Secret History is a murder mystery told in reverse, where the reader is shown the victims and perpetrators at the beginning. The book is narrated in first person by one of the perpetrators, and the events are revealed through his recollections of them. The story is set in a fictional small college in New England in the 1980s, where a group of six students form an exclusive cohort under the tutelage of a professor of Greek classics. This professor has peculiar practices, such as being very selective about which students he allows in his classes. He only lets a few students in at a time, and takes total control of their schedules, becoming almost their only professor by teaching multiple classes at once. This creates a close-knit group of students who are almost strangers to the rest of the students on campus.
Aesthetics
This book is similar to Dorian Gray in that the pursuit of a possibly extinct beauty animates several of the characters. This search is often dangerous and tends to leave destruction in its wake. The search for ever clearer representations of beauty is a well-trodden path leading through various mediums, but typically arts, music, literature, and eventually into the fringe. In this case ancient Greek mysteries.
Greek
The ancient Greek culture is the backdrop for everything that transpires in this story. It shows up in the sexuality of the characters through homosexuality, incest, and hints of possible pederasty. For the character Henry in particular, he seems to attempt to incarnate the Greek spirit in himself. In particular, I was interested in Tartt’s description of Greek as an “action oriented” language and how that might affect the lives of those who speak it.
Presentation of Self
Another major theme in the story is the performative side of self. We build expectations and ideas around people not for who they are, but for who they are pretending to be. The relationship, in its original form, can really only last as long as the pretense goes unrealized. Yet this is not an external phenomenon because you yourself are to some extent performing as well. Your relationship with yourself also changes when this pretense is exposed. In this case it was exposed to the main character through the act of murder. Afterwards, the world and everyone in it, were irrevocably altered. To quote Freud “In the beginning was the deed”.
Thoughts
The book itself was entertaining, quite moody and atmospheric. I was a bit disappointed that even with all the emphasis on Greek we didn’t get more details on the mysteries, but perhaps this was for the best as everything is better when it is hidden. The pacing of the book was decent, with plot twists and reveals that were largely unexpected and satisfying.