Isabel Waidner's Surreal Exploration of Doubles and Work Precarity
In Isabel Waidner's latest novel As If, the surreal and the everyday collide in a narrative that playfully dissects the precarious nature of contemporary working life through the lens of uncanny doubles. Following their Goldsmiths Prize-winning work Sterling Karat Gold and last year's Corey Fah Does Social Mobility, Waidner continues to establish themself as a distinctive voice in experimental fiction that blends existential farce with sharp social commentary.
The Mirror Image Men of Clerkenwell
The novel opens in a Clerkenwell sublet where two startlingly similar men confront each other in a scene reminiscent of Beckett's Waiting for Godot. Aubrey Lewis, a former actor now down on his luck, finds himself face-to-face with Lindsey Korine, who enters the flat "as if he owned the place." Both men are in their late 40s, exceptionally tall, dark-haired, and share what Lewis describes as "my unremarkable eyes, they were looking back at me." This initial encounter sets the stage for a narrative that constantly questions identity, performance, and the instability of personal and professional lives.
Waidner masterfully constructs parallel backstories that heighten the surreal doubling. Lewis has lived in the flat for two years following the death of his curator wife Laurie from cancer. Korine, meanwhile, has a wife also named Laurie who has survived cancer, plus a small child. Both men share connections to London's acting world and even claim to have attended the same south London school as Gary Oldman, creating layers of coincidence that blur the lines between reality and performance.
The Performance of Work and Identity
Through the acting profession's inherent themes of performance and doubleness, Waidner explores what they term "the precarity of work." Lewis had experienced brief fame after a Barbican production of Waiting for Godot but saw his career collapse due to stage fright, followed by seventeen seasons on a suddenly canceled television show where most of his acting was accomplished through a prosthetic nose. Korine presents himself as a "house husband" who has worked countless unsatisfactory short-term jobs before abruptly leaving his family.
The novel's structure reinforces these themes of instability, with Lewis and Korine narrating successive chapters as they pursue a cat-and-mouse game across London's urban landscape. Their identities become increasingly interchangeable as Lewis ends up as a surrogate husband and father to Korine's family, while Korine moves into the sublet and impersonates Lewis at a painfully awkward audition. A third figure, Lucien Jelley, appears as a sinister understudy who closely resembles both men, suggesting there's always someone waiting to snatch away whatever stability one might find.
London as Character and Stage
Waidner gives London itself a starring role in the narrative, moving beyond mere backdrop to become an active participant in the characters' existential drama. The city's geography—from housing estates and grotty sublets to greasy spoons and abandoned alleyways—mirrors the characters' internal landscapes. Particular attention is paid to the Barbican underpass, which represents dubious shelter and transitional spaces where identities might be shed or assumed.
The novel's London echoes locations familiar from Gary Oldman's recent television work in Slow Horses, creating another layer of cultural reference and performance. Waidner acknowledges Oldman's influence more directly through Lewis's revelation that he was galvanized to take up acting by Oldman's portrayal of playwright Joe Orton in the 1987 film Prick Up Your Ears. Like Orton, Waidner displays a macabre relish for kicking back at authority and established systems.
Absurdist Comedy and Poignant Humanity
Despite its surreal premise and absurdist comic jolts, As If maintains a poignant humanity, particularly in Lewis's scenes with Korine's child, who alternates between sunny and sullen responses to this strange surrogate father. Waidner's tactic of switching selves—asking whether Lewis, Korine, and Jelley might be aspects of the same person—proves both wrenchingly funny and emotionally resonant.
Early in the novel, Lewis remarks that "consistency is the death of good acting," a statement that serves as both artistic philosophy and commentary on modern life's demands for flexibility and reinvention. Waidner's brand of anarchic dissonance buoys the novel forward, even as the whole enterprise acknowledges the darkness beneath the laughter. The novel ultimately suggests that in an economy of precarious work and unstable identities, we're all performing versions of ourselves, with someone always waiting in the wings to take our place.
As If by Isabel Waidner represents a significant continuation of their exploration of social mobility, class, and the surreal realities of contemporary existence. Published by Hamish Hamilton, the novel solidifies Waidner's position as one of Britain's most innovative literary voices, capable of transforming the existential anxieties of modern work into compelling, darkly comic fiction that resonates long after the final page.
