School Days

February 1, 2022
Boarding school life and loves in the 1960s. Sam Brandt, the protagonist of well-known editor and poet Galassi's second novel, is an alumnus of Leverett, a Connecticut boarding school that had "always exuded an aura of meritocratic rather than purely pecuniary elitism." Some 20 years after graduation he returns to the school to teach English. When the Head of School receives a claim of long-ago sexual abuse from one of Sam's classmates, he asks Sam to investigate the accusation against former faculty member Theo Gibson, "the most inventive, demanding, popular teacher in the school" and someone who served as Sam's "sounding board and source of wisdom." The novel shifts into a lengthy flashback from Sam's perspective, describing the complicated choreography of sexual desire at the school in its final years as a male-only institution, and specifically how students like him were forced by the mores of the time to suppress any overt expression of their desire, as "love among the boys was tacitly acknowledged and rigorously guarded against." In Sam's case, that included an intense, but utterly chaste, relationship with Eddie Braddock, a "dazzling, combustible kid" in Sam's eyes. He was "desperate for Eddie's touch, yet he was determined, too, that the nobility of their bond not be tainted by neurosis." When the story returns to its contemporary setting, capped off by a brief coda at the class of 1967's 50th reunion, Galassi reveals how this sexual repression has damaged the lives of Sam and his friends--in Sam's case, a marriage that produced a child has ended when it could no longer endure the truth of his sexual orientation--but at least hints at the possibility of recovery in late middle age. While the novel could have benefited from the elimination of some peripheral characters, Galassi's understated style and economical prose are well suited to this elegiac story. A thoughtful exploration of the lingering effects of repressed sexual identity.

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February 7, 2022
Publisher and poet Galassi’s emotionally resonant latest (after the novel Muse) chronicles an English instructor’s complicated relationship with his Connecticut boarding school. In 2017, Leverett senior faculty and alumnus Sam Brandt is tasked by the school’s headmaster with investigating allegations that Theodore Gibson, a demanding yet beloved teacher, sexually abused students decades ago. Suppressed emotions surface from Brandt’s years as a Leverett student in the late 1960s, when it was an all-boys school. A protracted flashback ensues, detailing how Sam cautiously allowed his passion for his dormmate to simmer to the surface, despite otherwise keeping his sexuality a secret. Brandt tries to reconcile his memories of Gibson’s formative mentorship, which kept him mentally afloat through his school years, with the accusations levied by several of his Leverett classmates. Meanwhile, as an adult, Brandt continues to suppress his sexuality, eroding his longtime marriage to a woman. Galassi’s talent for crisp and moving storytelling is again on display, elegantly turning on themes of truth, loyalty, and the ways in which his protagonist’s capacity for self-deception override his desire to enjoy an “unlived life.” This heartful novel packs a punch. Agent: Andrew Wylie, The Wylie Agency.

Starred review from February 1, 2022
It's October 2007, and fifty-something Sam Brandt is an English teacher at Leverett, a tony Connecticut boarding school. When the school's headmaster receives a vaguely threatening letter from an alum named Ron Bryden implying that he had, as a student, been sexually abused by a beloved faculty member, the headmaster asks Sam to investigate, as he was a classmate of the alum. Cue a flashback to February 1964, when Sam was a freshman. A "despised loner" at the time, Sam had only two friends, Ray Kaiser and Eddie Braddock. Sam has a killer crush on Eddie, but, alas, Eddie is straight. As for Ron, he is "a sour-faced boy from Texas" who is generally disliked and mysteriously drops out of school as a junior. Galassi introduces other characters and follows Sam's experiences to his graduation when we flash forward to November 2007 and find Sam in love with another straight man, Dean. The novel dramatizes Sam's obvious struggles with his homosexuality and his continuing effort to divine the truth of Ron's allegations. Galassi (Muse, 2015), who is Chairman and Executive Editor of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, has written a classic coming-of-age novel leavened with gay content, which is handled beautifully. As for Sam, he's a terrific, empathic character whose life is fascinating, as is this beautifully conceived and written novel.

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