This Radiant World

 

I read “Station Eleven” again this past spring. Given current circumstances, it seemed even more relevant than it did when I read it the first two times. Before I began this post, I revisited Bibliography 7 to remind myself of my initial impression of the book and was struck by my closing thought:

Will we create something better the next time? Or will we just want to go home?

Having lived with the threat of COVID-19 for the past six months, I’m afraid I have my answer.

Granted, watching the news is not the best way to feel good about human nature. Too many stories involve vandalized cars bearing out-of-province plates, or claims that mandatory wearing of masks on the bus is a human rights violation, or crowds of young ’uns flagrantly defying the rules meant to keep everyone safe. Fear-and-anger-mongering keeps the media solvent, after all. There is no money in keeping people calm unless you’re in the pharmaceutical industry.

I’m not afraid of the virus, myself. I follow the guidelines and respect the rules, but I’ll tell you, after six months, I’ve had enough. I am done with novelty face masks and working from home. I hate online shopping. I miss bacon cheeseburgers and Vietnamese noodles. I want to expand my bubble and get to know my neighbours. I want to browse in a bookstore. I want to explore my neighbourhood, to become a regular at Guido’s café and share a bench at the park. I want to have a conversation while standing in line. I want to see James Bond at the theatre in November. I want hockey in winter.

Bugger a brave new world. It appears that I want to go home.

But it ain’t over yet. And until it is, there is a line in the novel that resonates each time I read it, a line that encompasses everything about this life and the stage on which it is played. I have carried it with me since the very first reading, and though it hasn’t become a meme (gods forbid it ever does), it surfaces in singular moments.

One morning of late, I stepped onto the balcony after the sprinklers had stopped watering the lawn. It’s a lovely stretch of grass flanked by cedar hedges and dotted with magnolia and apple trees, with flowerbeds and a birdbath where the crows tend to bully the songbirds on a hot day. I’ve seen a raccoon stretching up for a drink, a deer resting in the shade, a squirrel cleaning its fur by wriggling in the dirt. Each of those occasions was a gift, but on this particular morning, the lawn was empty. I stood barefoot in a patch of sun, the floor warm beneath my feet, and I noticed that the tree by the birdbath was glistening. The water from the sprinklers lay thick on the leaves, sparkling like diamonds scattered over the green. It was so beautiful that I fetched the Canon with no hope of capturing the true glory of the shot. I initially called it “jewel tree”, until the line from “Station Eleven” reminded me of the tiny miracles in everyday life if I open my eyes to see them:

This radiant world.

I Wish I Wrote That!

books that deserve to be read

The Night Circus

Station Eleven

If We Were Villains

Each of these novels had me rending my garment on first read, they were so astoundingly, beautifully written. I’ve read the first four times in four years (with the fifth scheduled for this Christmas). I’ve read the second twice, with the third time pending. I’ve just finished racing through the third, and fully intend to read it again, slowly, to savour the details missed in my zeal to see what happens next. Magical tales in their own right, the language and style of the authors (all women—coincidence?) is pure art. Villains was partly written by Shakespeare, as it features hefty chunks culled from his plays, but he also inspired the “pidgin Bard” bandied so easily between the characters. Geez, it was an astonishingly gorgeous read; I fell so deeply into the story that it became real at the expense of my reality—and it urged me to improve my own craft.

I love English. I treasure grammar as much as I do the imagery conjured by the words. Prose can be poetry, after all, and after relishing novels like these three (among others), I long to be a poet myself.

I have had no problem with purple hyperbole in the past, but the glory in these novels lies in the simple beauty of language. A few well-chosen words can ignite brighter joy and sharper horror than a rampant stream of syllables. This trio of young women has created a wonderland in words, and though I may be similarly gifted, I am always in awe when a story excites my imagination and no scene is filler.

I love to write. I love to read. I can’t do one without doing the other (I must read more!), and why would I want to, when inspiration and aspiration are stimulated as one?

While I’m raving, I must include Z in the list of books I wish I’d written. It’s a completely different story in a completely different style, yet executed with the same respect for the written word and the talent to portray raw emotion as airbrushed fancy. Strong characters will always drive a story, of course, but set design and stage direction are important, too. Keeping it simple is the hard part. I struggle with it every time I put pen to paper. Books like those at the top of this post do more than entertain me. They teach me, absorb me, frustrate me, excite me, and inspire me.

