Confessional narratives such as tell-all magazine articles and dramatic reveals on talk shows frequently dominate the media. I could easily imagine the narrator of Katharina Volckmer's debut novel “The Appointment” inhabiting a similar scandal-hungry space as by the second page she admits she's sexually drawn to Hitler and muses “don't you think that there is something kinky about genocide?” But this book isn't simply trying to be sensational, exploitative or shocking. This is an unfiltered monologue from the perspective of a young woman who is a German expat grappling with unsavoury compulsions that consume her. She discusses her tumultuous relationship with a married man and how she lost her job after threatening a coworker. Over the course of the book she speaks to a mysterious individual named Dr Seligman who she's arranged to meet in a London examination room because she believes “the only true comfort we can find in life is to be free from our own lies.” The true nature of their appointment remains elusive, but over the course of their session she reveals her innermost desires and thoughts. In doing so we come to understand her ambiguous feelings about her family and relationships as well as her own national and gender identity. Through her unsparing honesty we're given a fresh perspective about the many instabilities at the centre of being.
There are some books I'd enthusiastically recommend to absolutely everyone and there are others which I'd only recommend to a select few friends. Because of the explicit and prolonged meditative nature of her monologue, this novel would fall into the later category. But it's one I savoured mulling over as its narrator presents such a challenging point of view with many pithy comments and insights. It made me think more deeply about how the country and family I was born into have impacted how I perceive myself and the way I conduct myself. She also gives such an interesting perspective about desire and relationships – how our intense connection to others becomes its own distinct narrative because “Love, like blood, needs to be a story we can tell.” It reminded me somewhat of the equally short novel “The Collection” in the way it boldly discusses erotic desire in a meaningful way. Volckmer is so insightful about how a prolonged disconnection from others can inhibit our abilities to actually express what we really want: “I think that's what loneliness does to people, Dr Seligman; they forget how to articulate their desires.”
I also really appreciated how meaningfully this story looks at the development of gender identity. The narrator humorously describes how as an adolescent she believed she could simply go into a shop to purchase a penis. It's a similar sentiment to what Hilary Mantel described in the first section of her memoir “Giving Up the Ghost” where as a young girl she assumed that she'd eventually wake up one morning as a boy. There's a sense in our early years that these aspects of our identity aren't necessarily fixed so the way adults relate to us as if being a girl or boy is integral to who we are shapes so much about our attitudes towards gender. Given what a politically-contentious subject gender identity is in the UK at the moment, I think it's especially useful to read a narrative that so openly discusses these experiences.
This novel also has an uneasy suspense to it given that the narrator is speaking continuously to the silent Dr Seligman. Of course, I initially assumed he was some kind of psychotherapist. But we're given small unsettling clues that this isn't all that's happening since she's positioned in an odd way while talking to him and at one point she notes how he's taking pictures of her. The mystery of what's going on adds a sense of drama because she's being so vulnerable, but there's nothing weak-willed about her because she actively speculates about Dr Seligman's identity and desires as well. It creates a curious atmosphere and sense of tension which engaged me beyond the overriding cerebral nature of this book. “The Appointment” certainly presents a forceful and welcome new voice in fiction.
