The Cellist

by Jennifer Atkins

A piercing meditation on love and music, and the silence and inscrutability which underpins the performance of each. Luc has lived a long time as a soloist. She has not seen Billy for many years. A visit to a major show of his sculptures sends her arrowing back to a younger version of herself: to a time when she had to make room to love him when she'd felt no room within herself. To a time when she could not find their convergence: the cello player and the lover. To a time when she was forced to make a choice between being one thing or another. To a time when he was a sculptor, but she was not yet a cellist. In exquisite and crystalline prose, The Cellist explores how you might make room for beauty and mastery for yourself, and still leave space for someone else. It asks what love and companionship costs: what happens when you are forced to cast yourself in the distorting light of another person’s needs?

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary, Book Club

304 pages, Paperback

Published June 1, 2022

Reviews

[Blair · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m surprised this book hasn’t had more attention, and a little frustrated to see it getting lumped in with mediocre ‘sad girl’ books. The Cellist follows a successful cello soloist, Luciana, as she looks back on a particular time of her life – a period of debilitating stage fright that happened to coincide with her only significant relationship. It’s a deeply introspective, mature story about the question of whether creative practice can coexist with romantic love and the big life changes that often follow it (marriage, children).

When Luciana meets Billy, she’s a rising star and he – an artist – is unknown. Then, after Luciana collapses during a performance, things start to shift. She struggles to find her way back to performing and to understand what effect falling in love has had on her as a musician. None of this happens in a straight line, though, and Luciana’s ability to logically assess her own feelings doesn’t make it any easier to work out the tangles.

Without regaining my certainty, I did not see a way back to the stage. I knew, then, that I had to consider the situation as an event that happened because I’d lost something. Yet I resisted considering it this way. I did not want to think of loss, which could, for all I knew, be permanent. I wanted that night to be an aberration, because I did not want to change any ideas of myself.

There’s a startling clarity of prose here, and Luciana’s narrative voice embodies a confidence that sits interestingly (and uneasily?) alongside the character’s uncertainty. It’s a story that carries a strong sense of emotional truth. I found it extremely moving at points, especially when Billy moves on and Luciana struggles, despite a deeply held conviction that they don’t want or need the same things. In devoting herself to art, has she made the right choice? The answer is always obvious, yet never fully fixed.

I would compare The Cellist to White on White by Aysegül Savas, another elegantly written novel about art and selfhood, and Arrangements in Blue by Amy Key; while Key’s book is non-fiction, it similarly explores the landscape of a life lived without romantic love. Though less of a psychological puzzle, it also reminded me of Delphine de Vigan’s Based on a True Story – the same sense of a a narrator working through the devastating effect of creative blockage, as well as the subsumption of their identity into another person.

[Jai · Rating 4 out of 5]

Preparing myself to fight Declan Hickey on this one

[Declan Hickey · Rating 2 out of 5]

Too nebulous for my liking.

[Stephanieeee.R · Rating 2 out of 5]

Found this painfully boring sadly, tired of books about sad weak women pining over uninteresting men ??

[Jemma · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this and couldn’t stop reading it. The way she writes about music is insane; I wish I had the technical knowledge about something to write about it so beautifully. The prose is so sparse but contains so much feeling at the same time… articulates emotion with the same precision she uses to describe Luc’s playing. Definitely a book I’ll be thinking about for a long time. Avoid if you’re going through a breakup!!

[Edward Champion · Rating 3 out of 5]

Why is it that nearly every other goddamned young British novelist writes like Rachel Cusk these days? Short introspective chapters, a brisk reading style on what it is to be alive. Look, I'm quite fond of this aesthetic too. But do you have to mimic it EXACTLY? Where's your hook, Jennifer Atkins? I read and I read and I see that you do not really have one! The first half of this book is a ho-hum meditation of the development of a relationship with the playing of a cello. If music be the food of love and all that. Yeah, I get it. Not too bad. But then Billy's dad dies in a plane crash and any sense of subtlety is thrown out the window. And, uh, yeah, whatevs. My name is Jennifer Atkins and I'm a Rachel Cusk clone. And apparently that's good enough to land me on the Granta 20 list. And one of the Granta judges just happens to be -- wait for it -- Rachel Fucking Cusk! Rachel Cusk, a narcissist and a cult leader hoping to build an army of Rachel Cusks? Well, if Jennifer Atkins's "talent" is anything to go by.

[Minjin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The way the writer relates back her relationship with her self, her lover and her artistry back to music and really nuanced / subtle reflections she has around the cello as an instrument / vehicle for self expression is just absolutely brilliant. Have never read anything like this before.

[Anna Emm · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the most beautiful book I've ever read. It came into my life at exactly the right time, and resonated deeply. I will forever be grateful to Jennifer Atkins for writing it.

[Elizabeth Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

There’s not really any way to review a book in an objective way, but occasionally as a reviewer you have an experience with a book that feels deeply personal and difficult to convey to others. For me, that was The Cellist. There was simply so many parallels to my own life in this story, from the messages the characters convey to the setting and the dynamics, which collectively made reading this book incredibly relatable – and as such, much of my enjoyment stemmed from this.

