Rating: 
Summary: inaccurate and tiresome
Review: On problem with the argument is that orthographics were simply not pinned down in the sixteenth century. I mean that people simply did not spell their names consistently each time they wrote it down, or each time it was recorded for them in a tax record or receipt. For example, the artist we call Geertgen tot Sint Jans was also called Gheertgen tot Sing Jans and Gheerrit van Haerlem and Gerardus Leydanus and Geertje van Sint Jans. In the Bruges records for the Guild of Saint Luke (which is the name for every painters' guild in every city, because Luke was said to have painted the Virgin's portrait from life) his name is spelled Gheraert, Gheraerd, Gheeraerd, Gherraert, Gherart, Gherardt, etc... Thus, basing an argument on the orthographics of Pieter Bruegel (Breugel, Brugel, etc...) can only lead to nonsense. A second niggling inaccuracy was that it would be impossible to do the amount of research on Bruegel (or on any other topic) in the time allotted to this activity according to the narrative. You can't just expect to drop into the British Library (which doesn't lend books) and find out all this information about the status questionis surrounding the Seasons paintings. (The author of The British Library is Falling Down describes library research much more accurately. First, you have to order your books, then immediately go on a coffee break, because some library worker has to page the books, and this takes at least an hour. Only if you order them the night before can you expect to be reading by 9 am.) Maybe I'm just sensitive to these issues because I spend so much time in libraries, and the character in Headlong makes finding information look so easy. I found this book inaccurate and tiresome. If you want to read a great novel about Early Netherlandish Painting, read William Gaddis' The Recognitions.
Rating: 
Summary: A good mixture of old masters and new schemes
Review: Headlong is an interesting combination of historical research and rationalizing behavior. Martin Clay, thinks that he has discovered a long lost Bruegal painting and he wants to present it to the world. The machinations involved in this scheme are extraordinary. The historical context of the Netherlands in the mid 1500s is fascinating as are the explanations of the researched paintings. At times, there is too much research detail which bogged down this reader. Overall, it is a good read and brings Bruegal and his work to life.
Rating:
Summary: Pleasant, funny, informative... but a tad overrated
Review: Frayn's novel is yet another fictionalization of the pleasures of scholarship, resonating with the same sorts of delight which informed Byatt's POSSESSION, Barnes's FLAUBERT'S PARROT, Hollinghurst's THE FOLDING STAR, Stoppard's play ARCADIA, and on and on and on. Perhaps this theme may have been done to death in the last twenty years, but that didn't stop Frayn from producing a very charming and informative novel about a man who has discovered a painting which may or may not be an important undiscovered Brueghel. The best things the book has going for it are its wonderfully inept and likeable hero (who is free of the tiresome sexual and intellectual arrogance that far too often dogs similar protagonists of similar works on this theme), and its real pleasure in delving to the arcane details of Brueghel's political and cultural milieu. This is a pleasant timekiller, but it is no great work: the plot is thin, the denouement is unbelievable, and the wife is an extremely shadowy and thinly-drawn character. Accept this novel for what it's worth, but no more.
Rating: 
Summary: Frayn creates a masterpiece (in oil)
Review: This is a novel about a painting; and it is also a novel about a middle-aged philosopher turned art historian, suffering from Peter Pan syndrome, subject to obsessive intellectual fits and get-rich-quick fevers. Martin Clay, the philosopher, is a very flawed protagonist, a bungling conniver, sort of like a more intelligent Basil Fawlty. The painting, on the other hand, is a treasure. The comic Clay finds it stopping up a fireplace in his comic neighbors' breakfast room, and he instantly falls for it the way Dudley Moore falls for Bo Derek on the beach in "10": "I recognize it instantly. ... I'm looking down from wooded hills into a valley. The valley runs diagonally from near the bottom left of the picture, with a river that meanders through it, past a village, past a castle crowning a bluff, to a distant town at the edge of the sea, close to the high horizon. .. Among the trees just below me is a group of clumsy figures, some of them breaking branches of white blossom from the trees, some caught awkwardly in the middle of a heavy clumping dance. A bagpiper sits on a stump; you can almost hear the harsh pentatonic drone. .. [H]alf-hidden in the raw spring undergrowth, watched only by a bird on a tree, a little thickset man holding two small wild daffodils is expressionlessly touching his comically pouted lips to the comically pouted lips of a little thick-set woman. .. A ship is setting sail, bound for the hot south. ... How can even these two fools not know what it is? I daren't think the name of its creator to myself, because it simply cannot be so." This very abbreviated excerpt only hints at the loving craftsmanship with which Frayn has created this lost masterpiece. It is more real, more alive, better crafted, more memorable, and more important to the reader than any of the characters in this novel. It's not just the intricate detail of the painting itself: Frayn convinces us that it's a painting which logically MUST exist, to make sense of the rest of the artist's works which really do exist in our world. After you are done, you will have to shake yourself alert and remind yourself that this painting is not known to have existed outside of Frayn's imagination, such is the integrity and reality which Frayn has lent its creation. I consider this to be an impressive accomplishment. The reader is fairly warned up front that she/he will be asked to attend to some details of art history and biography and to the history of the Netherlands under Spanish rule in the mid-16th century. The going is challenging but not impossible, and if you don't follow all the details, still you will be able to grasp the conclusions which they lead to about the unique importance of the painting and Clay's frenzied passion for finding the answers which have been put in his hand - or rather, which would be in his hand if it were now his painting. Which is the problem, of course: it's not. So, while on the one hand Clay engages in brain-wracking intellectual toil and surmise to produce the answers which have eluded the guardians of culture of the West for 450 years, on the other he is engaged in highly cinematic farce involving plots, deceptions, trying to sneak into the neighbor's bedroom, car chases, dogs, and the like. In fact the structure of the action is very much in tune with an Alec Guinness comedy, and has the same kind of bittersweet taste at the end. It would make a nice film if they could figure out how to get the intellectual arguments into it! I don't say that the novel is flawless, but it is a very unusual achievement. Ultimately it is a study of the dangerous lust of a foolish and unworthy married man for a sublime and unattainable object. The Moore-Derek metaphor holds up rather well. Except that Derek's beauty in "10" ultimately proved not to really be worth so much fuss. Not the case here - alas.
