typewriter, one thousand words an hour but half will in the end be cut out. When I write the first creating parts of my book I can go on for three hours without a stop. When revising I can work up to seven hours, with breaks.”

[james !! · Rating 5 out of 5]

yeah i’m just going to go ahead and state that Ann Quin is probably my new favourite writer, this is my 2nd book from her (started with the debut ‘berg’) and i’m blown away again! will get round to reading her remaining books this year 100%!!

but anyway, ‘three’. where to even begin?! this was such a hypnotic read!! doused in mystery and intrigue! honestly the best way i can think of describing it is saying it felt like something David Lynch would put together! the story is fragmented, broken up into different perspectives and what felt like different streams of consciousness! all stemming from voyeuristic secrets coming to light & watching how Ruth & Leonard’s relationship shifts because of them!

the nameless ‘S’, (who is suspected of suicide) speaking through diary entries (written quite formally) and through audio tapes (written in abstract half-prose/half-poetry) is the centre point of the drama and mystery. somehow Quin gets this abstract technique to build such a strong character, piecing S together bit by bit as the story progresses.

focussing on Ruth & Leonard, the opposite technique is used. a gritty, dark & depressing look into the state of marriage through painfully stark realism. still unconventionally written due to Quin’s unique writing style, their dialogue is clunky, claustrophobic, uncomfortable. building on this is the undercurrents of violence & sex that bubble away throughout the book. a look into patriarchal power dynamics in their relationship.

this is crying out for another re-read soon! i was completely absorbed & lost in this books dark mystique! incredible experimental fiction!

[Marlies · Rating 1 out of 5]

Dit boek was het niet voor mij. Te weinig verhaal, bleef tot het einde gissen naar waar het over ging, vond alleen de laatste 10 pagina’s interessant. Deed er ruim twee maanden over, en nu zit ik in een leesdip, bedankt he!!

[Hester · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sharp as a blade . A fragmented collage of dialogue , tapes , diary entries if a young woman ,S, as a couple ( L and R) seek to make sense of her death , who stayed with them as a boarder for a period prior to her death . All three are lonely and unhappy but only S seems able to delve into herself with freedom and compassion and explore her own grief . L and R circle about each other in a ritualised dance of concealment , need and rejection from which neither can escape except into lust and obsessions (L) or narcissism or illness (R) A change of place does nothing to change the dynamic . What came across most powerfully for me was the way the couple were imprisoned by their need not to see or to confront their losses ,their lack of communication forming a cage , both preferred captivity to vulnerability , despite its obvious limits .

This confinement is made concrete in the boundaries of their summer house , the private beach and the unruly masses beyond which constantly threaten to breach the walls . S is " one of them " but has to be cast as an exception as she lives within their walls belonging / not belonging and it's this liminal space that S inhabits that allows her to see the sham of middle-class life and it's shallow manners that serve to maintain distance and isolation. S decides to disappear in a boat in the ocean , the ultimate open space .

[Richard Thompson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I admired the experiment with shifting narrative perspectives that the reader has to sort out because they are not clearly marked by punctuation or descriptive transitions, but it ultimately didn't work for me. There's lots of symbolism here with water and broken things and orchids, and plenty of sexual suggestion interspersed with some actual sex, but it isn't enough to glue the disparate parts together. Ruth and Len are both essentially vacant people and though S exhibits a bit of the liveliness of youth, there isn't a lot to her either. At first I thought that the admixture of narrative perspectives was an expression of the essential unity of the three people, but we quickly learn that they are very different from each other and that they each have secrets and their own forms of emotional barriers that separate them from the other two. There are mysterties that are never fully explained - the adjutant, the beating, S's apparent death, but when the boorish tawdriness of the whole relationship becomes apparent in the second half of the book, it made me think that the explanation of the mysteries would be of the same stripe, so I quit caring.

