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2-track tale is cautionary, compelling

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By KEVIN WALKER

The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 14, 2009

"Perforated Heart," by Eric Bogosian (Simon & Schuster, $25)

In most stories, the main character makes a journey from Point A (there's something missing in his life) to Point B, where he learns something that causes him to change the course of his life. Or, at the very least, plan to change the course.

Predictable? Yes. But it leaves the audience with a certain satisfaction. It's what is expected. Jean Valjean goes from thief to protector. Kurtz sees the value of civilization. Intergalactic smuggler Han Solo helps the good guys blow up the Death Star.

Varying from this course, however, can produce compelling and memorable characters. Eric Bogosian gives us such a character in "Perforated Heart" with author Richard Morris.

You won't like him, but you'll remember him.

Bogosian - an actor ("Law & Order"), playwright ("Talk Radio") and author ("A Gentle Death") - gives us two versions of Morris, one a cynical success in his 50s and the other a curious and talented man in his 20s starting his literary career.

In 2006, Morris is a successful author of contemporary literature who has just had an operation on his heart. Recovering at his country house in Connecticut, he reminisces about the prices he has paid in life, how the self-absorption required to be an artist cost him relationships (especially one with an actress, perhaps the love of his life, whom he lost when he cheated on her).

During his stay, he stumbles across old journals he kept in the 1970s while living in New York City. From that point forward, the book follows two tracks, one with old Morris and one with young Morris. The younger version is eager to seek new experiences and live in the now. He eventually falls in with a drug dealer, John, and his lover, Bridgette, whom Morris adores and wants.

There are moments when the differences between the older and younger Morris are striking, particularly the way in which the younger reaches out while the older is withdrawn. But the truth is, even at a young age, Morris is using people to advance himself (he secretly tapes John, who is prone to go on long, entertaining rants, for use in a short story that ends up making him famous) and satisfy himself (he goes through a succession of lovers without regard to anyone else's feelings).

The younger Morris lives with two immigrants in a Manhattan apartment - Haim, an Israeli, and Dagmara, from Poland. Things are chummy enough, but it's only later in the book, when the older Richard tracks then both down in Europe, that we learn how callously he treated them.

"Haim's indifference to me is evidence," Morris thinks. "What else could I expect? We once lived like family. I hurt him, or he thinks that I hurt him, and I forgot about him as soon as he was out of sight. Has anyone ever had any significance for me beyond what I could get from them?"

Morris' indifference to others is reminiscent of Meursault in "The Stranger" by Albert Camus, who famously said: "She wanted to know if I loved her. I answered the same way I had last time, that it didn't mean anything but that I probably didn't."

Near the end of the book, Morris offers up some truth: "Desire has been the motivating force of my life. I guess there are other things that can serve that purpose: Love, for one. Hate, another. The prime mover has been desire. When I was small I wanted what I couldn't have. Then I wanted what you had. Eventually, I wanted everything. Later, I wanted a girl, then your girl, then every girl ... who am I without my desire?"

Maybe Bogosian means Morris to be a cautionary tale.

Whatever the case, he's certainly compelling.

Kevin Walker edits Friday Extra and the books pages for The Tampa Tribune.

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