Saccharine-free study of ageing

THE SECRET LIFE OF HENDRIK GROEN 83 YEARS OLD Michael Joseph/Penguin

TUESDAY, January 2013, and Hendrik Groen still doesn’t like old people, which is rather amusing as he is 83.

But he has turned to a new method of expressing his feelings and started a diary, a document he thinks might be useful for a friend (his best mate Evert, possibly) to read at his funeral.

The title of the book in its English translation, of course, harks back to Sue Townsend’s very popular and much-loved series of diaries of Adrian Mole.

Hendrik Groen’s novel follows much the same format in many ways, most obviously that it is also a diary. But there is another more subtle similarity in that the Dutch title of Hendrik’s story is Attempts to Make Something of Life.

This second title is something of an irony, given the content of this fascinating book; because part of the backdrop to the events in the novel are that by the time one has reached an advanced age, it appears there is not much to aspire to in terms of reaching goals and objectives.

Hendrik is a resident in the Horizons facility, a home for old people, and through his year as a diarist, he will take digs at them that expose the foibles of old age.

It is clear from the start of the story this is no saccharine-coated version of old age, but rather a tale told about how people’s characters don’t change just because they are old.

The diary has accounts of the bullies, the bores, and the prejudiced interspersed in a gripping story of real friendship, and even romantic love.

It is not only the residents of the home who are painted with wonderful word sketches in the book – the director of the home is depicted as a shameless user of her position to further her own career.

Her assistant, Anje, is a subversive figure in the gentlest of ways, with whom Hendrik is firm friends, and who helps him on various quests to find out exactly what it is that is going on in the home.

A threat throughout the story is of the fearfulness and dependency felt – albeit expressed in different ways – by the home’s residents.

This theme is tracked alongside the fates of the 50-plus political party; and this is one of the examples of how the author uses the outside world to reflect the somewhat cloistered life inside the ironically named Horizons home.

It is also a chance for the reader to meet Hendrik’s cynical side: he realises that many of the politicians in the party are mostly expressing concerns about their own old age, having put their elderly into the care of homes.

It’s not all doom and gloom, though.

Hendrik has decided to live his life in a glass-filled-to-the-brim manner.

Andhis quest for something more meaningful than a scrabble for the best chair, to watch the royal coronation after the abdication of Queen Beatrix, becomes a real attempt to make sense of a life that is limited by age.

He befriends not only Evert, who likes to gamble and to say outrageous things, but other people in the home who are likeminded, and together they form the “Old but not Dead” club.

The rules are simple: each member has to organise an outing that remains a secret until its members arrive at their destination.

Things change for the better in many ways when Eefje, an attractive woman with a quick mind, moves into Horizons, and a friendship bordering on a romantic relationship blossoms.

The relationship is a courtly one and Hendrik comes to rely on Eefje as a confidant. She is also the source of good biscuits and sound advice. She lives life to the full.

With her Hendrik feels emboldened to shake off his cardigan, as it were, and to have his dinner jacket dry-cleaned and buy a new suit.

Of course, with friends, especially at an advanced age, there is the risk of loss. The hearse is a frequent caller to the home, but the cause of death is never told to its inhabitants.

Trying to find out what the policy is, the intrepid group of friends attempt to gain legal access to the papers, and one is reminded there will come a stage in life when one does not have all the time in the world.

Then there is a member of the club who is facing the realisation she is entering the early stages of dementia.

This complication and the complicity of the group in protecting her allows for a full examination of what relying on each other in an institutionalised life means. It also brings the group into a degree of opposition to the rules and regulations, which the home relies on to keep running cost-effectively and to the advantage of the director.

There is little sentimentality in this book, but rather a search through humour, pathos, and sometimes harsh and tragic reality, that takes the reader on a journey through being old.

The author takes the reader through Holland as the group stretches its wings and extends its trips to new destinations. The word pictures drawn of the characters and the realities of social care in the Netherlands make for a book that reads like a dream.

There is not a false word in it, and there are paragraphs that often sum up something extremely important to the narrative in that concise way that makes you want to run through the house to find someone to read it out to.

For those living in other countries where social care may not be as good as the Netherlands, it may seem that the residents’ fears of cutbacks by the government are minor, but the reality is that it is their truth that matters.

At the end of the day, however we end our days, we have in common our humanity, fears, and frailty; but we also have, as Hendrik Groen reminds us, the hope that what we have today will be good.

It’s about fear of the other, but also how one only can live with others alongside one in one’s quest to continue living in the shadow of what Hendrik knows is to come.

The book was published as fiction, but no one knows who the author is. It’s been published in over 21 countries and there is, according to Publisher’s Weekly a second book in the offing from the same author.

Not knowing who the author is, whether a well-known author or a genuinely old person writing their experiences, is part of the magic of the book. And a magical book it is; but where there is magic there must be wisdom and discernment.

There must also be a sense of truth and integrity that lie at the heart of the story.

This novel achieves all of this while reflecting on a world where the nuclear family has taken over from the extended family. Part of its intrigue is that of Hendrik’s entire life, which contains a great tragedy, we probably only read a page or more.

It’s one of those books that will stay with the reader long after it’s put down. Beautifully and evocatively written, it demands to be read and cherished.

This is a tale of how people’s characters don’t change just because they are old