On my bookshelf

I enjoyed contributing this short piece for the Museums Journal (December 2018) on a novel that continues to inspire me ...

Headlong, by Michael Frayn

When I was studying for my PhD my father sent me a copy of Michael Frayn’s novel Headlong, which he’d spotted in a second-hand bookshop. He included a note saying that he imagined that this was what my research was like. 

Headlong tells the story of Martin Clay, a young would-be art historian who leaves London for the country to write his first book. There, in the house of a neighbouring local landowner, he finds what he thinks is a long-lost painting from The Months series by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Clay’s desperate search to substantiate his suspicion and attempt to buy the painting, simultaneously making his professional and financial fortunes, takes the reader on a headlong rush into a moral and intellectual maze. It’s a compelling read that leaves you slightly breathless.

Sadly, my research has never led me to a long-lost Bruegel nor, of course, would any curator attempt to buy such a painting while deceiving the owner. More prosaically, I wish I could achieve the enviable quantity of reading (spanning multiple libraries across London) that Clay manages in a single afternoon. 

What has stayed with me from Frayn’s novel, however, is the sheer sense of excitement and wonder that Clay’s investigations produce: the quickened pulse that all museum people know from the pursuit of a good object story. I think of Clay whenever I find myself setting off into a research maze with that little flash of joy on finding a new lead.