Taylor Antrim, The Headmaster Ritual
Aug. 1, 2007 | The appeal of the boarding-school bildungsroman is contradictory. The classics of the genre, at least in its modern incarnation, aren't really about the privilege that permeates the setting. Indeed, an anti-materialist tone generally creeps in, and the reader is pretty much guaranteed that the protagonist will be having a miserable time. The books, then, resonate because they make geographic and social isolation stand in for the loneliness of the soul in formation. The dorms are emotional pressure cookers; the quad and dining hall and field house are stations of the cross. Mid-century offerings like "The Catcher in the Rye" (1951) and "A Separate Peace" (1960) are still in currency alongside more recent examples such as Curtis Sittenfeld's exquisite mope-fest "Prep" and the Harry Potter books, which for all their magical invention have an angst-filled hero at their core.
Set at the fictional Britton Academy in Massachusetts, 's debut, "The Headmaster Ritual," initially appears to be a modest entry into the field. With its shades of Andover ("The country's current president, at least two senators he knew of, the secretary of state: all Britton alumni"), the school is "a game preserve for New England Wasps," according to Edward Wolfe, the recently arrived headmaster. But Wolfe's pedigree is both Harvard and Students for a Democratic Society, and it soon becomes clear that he has his sights set on activities and causes beyond the school's -- and country's -- borders: namely, the plight of North Korea.
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