I suppose it won’t surprise you to know that I’ve been reading quite a few books about death and grief in the 17 months since Hazel died.
It’s probably equally unsurprising that the ones that have affected me the most have been those written by great writers about their own personal experiences.
Memorial Days by Geraldine Brooks and The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion come to mind.
Ghost Stories, by Siri Hustvedt, goes straight to the top of that list.
Hustvedt was married for 43 years to the novelist, poet, essayist, and film-maker Paul Auster, until his death from cancer in 2024. Ghost Stories is her account of their life together, a deeply personal and unflinching set of recollections, ponderings, love letters, snatches of remembered dialogue, poems, song lyrics (their daughter Sophie is a well known singer-songwriter), and very moving letters written by Auster to his just born grandson in the time he knew he was dying.
I know Hustvedt’s work well, having read two of her novels and a collection of her essays. She’s a wonderful writer, quite different to Auster, who I’ve also read and admired, especially his 1992 novel Leviathan and his collected exchange of letters with J.M. Coetzee.
I hope this conveys that these are literary, articulate, intellectual, thoughtful people, but they’re also passionate, impetuous, foolish, and affected by trauma – all of which is held open to scrutiny by Hustvedt in the most deeply revelatory way. Her skill as a writer is matched only by her willingness to explore and share her grief.
The title comes from Auster’s statement days before he died that he wanted to come back as a ghost, and Hustvedt’s conviction that he did, and she can at times sense his presence. This from a highly respected and awarded neurophysiologist, epistemologist, and life scientist as well as a poet and Booker nominated novelist.
And yes, of course I cried while reading Ghost Stories. If you know me and knew Hazel, you’ll understand I perceived many parallels in our lives and those of Siri and Paul, even though there are many and vast differences, too.
One of the remarkable things about this book is how controlled Hustvedt’s writing is, no doubt a result of her simultaneous scientific and literary skill. It’s by no means without passion but it never veers into bathos or self-pity. Maybe it takes a scientist to delve this deeply into their own emotional core.
I find it interesting that all the books I’ve mentioned here were written by women after the death of their husbands. I’ve read books by men sharing their grief at the loss of their partners but they haven’t affected me as deeply.
I’m also interested that Hustvedt shares my rejection of the “five stages of grief” proposed by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. Neither Hustvedt’s nor my experience matched the linear progression of Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance.
For me, I think an influencing factor was that by the time Hazel died, I had grieved the death of my mother (45 years before), my father, and my two oldest brothers. That’s not to say I didn’t have any of the five feelings, they just never appeared in a check-list fashion.
With Hazel, I think they happened all at once, or maybe not at all. It’s impossible to step neatly into Denial when you have to explain the circumstances of your wife’s death to uniformed police, plain clothes detectives, a forensic photographer, and the coroner.
As you can see, Ghost Stories resonated strongly with me and made me reflect on my own grief, which continues. I, too, am reminded of Hazel – you could say haunted – every day, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Hustvedt’s story is her own, though, and Auster’s, and their children’s, and even their grandson’s. It’s beautifuuly told.
Highly recommended.