The Enchanters – Second Reading

I’m currently rereading James Ellroy’s The Enchanters and enjoying it more the second time round, although naturally a few things that grated on the first reading now seem even more glaring. Rather than do a standard review, I thought I would jot down some thoughts.

The Setting

Los Angeles, 1962. Ellroy was fourteen years old at the time of the novel’s setting. ‘Geography is destiny’ Ellroy is fond of saying. To which we might add that history is memory. Ellroy has always been at his best when he can draw on his own experiences – his penchant for voyeurism, his cast-iron memory -and bring them into an historical fiction narrative. The Enchanters is strongest when he does this. Ellroy is not a natural researcher. He hires researchers to do the legwork for him while the inspiration springs from his memory. The WWII setting of Perfidia and This Storm robbed him of his modus operandi as he was completely dependent on researchers to portray the LA of before his birth.

The Characters

Now that Ellroy has abandoned the LA Quartet in favour of a Quintet (it’s a numbers game), how consistent is his portrayal of character? There are some characters, such as Dudley Smith and Elizabeth Short who have gone through too many jarring variations, but others feels they are coming into their prime. LAPD Chief William H. Parker is a far more interesting presence. He’s ambitious and cunning, unlike the pathetic, emotionally volatile figure he has been in recent novels. It helps that we don’t see too much of him. Despite deconstructing historical figures, Ellroy also left them enough mystique to stay interesting – the glimpses we see of J. Edgar Hoover in the FBI transcripts of American Tabloid to use one example. Fred Otash is also vastly more complex. Ellroy told me he never liked Otash personally… and in Widespread Panic it showed. Here, Ellroy has put his personal feelings aside, and he really explores Otash’s soul. I was less convinced that we needed Otash’s romance with the actress Lois Nettleton.

Marilyn Monroe

The FT review of The Enchanters makes the interesting point that Marilyn Monroe’s legacy has been hotly contested in recent years, and argues that Ellroy wants to ‘put that legacy right back where it used to be – in the zone of kink, innuendo, sex, gossip and scandal’. Well perhaps, but there’s something refreshing about Ellroy’s portrayal of a woman who understands her vices even though she can’t control them. His Monroe isn’t exactly an iconic icon of iconicity but she is endearingly human, and I loved her more for that.

Love Me Fierce in Danger: The Life of James Ellroy is published by Bloomsbury.