As literary fiction Jennifer Atkin’s work excels at delivering lines that carry that punch and weightiness that you come to expect from the genre. Yet with any writing like this there is always a fine line being walked between delivering a story that has depth to be explored, without then leaning too much into the issue of pretension and monologues devoid of any realness. Fortunately for me, part of what made The Cellist so relatable was how the characters gave breath to thoughts that I have seen expressed by the artist friends I have known in my everyday life.

It is authenticity to the complexities of both love and artistry that rests at the heart of this story and what allows it to be memorable. Space was given to express the full range of experiences that come from love, speaking to how empowering and supportive it can be, while still exploring how it compels, distracts and damages. The author then cleverly pulls this into conversation with the artistic pursuit, and how love can be either a conduit to making art, or a poison that stands in the way of progress and development. But even with all that being evidenced, the book refuses to make an inherently tangled subject black or white, and that makes for a fantastically balanced finishing touch.

Thanks to the use of short, snappy chapters and blank space, The Cellist is a remarkably quick read. If brevity is the soul of wit, then this book exists as testament to that. For writing I already found so much meaning in, recommend it to others is even easier knowing that its length makes it approachable. I might not necessarily steer people towards The Cellist if they aren’t prepared for innately philosophical ruminations, but given that is often the form literary fiction takes, it is about the only reservation I would make. I’m glad I read this.

[Juliano · Rating 5 out of 5]

“I have lived a long time as a soloist.” Jennifer Atkins’ debut novel The Cellist is good. Really good. Too good. Annoyingly good? Yes. This is the story of Luc, a cellist who finds herself in a toxic, tumultuous relationship with sculptor Billy and, following an incident on stage, abandons the cello and attempts to live a life of domestic bliss. But this is a love that wrecks; with all its weight and Luc’s ambition, Billy’s blinders and the endless gulfs in communication that keep appearing between them, this psychologically astute narrative follows Luc into her personal depths, pulling apart her life and slowly building it back together. “A lot of the time, I returned to the image of someone standing in the audience. Past the lights, someone, standing when they shouldn't, my cello tossed on the floor, the knowledge, privately, of dying.” Every sentence is so careful measured, every word, and what could be a slow, stumbling story is absolutely absorbing at every turn. Love is “a full inhabiting”, an “idea […] too abstract for the greedy actions of our bodies”, a “wall I came up against”. Silence is inestimably powerful too, a mystery as much as a threat: “I was puzzled into silence”; much later, “The silence was, similarly, the burden of that music.” Ultimately this is a novel that shines most in its exploration of craft and devotion to artistry “When I first started performing, […] it only seemed to me a question of certainty. I mean making an interpretation, picking an angle, claiming one reading as true over all others. It was about embodying the music, the moment- I couldn't imagine anything bolder than that.”

[LindeFee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I came across a copy of this book quite randomly and I’m so glad I did. A fascinating and gorgeously constructed novel about music, art, love, and the selfish desire to perform. Written in short vignettes of no more than a page or three, the observations are so profound and yet the story carries through with such force.
Luc and Billy keep orbiting each other as they both try to be together and try to be successful as a cellist and sculptor, respectively, only to realise time and time again that they can’t have both; they seem to repel each other as much as they can’t help coming together.

“I had told him, months before, that I could not share all of my space, and that my practice had to precede him. But at that point I could see the fallacy in this thinking, as if the different spaces of my life weren’t always contracting and expanding, eating away at each other”

“I had an unnerving sense of diffusion, as if I was in more than a single place at once. I felt the body I inhabited was no longer my only body—there was also the object in his mind, which his hands, just then, were brining into being. And I could no longer say which of these was the true form. I was no longer the authority”

4.5 / 5

[Will Duffay · Rating 2 out of 5]

First: this is not a novel about classical music. You don't need to know it to read it. Whatever it is about is probably identity and the struggle for artistic creation. But frankly i found the book fundamentally difficult and a little pointless for my limited intellect.

Atkins writes beautifully, with a clear conciseness which is very refreshing after other authors' bloated superfluity. The lack of chapter headings or numbers suggests a confessional journal - the narrator is first person - rather than novel.

However. By halfway I was tired of the narrator's intense, profound, introspective misery. She moves through a succession of social encounters which she finds irritating, unbearable, confusing, overwhelming. I lack her intelligence, depth, subtlety and ability to feel so keenly, so felt alienated by her.

[Gerður Róbertsdóttir · Rating 3 out of 5]

Áhugaverð bók um ást, náin kynni og frelsið. Kjarni bókarinnar er leit manneskjunnar að eigin sjálfi og eigin markmiðum, hvernig okkur tekst, eða tekst ekki að nálgast okkar innri kjarna, vonir og væntingar. Um leið er fjallað um alla ytri árekstrana sem við þurfum að takast á við, ástina, nándina og samfélagslegu kröfurnar.