They also exhaust me—and that’s the most fun of all!

King of Kings

It’s been years since I read a novel by Stephen King. His On Writing is a staple on my bookshelf, but despite his name perennially displayed in the New Releases section at the local bookstore, the last novel I read was Gerald’s Game in 1993, and even then, I did not finish it. Too scary.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I still believe The Stand is his best work. Cal Leandros even gives it an honourable mention in Roadkill!

The man doesn’t need a book release to get my attention, however. I have long admired him for his honesty and, in particular, his sense of humour. The guy’s a hoot.

Little did I know that he and George R.R. Martin have been friends for decades, since before GRRM struck gold with A Game of Thrones (the book, not the TV series). So imagine my delight on finding a video of the two old pals having an onstage conversation when Steve’s recent book tour brought him to New Mexico. The bulk of the talk was stuff I already knew, but I always appreciate hearing how the professionals operate. One of King’s genre policies is this: “Aim for terror. If you can’t reach terror, aim for horror. If horror eludes you, settle for the gross-out.”

The other thing he said that had me rolling on the floor was during an elaboration of a storyline. He mentioned a villain’s recent diagnosis of pancreatic cancer as motivation for a diabolical act and the audience gasped as one. He looked at them and scolded, “It’s written on page nine, for Chrissakes! Spoilers? Spoilers? There’s no such thing as a spoiler. You can’t ‘spoil’ a book; people read books to have an experience, so who cares?”

Or words to that effect.

He’s right. If he was wrong, I’d only read a book once. How else can I explain my passion for revisiting The Night Circus or GRRM’s series, or Station Eleven or the Cal Leandros novels; or for multiple viewings of Orphan Black or The Newsroom, for that matter? Knowing what happens ahead of time is clearly no deterrent. It’s the joy of reconnecting with beloved characters that brings me back time and again.

I recognize that some folks prefer the slow reveal. I admit, I prefer it myself, but knowing before I saw The Empire Strikes Back that Luke Skywalker’s dad was Darth Vader did not prevent me from paying to see the movie. If you really care, you won’t care. Stephen King certainly doesn’t.

Long live the King.

Feeding the Muse

A quote from form Lily Tomlin 

We have a staff library at work. People bring in books from home and leave them for others to borrow—that’s how I was able to nab a copy of Andy Weir’s “The Martian” after Ter and I saw the movie. I mentioned to Treena that I was looking for the book and she said, “There’s one in the break room.” Serendipity strikes! The film stayed pretty well true to the novel; anything that wasn’t used wasn’t missed as far as I could tell.

My next pick was … disappointing. A textbook murder mystery where the law falls for the prime suspect, who is innocent but confesses to protect a loved one. I had the loved one pegged from the third chapter, which hardly made for enthusiastic reading—it took me weeks to skim four hundred pages because I wasn’t hungry to see what happened next when I already knew what happened next. Except I didn’t. A weird twist in the final chapter deflected the spotlight from the loved one to a secondary character whose motivation didn’t, in my opinion, warrant the grisly murder suffered by the sleazeball victim. I wasn’t disappointed as much as bewildered. The twist felt like a deliberate attempt to derail the reader where it would have been, again in my opinion, more honest to let the story end as predicted. I whined to my boy sister, “This was written by a New York Times best selling author!” to which he replied, “Was this the book that made the list?”

Good point, BS. Whether or not the author could do or had done better, this book was mediocre at best.

A mediocre book does two things: it threatens to lower my standards for my own writing and, in direct opposition, urges me to revisit a known gem. Next up: a second run at Station Eleven, a story so gloriously enchanting that I’m delaying the moment simply to relish the anticipation of a truly nourishing read.

A fabulous book will encourage me to stretch my own muscle, and I would rather overextend my reach than settle for “good enough”.

