‘Trust’: a tremorous exploration of the edifice of American capital

“Diaz has described capital as a labyrinth that distorts the reality around itself in the American value system. He is fascinated by the “transcendental nature of money in American culture.” Indeed, much in the same way that The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald, which was written around the time of the events narrated Trust, explored the flaws in the idea of the American Dream, Diaz lays this myth bare.”

Trust by Hernan Diaz – A Review

SB Veda <CALCUTTA.

The title of Hernan Diaz’ Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, Trust, is a double entendre. It refers to a monetary instrument in which assets are held for the benefit of another just as it asks the reader whose version of this four-fold account of the events narrated in the story should the reader trust.

While the title has been out for a while to much acclaim, it only breached the literary borders of the Indian market, recently, so we review it, now.

Ostensibly, the story is about money and the personalities around it – a fortune made and the rich people around it. It is also about relationships, husbands and wives, and points of view on this system that enables people to amass such wealth: Capitalism.

The reader is first introduced to central character in the book, (one can’t quite call him the protagonist as his negative qualities overshadow the natural tendency for the reader to be on the main character’s side) Benjamin Rask. Rask is the intelligence behind Adam Smith’s invisible hand – a Manhattan virtuoso in investing who bets long when the market is booming in the 1920s and takes short positions  just before the crash of 1929.

While his former actions elevate Rask to heroic standing in the eyes of New York society – a conclusion constructed from the notion that Rask’s investing in companies is building the wealth of the entire economy, creating jobs and livelihoods. That said, his cold short selling of stocks (making money from the losses) just before the crash, exposing what is sure to be market manipulations by him (the lack of regulation in the stock market was one of the key factors in creating the boom and bust that both built and wrecked America’s economy over two decades) begin to jaundice this view. The exile from polite society doesn’t bother him. His cold calculations give him a comfort that societal acceptance is incapable of providing, and despite his wealth, he continues to invest like a predator: a shark cannot help but feed.

Rask’s wife, Helen, having led a sheltered life under the auspices of a pedigreed family, does not so much fall in love with Rask as empathizes with him, for on observing his solitude, which she reasons could only result in loneliness, she finds that his detachment echo her own feelings of isolation. Her tendency to feel for others is a strong thread that runs through her character but within that thread are fibres, which are purposeful, deliberate, and self-interested.

Indeed, these dialectics pulling and pushing on her psyche cause Helen to become impacted by Rask’s business dealings in a diametrically opposite way. So often, the spouses of the robber barons who make their fortunes, give some of it back in philanthropic causes, leaving a legacy and position in society. The Rockefellers, Kennedys, Carnegies and Gateses all left foundations that came from the amassing of incongruous wealth, sometimes by making inhuman decisions. Today, these names are synonymous with the upper crust of American benevolence. But what are their motivations beyond simply wanting to help others?

Diaz writes of Helen, “She knew, with total certainty that Benjamin Rask would take her as his wife, if she let him. And she decided right then and there that she would. Because she saw that he was, in essence, alone. In his vast solitude, she would find hers –
And with it, the freedom her overbearing parents had always denied her.”

The opportunity to utilize Rask’s money and standing burnishes their position in society. If charity is not simply altruism – can it truly be trusted? What are the consequent expectations of such ‘benevolence’? Surely, the recipients are beholden to the benefactors. These are questions that Helen’s storyline explore.

After Rask’s manipulations of the market come to light, post-crash of 1929, Helen is stung by the ostracism of her peers. That she and Benjamin amass more wealth during The Great Depression, while others hurl themselves from the tops of buildings on account of financial ruin, is a blow she cannot bear. The turn of events see the Rasks becoming objects of revulsion. While Benjamin is unaffected, his wife, falls debilitatingly ill.

Although Rask’s attempts to get Helen proper treatment in Europe, away from the prying eyes of New York society does humanize him to the reader (he spends much time at her bedside), he can’t help but gamble with that as well, investing in the company that makes her medicines. His investing actually drives the treatment rather than the decisions of treating physicians. So, what initially emerges as a gentle aspect to Rask’s character metamorphizes into something far more colder. Even in Helen’s treatment, Rask cannot fight the compulsion to make decisions based on what will acquire him more wealth. In the end, Rask’s cold calculations are more dear to him than the health of his wife. Helen’s prognosis, in the end, comes as no surprise to the reader.

As this tale is recounted from four different perspectives, it appears that to Rask, the loss of his wife is just another loss that is balanced out by the financial gain, realized by his purchase of the pharmaceutical company making the medicines used in her treatment. Ultimately, the losses and gains shown in the novel, from Rask’s point of view show no distinction between the markets and Rask’s personal life. He is his own market.

Interestingly, these accounts of what is essentially the same story, are devoid of dialogue. They are parallel narratives written from varying perspectives. So, the reader is left to determine which version they should ‘trust’. The lack of dialogue lends an impersonal character to the novel, distancing the reader from the characters in a way that one suspects is deliberate. Money may facilitate and enable the living of lives  but, in itself, is not imbued with breath. Hence, we are left to imbibe the narrative in this distilled form.

A trust in financial terms means a fiduciary arrangement that allows a third party, or trustee, to hold assets on behalf of a beneficiary or beneficiaries. In the case of Diaz’s novel, it is we, the readers, who are the trustees – and the narratives are the assets. Just as assets appreciate or decline in value, it is for us to determine their relative worth.

The novel is an exercise in positioning the reader to view life as a balance sheet in the same way that the murky protagonist of the stories does. It is a narrow view of the events of the human experience but in so doing, reveals something about the opaque complexities of financial markets, and the driving force behind them: greed.

Indeed, Diaz has described capital as a labyrinth that distorts the reality around itself in the American value system. He is fascinated by the “transcendental nature of money in American culture.” Indeed, much in the same way that The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald, which was written around the time of the events narrated Trust, explored the flaws in the idea of the American Dream, Diaz lays this myth bare.

For those who have an interest in understanding America, her motivations, and what makes American society tick, Trust is a vivid exploration that may or may not reveal much – depending on whose version you trust.