[Olivia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This had so much promise and potential but just didn’t quite deliver for me. I found it a little bit repetitive and I really didn’t engage with the narrator at all. Still, there are some beautiful passages in it.

[Kiva · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think this books shows the boundary between “for an artist the art is a singular unique mission that wreaks havoc on people’s personal life” and “some people are just narcissistic assholes” is pretty thin.

[Therese Cawley · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found myself swinging between what great descriptions of passion for her playing as well as her love interest and what a load of tosh, I wish she'd get over herself. Maybe this is what is needed to be a great artist.

[Iain Martin · Rating 2 out of 5]

A really route-one offering from a writer who hasn't been made aware that this book has been written many, many times before.

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fine - found the narrator annoying. Fine to piney and frustrating for me

[Lou]

Highly contemplative and intelligent piece. I'd love to see how Atkins develops. Wouldn't mind checking out some short stories.

[Jeremy Jl · Rating 3 out of 5]

A strange book, but I enjoyed the interplay with classical music.

[Laila · Rating 5 out of 5]

very poetic, very pretty, nice :)

[Jonas Brothers]

i liked how short some of the chapters were. found the main character to be ultimately quite unlikeable. and yet quite relatable at points (though perhaps not as relatable as i thought she'd be)

[Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer · Rating 3 out of 5]

To return home was to admit loss in a way I hadn't before, when the endless talk around what had caused my stage fright distracted me from the emptiness of that failure. Then I returned home anyway, and the loss was thorough. In order to, do this, I convinced myself it was not as decisive a move as I now view it, and in fact, I believed at one point I would go back. I might even have told him so.
For the first fortnight after my return, we could only text. This was partly due to the patchy signal at the house in Spain, and partly because talking to each other, in complete sentences, was too difficult. He was confused. He did not know what had
happened. He maintained I did. At this time, it seemed I was regularly confronted by people who insisted I had an idea of things, a greater comprehension.

I read this as it is the debut novel, published in 2022, from an author who in late April 2023 was selected for the decennial Granta Best of Young British Novelists list.

The FT in a recent lunch date article ahead of the release of Deborah Levy's "August Blue" (an article which as an aside failed completely to investigate the "Frozen" links) mentions Levy's " galvanising effect on young writers - its reach going some way to explaining the inclusion of a clutch of female autofiction authors" on the Granta list; and while this novel is not, as far as I know, autofictional, it does I believe show the influence (implicitly if not explicitly of Levy in its crafted but still enigmatic prose and with (to quote my own review of "Hot Milk") a narrative which "serves more as a device to set up a series of tableaux filled with striking imagery .... [which is] internally consistent and coherent building up a picture of female identity".

Further it bears an uncanny overlap with "August Blue" (albeit published a year earlier) - featuring at its heart a professional classical musician who freezes in a public concert.

The story is narrated in first person, in a series of short excerpts (typically from half a page to four pages, although with one 14 page scene) by Luc(iana), a talented professional classical cellist, looking back in particular on a time when she was around 30 was increasingly looking to concentrate on her solo career and in particular a close collaboration with an up and coming avant-garde composer - at which time she met Billy, an up and coming sculptor on the verge of a career breakthrough.

A number of particular incidents are key in her recollections and her attempts to re-examine her relationship with Billy and with her own career (and her cello): an important concert where she has some form of nervous breakdown/stage frighton stage - which puts a significant hold on her career; a career launching exhibit Billy holds where he shows a sculpture based on her body and where she has a negative reaction when she views it; a rupture between the two in Spain (where Billy has gone to stay in the house of his recently deceased estranged father).

And this is a very introspective novel - perhaps painfully so at times with the reader sharing the frustration that we sense in those close to Luc (including her parents and the avant-garde composer about her unwillingness to truly articulate and seek to understand what happened to her on stage, and to confront some of Billy's behaviour (which at times to me seemed to verge on gaslighting) while also perhaps never really properly opening herself up to Billy.

I think though that what really hindered my appreciation of the novel was my lack of knowledge of or interest in classical music (or for that matter sculpting) - and the main time I had sympathy with Billy was in this exchange

I spoke about the issue of doing something novel, the line it was important to tread between what felt new and what felt truthful. I spoke about Beatrice Harrison and Jacqueline du Pré.
He stopped me. 'Are they cellists?'
'Oh,' I replied. 'Yes.'
I did not continue speaking. From the way I did not do this, my shock must have been evident. After a few moments he said, if he was honest, he didn't listen to it-classical music. He'd heard of Elgar, but he wouldn't recognise his pieces.
He had no clue what a concerto was, as opposed to other things I'd mentioned: sonatas, suites.
I don't actually know the names of any cellists

Because I feel that a greater level of appreciation of the technical aspects of music and cello playing discussed in the book, as well as what I think are probably some clever parallels between music and Luc's thoughts would have elevated the novel beyond the level at which I appreciated it.