Rating:
Summary: Hilarious, if you are academically inclined
Review: Many reviewers have complained about the detail of the art history aspect of the novel. Some have even called it a flaw. I couldn't disagree more! It's the books greatest strength. The ability to reflect on what is only a mix of pigments on a canvas, and to extract intriguing insights into a long-gone century and culture is fascinating. To those familiar with the academic milieu, the iconography/iconology distinction and mutual distain is dead-on and hilarious. If you aren't interested in history and/or art, well, you might not find the book so thrilling. The main plot is sitcomesque, to be sure (though it's not half as hokey as Ian McEwen's "Amsterdam"). Nonetheless, it is fun to watch the main character's mind at work - everybody thinks they're perfectly reasonable, now matter how flawed they are. If you enjoy that aspect of the novel, consider reading Tim Park's "Juggling the Stars" and its sequel, "Mimi's Ghost". The "protagonist" in those darkly comic books descends into multiple murder, all the while maintaining an entirely reasonable attitude (in his eyes).
Rating: 
Summary: Oil and Water
Review: This novel is an awkward attempt to marry farce with art history. The farcial portions of this book are immensely entertaining with well drawn characters. The art historical portions, while initially interesting, tend to bog the plot down with overlong excursions into fairly obscure aspects of Netherlandish history. If you want well done art history, read "Rembrandt's Eyes". It actually would have been helpful to the average reader for this book to include some plates of the paintings being discussed, which is an odd comment to make for a novel!
Rating: 
Summary: Is Grisham writing art novels under a pseudonym?
Review: This thing was very disappointing. To wit: the protagonist concocts a scheme to steal a valuable painting that involves--really just that, stealing it, no sophisticated confidence scam, etc. Instead, they guy (with the help of the victim's wife) puts it in the back of a truck and drives away with it as fast as he can with the victim chasing him--clever. Another thing I didn't like (and there were a lot) was the characters--dullards, each and every one of them, especially the guy's wife, from who he kept the scheme quiet for fear she would not believe him and who tried to foil his scheme by involving a friend and mutual art critic to look at the painting, then finally just tells him to go away, at the same time she gives him money to pursue the hair-brained scheme. Let's be clear: some very, very good novels are about very mundane, even repulsive things (e.g, david foster wallace's novel set in a half-way house) and just because a novel is "about" art and art criticism, doesn't make the book a work of art. In other words, it takes more than a high-brow setting to make a good novel. Usually one has to visit an airport to find a novel of this quality.
Rating:
Summary: disappointing and self-indulgent
Review: There is nothing worse than squandered talent and skill. Unfortunately this novel is the poster child for self-indulgence and narcissism. Frayn is a fine playwright and I highly recommend Copenhagen, but this novel is an extended narrative on the author's desire to be an art critic/philosopher, replete with long discursive sections that neither reveal character or move the plot forward. Female characters are a sham and are so unbelievable as to break the willful suspension of disbelief. Of course with this noxious stew in place it is no surprise that Frayn was forced to breathlessly resolve the plot in 5 pages or else, not withstanding voluminous ruminations on art and philosophy that could be better read elsewhere. Like a previous reviewer, I'm off to the used bookstore to salvage what I can from this book. A major downer!
Rating:
Summary: Dive into this absolutely brilliant and entertaining book
Review: Headlong by Michael Frayn has everything I like. Comedy, chewy language, history, ideas and loads of momentum. This book just keeps on going to its literally smashing and satisfying climax. It is just what you'd expect from the playwright of Noises Off and Copenhagen.Martin Clay, the philsopher-turned-art historian who tells the story narrates in the first person present. He reports everything as he sees it and--even better--thinks it. Following along with Martin from elation to desperation, from clarity to confusion, from logical conlusion to its equally logically refutation keeps Headlong exciting. Even the pages on Netherlands history are exciting, made that way by the deft and breathless narration.Consider this tip as you read: pop into the library (or a bookstore-coffee bar) and have a look at book of Bruegel's paintings. You'll have a better appreciation of the artist in question and, in a way, be Martin's collaborator he works to uncover the mystery of the Merrymakers.Headlong is just that, an exciting rush of a book you will dive into and keep pursuing at full delight to the last page.
Rating:
Summary: I certainly missed something...
Review: I also read a glowing review of this Booker award nominated novel, rushed right out to buy it, and must confess that my copy went straight to the local library sale within a week. I thought that the art history topic would be an enthralling component of the plot. Nope. Although I don't have an intense academic art background, I have taken a few courses and was surprised that the author couldn't spark more than passing interest in a complete new world of art historians, auction houses, etc. Ah well, at least the character development should be something special. Oops. No again. Other reviews saw this novel peopled by flawed but humorous, true to life subjects. I only read about fairly unintelligent, selfish, yet surprisingly boring characters. I frankly didn't care all that much about what happened to them. This author is off my list....
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