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April 30, 2019
Stewart O'Nan's Playlist for His Novel "Henry, Himself"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Heidi Julavits, Hari Kunzru, and many others.
Stewart O'Nan's Henry, Himself is a moving and subtly told novel of everyday life.
Kirkus wrote of the book:
"As usual, this profoundly unpretentious writer employs lucid, no-frills prose to cogently convey complicated emotions and fraught family interactions. The novel makes no claims for Henry or his kin as exceptional people but instead celebrates the fullness and uniqueness of each ordinary human being. Astute and tender, rich in lovely images and revealing details—another wonderful piece of work from the immensely gifted O'Nan."
In his own words, here is Stewart O'Nan's Book Notes music playlist for his novel Henry, Himself:
The Fundamental Things Apply
Henry Maxwell’s Hit Parade for 1998, like Henry himself, belongs to the past. A son of Pittsburgh’s burgeoning middle class in the ‘20s, he was subjected to piano lessons as a way of acquiring culture, and like many a boy, developed a crush on his young and beautiful teacher, a student at the nearby conservatory. His memories of Schumann’s Spring Song and Czerny’s exercises are colored by that first unrequited love but also by his successful courtship of Emily, who played as well. The metronome from his childhood home still adorns the piano in the corner of their living room, so there’s a living connection there besides Emily’s daily reliance on Pittsburgh’s classical station, WQED.
Unlike Emily, who came from humble beginnings, Henry never tries to be highfalutin. He doesn’t care whether the hymn they’re singing in church was written by Byrd or Bach or Britten, where she takes pride in identifying it by the third note. He likes the choir but doesn’t particularly care for the organ. And he doesn’t seek out music the way Emily does, taking out opera CDs from the library or listening to the Met broadcast Saturday afternoon. He doesn’t have favorites. The only thing he listens to on the radio is the Pirates.
Henry wouldn’t even say he’s musical, and yet from time to time, unbidden, he’ll start whistling, and at least once in the book he breaks into song, crooning “Fly Me to the Moon” into Emily’s ear as they dance on the dock at Chautauqua. In an early draft, I had a brief section of him singing a made-up song to Rufus, an example of Henry’s high spirits, too often overshadowed by his practicality.
Even at his advanced age, Henry can be goofy, and he’s a sucker for the Great American Songbook. Valentine’s Day, the pianist at the fancy restaurant he takes Emily to is swinging “Anything Goes,” making him nod along. Later he recalls the old neighborhood gang crowded around the piano at parties, belting out old chestnuts: “Button up your overcoat, when the wind is free. Take good care of yourself, you belong to me.”
That’s where his playlist ends, somewhere in the mid-’50s. He doesn’t care for the rock music his children listened to, or the teenybopper pop his grandchildren prefer (this being the heyday of Britney and Pittsburgh’s own Christina), and the reigning rap of the era all sounds the same to him, a foreign noise booming out of cars cruising by their house in the middle of the night. The little music that he knows and loves has to do with romance and family and community, and these new forms seem to him not just loud and tasteless but impersonal and alien.
But Henry thinks that about a lot of things. He’s 75, and the Pittsburgh of 1998 isn’t the one he grew up in. The city has changed, and their neighborhood, not all for the better. Every day he’s confronted with more evidence that the world has passed him by, he’s just not sure how it happened or when, yet when one of those old songs comes on, he feels young again, and happy, and he remembers how lucky he is, recalling that boy inside of him, because despite everything, he’s still in love.
Stewart O'Nan and Henry, Himself links:
the author's website
excerpt from the book
Booklist review
Kirkus review
Minneapolis Star Tribune review
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette review
Columbus Dispatch interview with the author
Largehearted Boy playlist by the author for The Odds
Largehearted Boy playlist by the author for West of Sunset
Pittsburgh City Paper profile of the author
also at Largehearted Boy:
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Book Notes (2015 - ) (authors create music playlists for their book)
Book Notes (2012 - 2014) (authors create music playlists for their book)
Book Notes (2005 - 2011) (authors create music playlists for their book)
my 11 favorite Book Notes playlist essays
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musician/author interviews
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