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Title: State of Wonder
Author: Ann Pratchett
Genre: Contemporary literary fiction
Thingummies: 5
Synopsis: After a colleague is reported dead, a pharmacologist goes to the Amazon to try to discover what happened and whether the project he had been working on can be completed
Thoughts: I've been asked why I bother with literary fiction when a lot of the tropes tend to annoy me. This book is why.
I'd read Prachett's Bel Canto last year, and was dazzled by the language and character portrayals, but disappointed by the last five pages. (One of the things I find most annoying about many literary novels is that once the emotional arc of the protagonist is complete, literary authors have a tendency to end the plot abruptly, not caring much about the tension they've established and not knowing quite what to do with everyone.) State of Wonder has no such problems. The plot moves along swiftly and the main questions are resolved satisfactorily. Marina loses herself in the Amazon trying to find out what really happened to Anders and whether the pharmaceutical research her company is paying Dr. Swenson to do is actually progressing. These questions are answered, although not in the ways that Marina expects. Chekov's guns are fired, and minor incidents and references turn out to tie into the climax in startling ways that suddenly make sense. But other, bigger questions are raised, not all of which are addressed. Will Marina return to the Amazon? How will her company deal with what has actually been discovered? How will the trip impact her relationship with her lover? Marina does not know, and neither do we. But it's in the sense that none of us know what the long term impact of our actions will be on the world or ourselves--the best we can hope for is to resolve a particular incident and then see how it ripples throughour lives. This incident is well resolved; the ripples are left for us to wonder about. It's satisfying, not completely, but realisticially. It's an effect that many novelists attempt to create, and few do without just being frustrating. Here, it works.
But one doesn't read literary fiction for the plot, anyway, or at least I don't. It's a genre that is entirely centered on psychological insight and beautiful prose, and this book is exemplary. The characters leap off the page, fully realized people with doubts and triumphs and inconsistencies, not all of which they are conciously aware. Marina has plenty of imperfections--a deeply problematic romantic relationship, an early career path abandoned after trauma, lingering nightmares, and a stalled life in general. But she is earnest and accidentally charming and frustrated and deeply engaging, a person with whom you are happy to spend the hours of the novel.
In some ways, though, it's the minor characters who shine. Most of them would have been very easy to leave as cariacatures. Dr. Swenson--cold, arrogant, oblivious, brusque, more concerned with her work than the people her work would affect, quite the image of the slightly mad scientist--could easily have been left that way. The backstory that rounds her out--the lost love affair, her doting upon a single boy whose life she saved, her noble quest--could just as easily be made to redeem her. It does not. She is not heartless, she is not noble, she is human. Her qualities are balanced by monstrous flaws, her flaws are balanced by shining qualities. It's not either/or--they are inextricably linked. Her most lovable actions were begun by a shockingly lack of compassion, which was caused in turn by a noble act which she continues to regret.
But then, Dr. Swenson is the closest thing we have to an antagonist, so it makes sense that she be well developed. Even more delightful is how well the truly minor characters are portrayed. There is the pharmaceutical company CEO worried primarily about his bottom line, the bohemian couple with a complete disregard for how the real world works, the Indiana Jones-style swashbuckling professor, the noble savage deaf boy, the jealous grieving widow, the absent-minded researcher. Each could have played the part required by the plot as a cardboard cutout without hurting the arc of the story or Marina's development. But Prachett takes the time to make each one human. The CEO grieves for his lost employee. The widow manipulates Marina into going after her husband's body, admits flat out that she is trying to manipulate her, and begs her anyway. The professor leaves of a legacy of selflessness and selfishness that keep his students bickering over whether or not he was a great man decades after his death. Even when they appear briefly, the minor characters feel fleshed out and real, as full of human foibles and as capable of nobility as Marina herself.
All of which is well and good. But the real reason to read this book is the sheer luminosity of the prose. I'd give my eyeteeth to be able to write like this. For example, in my favorite passage of the book, Marina is in a boat on the Amazon with other scientists, the deaf boy, and another native who wants to be a tour guide someday. The would-be guide reaches into the water and pulls out a massive anaconda that quickly fills the boat with thrashing, murderous, furious reptile. In a lesser work, this might be simply an exciting incident to remind us that the Amazon is a dangerous place, or to heighten the tension, or just to bring in a bit of action. Or it might be mostly an opportunity for Marina to rise to the occasion and overcome some of her fear of acting. A better author would use the aftermath to show how Marina believes that she is rewarded for actions that don't deserve praise and that the world routinely misattributes its recognition. Alternatively, the Western-trained doctors' panic contrasted with the two native boys' focus could be used to symbolize how the Amazon is dangerous to everyone, but qualifications that are valuable elsewhere may in fact make one more useless than the less educated natives. There's an arrogance to the Westerners thinking that they can teach these people anything actually valuable to their daily lives. Pratchett accomplishes all these things and more, so swiftly and gracefully that you cannot help but feel startled and frightened and horrified, even as the entire thing is ridiculous and genuinely funny all at once. It's an absurd image, the two boys purposefully wrestling with a giant snake while the educated adults flail about cursing in complete panic. And Marina knows it's absurd, even as she's terrified. The scene is funny and terrible and bursting with an almost joyous vitality, in the boys, in the snake, in the jungle, in the very act of writing itself. Wrestling this snake is so foolish and so vitally important, it becomes a metaphor for life and for the writer, for all the things that Marina and Pratchett fear to do and so must do. And yet, none of this will occur to you as you read the passage and you smile at the ridiculousness despite yourself and then suddenly everything has gone so terribly wrong. Because the best writing does not tell you what emotions to feel--you simply feel them, three or four at once, just like in real life. And in all the contradictions and all the lack of final conclusions, there is a rhythm and a beauty that makes it all worthwhile.