[Marc Nash · Rating 3 out of 5]

The diaries, photos and film reels of a young woman who has committed suicide and left the couple who she was lodging with looking for answers and exposing the tensions in their marriage and the triangle of relationships suggested by the title. When the diary entries are fragmented, they are at their most interesting, being highly lyrical, chockfull of symbolism and pregnant with meaning. When the entries are more full narratives of the three of them together on the beach or around the house, they are less interesting. The sections of the married couple together are also more conventional and though the bitterness and frustration reeks in these sections, it's not really something you haven't read or seen many times before. Reminded me of a Harold Pinter play in its understated violence.

[Jules]

DNF. I read the blurb and was attracted to the premise but failed to read the part where the book is described as “experimental”. This is a dense and difficult read - maybe it’s brilliant, but I read for pleasure and I was finding none so I didn’t continue to find out.

[Benjamin Stevens · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kind of opposite pointillism, abstract from afar then becomes more real the further in you go.

[Tülay]

Kelimelerle, isimlerle , tarihlerle yüzleştim. Kalbin gizliden gizliye bildiği ama etrafa savurarak tamamlanmasını zorlaştırdığı bir yapboz- hangi parça tam olarak nereye oturuyor? Ann Quin. Üç.
Belirsiz, flu, derin bir okyanus Ann Quin'in üslubu. Tedirgin edici bir atmosfer ve bir sıkışmışlık hissi. Ucu açık cümleler çözülmesi beklenen. Bu bakımdan Anna Kavan'in uslubuna benziyor diyebilirim. Mekanın ve zamanın belirsiz olduğu ama tedirgin edici atmosferi bize hissettiren bir metin Üç. Ruth ve Leonard ve onların yaşamlarına dahil olan S isimli karakterin intihar etmesiyle birlikte bir evliliğin sorgulanmasına şahit oluyor okuyucu. Gizemli S isimli karakterin arkasında bıraktığı günlüğünden, anlaşılmasi zor cümlelerinden iki kişinin sorunlu evliliğine, kişilik çatismalarina, uyumsuzluklarina ve sadakat kavramına bakışlarini okuyoruz. Kimi yerde şiirsel cümlelerin olduğu ve bazen kimin metin içinde konuşmaya başladığını anlamakta zorlandığımiz bir kitap Üç. Sakin bir şekilde ilerleyen ama kasveti de hissettirdiği için her okuyucuya hitap edeceğini dusunmuyorum. Anna Kavan okumayı sevdiğim için bu kitabi sevdim. Yazarın Berg isimli kitabı da hoşuma gitmişti. Derin okumalar ve psikolojik analizler yapmayı seviyorsanız okuyun derim ama hareketli bir kurgu için okurum derseniz bu kitap size göre değil. Clarice Lispector sevenlerin de seveceğini umduğum bir kitap Üç.. İyi okumalar herkese

[Deborah]

I first met Ann Quin on the front of a bus and have been trying to catch her ever since. Our initial encounter was with Berg, and picking up Three, I expected the same acrobatic, blackly comic and absurd treatment of Brighton’s underbelly. Could not have been more wrong: Three is a very different form of transport; for one thing, it is non-linear and there aren’t many stops.

Uncomfortably, one of the three characters, S, has drowned before the book begins, a fate Quin met herself when she took her own life by walking into the sea at Palace Pier. The narrative (if it can be called that) perambulates S’s letters, diaries and audio recordings, as picked over by Leonard (‘L’) and Ruth (‘R’), a process that savagely strips back this uncomfortable ménage à trois (quatre, if you count Bobo, a strong feline presence throughout: Quin must have been around cats).

Not sure what to call the flow of looping repetition, associations, non-sequiturs and juggling of voice that stitches together the prickly relationship L and R endure. Well, I do actually – it’s stream of consciousness, but this time it leaves the reader to infer the interior thoughts by streaming together the apparently innocuous, domestic exchanges between L and R. It's so clever and done better here than anything I’ve come across (and for me that includes Mrs Dalloway).

Why isn’t Quin more read?