How Insensitive

by Russell Smith

Adrift in Toronto s gossipy, grant-driven cultural scene, a coterie of overeducated, underemployed young people stab at vaguely artistic projects and scramble after the opportunities that seem tantalizingly within reach if you know the right people. Searching for work, sex and big-city life is Ted Owen, who quickly finds himself swept into the complicated lives of the young and the jaded, people who thrive in a strange world of hip fashion and surreal night-clubs."

Genres: Fiction, Canada, Novels

304 pages, Paperback

First published April 23, 2002

About the author

Russell Claude Smith is a Canadian writer and newspaper columnist. Smith's novels and short stories are mostly set in Toronto, where he lives.

Smith grew up in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He attended the Halifax Grammar School and Queen Elizabeth High School, and studied French literature at Queen's University, the University of Poitiers, and the University of Paris III. He has an MA in French from Queen's.

Russell Smith is one of Canada’s funniest and nastiest writers. His previous novels, including How Insensitive and Girl Crazy, are records of urban frenzy and exciting underworlds. He writes a provocative weekly column on the arts in the national Globe and Mail, and teaches in the MFA program at the University of Guelph. He hates folk music.

Reviews

[applesaucevictim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome. Funny. Romantic but in an 19th century kind of way. Full of goths, clubs, sexy people doing sexy things, yet the viewer of this world is always separated from it. Distance and the search for a home is the main thesis of this story: a young man recently moved to 90s Toronto in search of a new friend group and money to pay the rent. Strangely it is not a far cry from another of my favourite books, Augustine’s Confessions. That mixed with 90s Richard Linklater and you get a wonderful lackadaisical pilgrimage (or flaneur would be a better term) into the restlessness of the heart at the turn of a new millennium

[A.J.]

How Insensitive, as it follows the travails of a young man in the big city, wandering drunkenly from one party to the next, meeting models, and so on, all in the early 1990s, reminded me strongly of Jay McInerney. Except that, I hasten to add, it reminded me of Jay McInerney when Jay McInerney was good. That is, the McInerney of Bright Lights, Big City, not the disappointing McInerney of Brightness Falls and then The Good Life.

I hasten to that particular clarification because, unlike the later McInerney, whose pages are clogged with exposition and whose prose is often simply mundane, Russell Smith’s sentences crackle along. His dialogue is good and he never succumbs to the urge to go back and explain things for the sake of the dopey reader. How Insensitive is sharp and funny, and its nomination for the GG was well deserved.

So I find myself wondering why McInerney became a big success, while Smith remains, in the class photo of Canadian novelists, in the second row, behind Atwood and Ondaatje and all the other popular kids, but in front of Whatshername and Whothehellisthat. It’s certainly not for lack of a good book.

[Andrew Kaufman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pleasantly surprised at just how well this book held up. It's probably even better twenty years later, because my focus wasn't just on how well Russell captures the times and trends, but the emotional arc of young men struggling to get up on their wobbly legs. Just great. Can't believe he's not recognized as one of the greatest Canadian writers working.

[Benjamin Kahn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read this a long time ago, when it first came out. I didn't like it - I found the protagonist kind of smug, and the writing style was trying to hard to be hip and knowing. Left me with a bad taste in my mouth, and an abiding dislike for the author.

[Shannon · Rating 1 out of 5]

big nope.

[Cliff Seaton]

This one is my favorite.

[Sammy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just finished How Insensitive by Russell Smith in one day, over about two solid sittings. Rather proud of myself; I haven't seen myself read like this in a long time. I bought it a few weeks back.

Smith is a Queen's grad. A copy of this book sat in a display case for "up-and-coming" Queen's writers in the middle of Mac-Corry Hall, just outside the Geography computer lab. The book had a section all on it's own along with a portrait of Smith as a "young punk" next to a pillar outside Stauffer. I remember I used to pass by it almost everyday to class; in half admiration, half curiosity. I finally read and was not disappointed. Not disappointed at all.

I liked the book a lot. I made a few jot notes about it:

1) Canadian novels are slow. The story was great but the pacing was a canter instead of a trot. It seems like editorial decision. I wonder if American editors just green more in general. I noticed that other Canadian writers had the same laconic but sensual style as well.

2) Some of the dialogs of the main character, Ted, was a bit over the top. I know he was a post-modernist but the ones I know don't really talk like that.

3) The artsy scene has changed all that much since 1994 in Toronto.

4) Smith got the "Southern Ontario University" guys down pat.

Those guys all dress like they're about to ... go camping. Then they get rich and they dress like they're fat.
- Mike


5) A pair of Toronto quotes I really liked...

"I had no idea the city was so vast," said Ted. "I guess we only know a tiny part of it. I guess I don't know the real city. This isn't anything like the part we know. I mean we hardly ever leave a few square blocks."
"I go to Yorkville sometimes," said John.


and also a little later,

"Massive city," he said. "So spread out. Miles and miles of ugly places we'll never go. People who never have to come downtown. It's like lots of little small towns joined up. Seriously, we live in a small town. We hardly ever travel outside."
"I go to Yorkville sometimes," said John.

[Daniel Kukwa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good...but not as good as it thinks it is. I enjoyed it, but it now seems very much of its time. Nothing dates faster than pop culture...but sometimes, nothing ages better. We'll see how this novel does in the future...

[Adam Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book a long time ago, but I really enjoyed the story. I was a young urbanite at the time working in some non-descript office job that didn't really matter to me, so it was timely for my situation.

[Rebecca Rosenblum · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is another reread.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

Against my expectations, I liked it, especially the bit about how Louise was struggling to hold the romantic attention of guy who beats her up.

[James Campbell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Smith's debut, and while it certainly worked to set the stage for what was to come, it was as fulfilling as his later work.

[Anita · Rating 5 out of 5]

love this author too

[Feathzzz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read while in jail. Actual rating: 3.5