Book review: The Gustav Sonata by Rose Tremain: layers of Swiss intrigue

Soothingly melodic prose with off-key notes hidden amongst this harmony

Like the musical arrangement from which Rose Tremain’s new novel takes its title, The Gustav Sonata is a story told in three movements. This structure allows Tremain to jump back and forth in time as she examines the lives of a handful of residents of Matzlingen, a fictional town in the Mittelland of Switzerland “where nothing much happened”. Beginning in the late 1940s, the narrative then slips back to the previous decade, before bringing the story to its conclusion at the turn of the 21st century. It’s a broad period to do justice to, especially in what’s a relatively slim volume, but Tremain tethers herself tightly enough to her characters in order to make it work.

At the heart of the novel is what turns out to be a life-long friendship between Gustav Perle and Anton Zwiebel. Despite the closeness of their bond, the two young friends’ home lives couldn’t be more different. Anton, a precociously talented pianist, is delicate and highly-strung, but has two loving and supportive parents to indulge him in a life of relative luxury. Gustav, meanwhile, lives alone with his widowed and increasingly bitter and unhappy mother. His childhood is one of all-encompassing impoverishment – no gestures of love or affection, no kind words, not enough money and only a lone tin train to play with. Nursing long festering psychic wounds of her own – the details of which are elucidated in the second part of the novel – Gustav’s mother is unable to nurture him, instead commanding that he be like Switzerland itself: “You have to hold yourself together and be courageous, stay separate and strong.” It’s an idea that’s integral to the story that subsequently unfolds – one that questions the cost of neutrality, in terms of both individuals and society as a whole – but all the same, it’s a bit of a heavy-handed comparison.

Such contradiction encapsulates the novel as a whole. It’s cleverly layered and finely woven together in a way that’s eminently pleasing to read: there’s something soothingly melodic about the pace of Tremain’s prose. But hidden amongst this harmony are a series of individual notes that seem strikingly off-key. For example, I’m pretty sure nobody in 1940s rural Switzerland ever said “I’ve got a cool idea”; and neither am I convinced that any 1930s hausfrau was as brazenly sexually empowered as Tremain invents – especially not in über-conservative Switzerland, a country that didn’t even give women the vote until the 1970s. More problematically, I was left feeling entirely unsure of whether I should have been rooting for Gustav and Anton’s relationship or not. The narrative arc suggests yes, but Anton is so distressingly oblivious to Gustav’s support and affection, I couldn’t help but want the latter to just give up trying to please everyone around him and put his own happiness first for a change. I guess this is Tremain’s message though: you can’t escape your past and the interactions and relationships with the people who made you who you are.

The Gustav Sonata by Rose Tremain (Chatto & Windus, £16.99)