Reading With My Dad's Spirit III: The Count of Monte Cristo

Here is it yet more of the story of how I finished reading my dad's favourite book.

Issue #006

I close it quietly and sit in a sort of stupor.

With a tome like that, I expect a bang, some outward melodrama that reflects the storm of emotions I’ve just experienced, but everything around me is oblivious and disinterested in what I’m going through. There is a silence and I’m alone.

Alone, yes. And then, in a moment, even the book fades. The story is momentarily forgotten in an opaque cloud. It’s perhaps shock, mingled with fear.

I’ve finished it. Now what?

He isn’t here to discuss it with…

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This was something close to the erratic seismograph of turbulence that I underwent when I finally finished The Count of Monte Cristo. My adventure, minute and introspective though it was, mirrored in some ways that of Edmond Dantès’. There was an instance that the denouement of my journey fractured my sense of self and cast doubt over my feelings about the book.

And then I sat back. You know that feeling when you change your posture, and it snaps you out of the net of some particularly troubling and meddlesome emotions? Well, that happened, and I suddenly felt a clarity diffusing through me.

The truth is that my feelings tied to both the actual story and process of reading it are going to be a little more complex and layered than they would have otherwise been. I wasn’t just reading for pleasure here but undertaking the mammoth and multifaceted tasks of coming to terms with my grief, holding conversations again with my dad and, admittedly, trying to hard please him.

I wanted to show him that I’d finished it. To talk to him about it and have a laugh over how a few of the characters may remind us a little of people we know.

I’ll just have to be content with waiting a little before I speak with him. In Islam, we believe that the souls of good people gather in the hereafter; it is a place of rest, reunion and relaxation. It is a place where, if you want, you can tell your dad that you’ve finished reading his favourite book and have a thing or ten to say about it. Silly as it may seem, this is the little fantasy I’ve amused myself with since finishing the book.

I feel like a whole multidimensional universe exists in our imaginations. In it, some of us flit from one universe to another, banking from current realities to lost possibilities to future imaginings. What would I have actually said to him if he’d been alive? No idea, but I would probably talk about the tension of the count’s plotting and scheming, or the depiction of the Parisian elite, or how I wasn’t completely happy with the representation of women in the novel, or the callous profiting from war bonds by the European bourgeoisie or how fascinating it is that many of the Greats from 19th century French literature were so assured in the will of Providence.

(Ok, maybe clarity isn’t the right word – my mind is still wandering and waking slowly to new thoughts and ideas. Expect this to be a meandering newsletter!)

Although I did pick out all those stray thoughts and ideas, and did a fair bit of philosophical unpicking of them, there was one thing that really stood out to me. Trust me, you won’t be surprised…

So, paternal relationships hold quite a bit of importance in Dumas’ epic tale. (Were you surprised, shocked, swooning like a mademoiselle de François?) The story portrays a variety of fathers – both biological and adoptive – and how they impacted their sons and daughters in a variety of ways. It shows their legacies, their foibles, their love, their facades and their secrets. Some were heroes, some villains, some ordinary laymen; all were used to portray the consequences of the actions and behaviours of a father figure. Initially, we meet Edmond’s own father and see that theirs is a bond of tenderness and that Dantès has a sense of fierce protectiveness over his father even from the outset. This little detail sets up the remainder of the story nicely and equips the count with much of the motivation for acting the way he does.

And, actually, the way that Dantès is separated from his father and is so acutely and irreparably affected by this is something that I related with so much. As the narrative unfolds, other characters are shown to be living out their lives in a manner that is seemingly oblivious of the suffering that Dantès underwent as a result of that undue separation. It is a suffering that seemed to wholly transform him, but what is really interesting is how transformation isn’t just limited to Edmond Dantès. In fact, many other characters undergo various transformations, but theirs are marked by blatant self-interest and almost appear to be at the expense of Dantès. There is this feeling of being almost held in place by your grief and by the separation from a beloved father whilst everyone else moves on that I really connected with.

And the other interesting thing? I wouldn’t have discussed any of this with my dad. Despite all the ideas of what our discussions would have entailed, I don’t really know what we would have said. But there is one thing that I think I’ve managed to achieve during this read that I would have had so easily had if I’d read it whilst he was alive, and that is the experience of a shared read. By voicing my thoughts and sharing my words, I have managed to fulfil a semblance of what it would have been like to read a book with him. I can almost feel his spirit as I think about what I’ve read and with the help of everyone who has spoken to me after reading my newsletters, I can definitely say that this hasn’t been an isolating experience.

It's curious, isn’t it? In not reading my dad’s favourite book while he was alive (a thing I still regret a little), I have read in a way that was so much more enriching and emotional.

So, you’re probably wondering if it’s my favourite book, too. Well, admittedly, no. But I do love it. It’s a book I’m glad I’ve read, and I will read again just to feel close to my dad.

All that’s really left to say now is, thank you to everyone who has stayed with me and has spoken to me about their own feelings. What else are words for, if not to open up the box to the heart, which contains so much of us?