Well I finished it shortly after my last post, I can see where your coming from Idlerich, yeah, in parts its distinctly unsubtle but I dont necessarily regard this as a bad thing, think of Ballard, his last two books really felt like plays of pawns by the hand of the author, yknow?
That said - although i dont feel its a bad aspect I do think from what ive read so far Austerlitz is much more conceptually developed and "whole" than regeneration, Sebalds book really felt like a artwork, a piece of art whereas Barkers feels like a story - so far... remember it IS a trilogy..
Im going to go out on a limb and make a slight criticism - in regard to idlerichs comments yeah, when you take into consideration the period and the themes explored Freudian methods and approaches to things like class, homosexuality, masculinity etc the way these are dealt with is unsubtle but then I find most of these sorts of notions very obvious having grown up in a post-all that sort of stuff world ( Flake adverts etc ) - but for the period and the characters in the book ( except the anthropologists and psychoanalysts - but then they would think of it as radical and pioneering.. ) these themes would be seen as controversial and alternative, certainly not second nature like you and me. So I think the deal of Patients experience followed by Rivers ( fairly obvious to us, ) thoughts and interpretation of the subject is understandable... however their are lots of parallels that are only afforded by presuming our position and views, I think a good example of this would be the constant eugenics discussions Rivers collegues tend to have regarding Height, breeding, and how the upperclass soldiers are better built etc... obviously within the story the irony is impossible to express but im pretty sure these passages were wrote knowing how apparent it would be to a reader in 1991! But the same treatment is not given to other subjects hence maybe...maybe why Idlerich and to a lesser degree myself feel the comparisons of topics and freudian themes are clumsily explored and explained... explained rather than implied or hinted like irony of eugenics coming up.
Yaknowaddameen??