Author: Ann Pratchett
Genre: Contemporary literary fiction
Thingummies: 5
Synopsis: After a colleague is reported dead, a pharmacologist goes to the Amazon to try to discover what happened and whether the project he had been working on can be completed
Thoughts: I've been asked why I bother with literary fiction when a lot of the tropes tend to annoy me. This book is why.
I'd read Prachett's Bel Canto last year, and was dazzled by the language and character portrayals, but disappointed by the last five pages. (One of the things I find most annoying about many literary novels is that once the emotional arc of the protagonist is complete, literary authors have a tendency to end the plot abruptly, not caring much about the tension they've established and not knowing quite what to do with everyone.) State of Wonder has no such problems. The plot moves along swiftly and the main questions are resolved satisfactorily. Marina loses herself in the Amazon trying to find out what really happened to Anders and whether the pharmaceutical research her company is paying Dr. Swenson to do is actually progressing. These questions are answered, although not in the ways that Marina expects. Chekov's guns are fired, and minor incidents and references turn out to tie into the climax in startling ways that suddenly make sense. But other, bigger questions are raised, not all of which are addressed. Will Marina return to the Amazon? How will her company deal with what has actually been discovered? How will the trip impact her relationship with her lover? Marina does not know, and neither do we. But it's in the sense that none of us know what the long term impact of our actions will be on the world or ourselves--the best we can hope for is to resolve a particular incident and then see how it ripples throughour lives. This incident is well resolved; the ripples are left for us to wonder about. It's satisfying, not completely, but realisticially. It's an effect that many novelists attempt to create, and few do without just being frustrating. Here, it works.
But one doesn't read literary fiction for the plot, anyway, or at least I don't. It's a genre that is entirely centered on psychological insight and beautiful prose, and this book is exemplary. The characters leap off the page, fully realized people with doubts and triumphs and inconsistencies, not all of which they are conciously aware. Marina has plenty of imperfections--a deeply problematic romantic relationship, an early career path abandoned after trauma, lingering nightmares, and a stalled life in general. But she is earnest and accidentally charming and frustrated and deeply engaging, a person with whom you are happy to spend the hours of the novel.
In some ways, though, it's the minor characters who shine. Most of them would have been very easy to leave as cariacatures. Dr. Swenson--cold, arrogant, oblivious, brusque, more concerned with her work than the people her work would affect, quite the image of the slightly mad scientist--could easily have been left that way. The backstory that rounds her out--the lost love affair, her doting upon a single boy whose life she saved, her noble quest--could just as easily be made to redeem her. It does not. She is not heartless, she is not noble, she is human. Her qualities are balanced by monstrous flaws, her flaws are balanced by shining qualities. It's not either/or--they are inextricably linked. Her most lovable actions were begun by a shockingly lack of compassion, which was caused in turn by a noble act which she continues to regret.
But then, Dr. Swenson is the closest thing we have to an antagonist, so it makes sense that she be well developed. Even more delightful is how well the truly minor characters are portrayed. There is the pharmaceutical company CEO worried primarily about his bottom line, the bohemian couple with a complete disregard for how the real world works, the Indiana Jones-style swashbuckling professor, the noble savage deaf boy, the jealous grieving widow, the absent-minded researcher. Each could have played the part required by the plot as a cardboard cutout without hurting the arc of the story or Marina's development. But Prachett takes the time to make each one human. The CEO grieves for his lost employee. The widow manipulates Marina into going after her husband's body, admits flat out that she is trying to manipulate her, and begs her anyway. The professor leaves of a legacy of selflessness and selfishness that keep his students bickering over whether or not he was a great man decades after his death. Even when they appear briefly, the minor characters feel fleshed out and real, as full of human foibles and as capable of nobility as Marina herself.
All of which is well and good. But the real reason to read this book is the sheer luminosity of the prose. I'd give my eyeteeth to be able to write like this. For example, in my favorite passage of the book, Marina is in a boat on the Amazon with other scientists, the deaf boy, and another native who wants to be a tour guide someday. The would-be guide reaches into the water and pulls out a massive anaconda that quickly fills the boat with thrashing, murderous, furious reptile. In a lesser work, this might be simply an exciting incident to remind us that the Amazon is a dangerous place, or to heighten the tension, or just to bring in a bit of action. Or it might be mostly an opportunity for Marina to rise to the occasion and overcome some of her fear of acting. A better author would use the aftermath to show how Marina believes that she is rewarded for actions that don't deserve praise and that the world routinely misattributes its recognition. Alternatively, the Western-trained doctors' panic contrasted with the two native boys' focus could be used to symbolize how the Amazon is dangerous to everyone, but qualifications that are valuable elsewhere may in fact make one more useless than the less educated natives. There's an arrogance to the Westerners thinking that they can teach these people anything actually valuable to their daily lives. Pratchett accomplishes all these things and more, so swiftly and gracefully that you cannot help but feel startled and frightened and horrified, even as the entire thing is ridiculous and genuinely funny all at once. It's an absurd image, the two boys purposefully wrestling with a giant snake while the educated adults flail about cursing in complete panic. And Marina knows it's absurd, even as she's terrified. The scene is funny and terrible and bursting with an almost joyous vitality, in the boys, in the snake, in the jungle, in the very act of writing itself. Wrestling this snake is so foolish and so vitally important, it becomes a metaphor for life and for the writer, for all the things that Marina and Pratchett fear to do and so must do. And yet, none of this will occur to you as you read the passage and you smile at the ridiculousness despite yourself and then suddenly everything has gone so terribly wrong. Because the best writing does not tell you what emotions to feel--you simply feel them, three or four at once, just like in real life. And in all the contradictions and all the lack of final conclusions, there is a rhythm and a beauty that makes it all worthwhile.
