Intimacy (Aut. Hanif Kureishi)

This book of fiction (although apparently based on British-Pakistani Kureishi's own marital life), is the stream-of-consciousness of a middle-aged English male writer on the eve of his "abandoning" of his competent spouse and two young boys. It has often been described as a much-needed "man's novel" in today's age of feminine/feminist abundance. Yet, despite (or perhaps because of) my status as a self-proclaimed feminist, I enjoyed this honest rendering of what goes on inside a man's head, even if he may be a man more attuned to the creative world of self-knowledge than most "average" men. Why did I like a book filled with so much retrospection, regret and rumination? Or was it the disjointed narrative with its unexpected trips down suburban-London-lanes and its seamless, almost palpable depiction of ongoing love-lust that appealed to me? Yes, the narrator-writer's state of mind was/is manifested in my psyche as my fingers trace(d) his words. I don't sympathise with him; I don't know if he is brave or gutless; I'm not sure if one can be free through escape. But the idea that one cannot be loyal to others by being disloyal to oneself has stayed with/in me. Or is this the realm of self-indulgent artists?