Moss Rock

During my post-Station Eleven flânerie, I hiked up to Moss Rock Park, a scrubby expanse of rock and brush at the top of a hill overlooking Fairfield. From there I was able to see the entire neighbourhood and the ocean beyond it, not precisely a bird’s eye view, but a grand vista nonetheless. High-end houses rim the park’s perimeter, but the sense of isolation fit the mood of the post-apocalyptic novel I had finished reading hours earlier.

There is one scene in the book, where the heroine, Kirsten, is faced with imminent death. Refusing to let the face of the man holding the gun to her head be the last thing she sees on this earth, she lifts her gaze and watches a bird wheeling across the sky. She absorbs as much of the surrounding world as she can—the crickets chirping, the smell of the grass, the warmth of the sun on her skin. She remembers the people she loves, she feels how desperately she loves them, and she thinks, I am not afraid.

I knew someone who chose to die in this park. I was hardly close to her; I didn’t even like her that much—we worked in the same place for a time and didn’t get along that well. When her husband died, she couldn’t face life without him, so she disappeared and a few days later, the searchers found her at the top of the hill. It was sad news, to be sure. It’s the most personal decision anyone can make, whether or not to continue in this estate. Understanding may not be possible to those on the outside, but compassion certainly is.

This was my first visit to the park and, naturally, I couldn’t go there without thinking of her. I sat on the lone bench and watched the sunlight on the water. Birds wheeled across the sky. Insects buzzed over errant flowers, paintbrush drops of colour against the stone. The air was warm and silken, the breeze whispering through the dry grass, and I thought, I know why you came here. And I knew why Kirsten, while staring death in the eye, chose the open sky to be her final sight before the end. It’s what I would choose—what I will choose, assuming I have a say—to take with me when I go.

There is nothing more beautiful than the world we’ll leave behind.

Bibliography VII

“Station Eleven” – Emily St. John Mandel

Once in a while a story comes along that alters my perception of the world. This is such a story.

Written in a similar-but-not-really style as The Night Circus, it, too, is a glass box of jewels. In this instance, however, the box is tinted. The jewels within are as luminous, as colourful, as rich and multi-faceted, but seen through darkened glass, the overall effect is somber. Glorious. Terrifying. Romantic. Despairing. Panicky. Violent. Tranquil. Remorseful. Wistful. Hopeful.

Brilliant.

Those who must label everything call it a sci-fi novel, but it’s really about people: people at the end of the world, people surviving the end of the world, people creating a new world. Humans are nothing if not resilient. We’re also fairly flexible; as one of the main characters observes, we can adapt to anything.

I admit, I resisted this one at first. A friend requested it for Christmas, and when I read the dust jacket I thought, oh, cheerful. A global pandemic takes out ninety-nine percent of the earth’s population practically overnight and the remaining one percent must figure out how to continue in a world where everything and everyone they’ve known no longer exists. It’s told in such a way that the horror is broken up by vignettes culled from the characters’ lives, both before and after the flu. One twist is a main character dying of a heart attack in the opening scene, yet through flashbacks and flash forwards, his life and the people in it become integral to the proceedings. In this way, the reader is spared the stress of a chronological buildup, given a breather from the spreading panic of passengers diverted to and eventually stranded at an airport, or a freaked-out city dweller hauling grocery carts of supplies through a snowstorm to his brother’s apartment. The world after the flu features a band of travelling players moving from settlement to settlement, performing Shakespeare for the locals “because survival is insufficient”. Incredibly, Ms. Mandel manages to tie all these threads together around the central theme and paints both worlds with a stark and desperate beauty.

Why did I pick it up at last? GRRM recommended it. Erin Morgenstern wrote a blurb for it. My waiting-for-the-end-of-the-world buddy loved it, though I’m unsure why at this point. I must discuss with her when I return her copy. She loaned it to me but, again like The Night Circus, I intend to read and re-read Station Eleven, ergo a copy of my own is imminent.

On the day I finished reading, I took a long walk through the neighbourhood and paid specific attention to the things around me: careless cars speeding along the road, the infernal joggers plugged into their iPods, gaggles of tourists juggling cameras and Starbucks cups. The convenience of my cell phone, of electric light and running water. Of lawn mowers and float planes and freighters loaded with shipping containers from across the Pacific Ocean. Then I looked at the gardens and imagined them overgrown, the flowers a haphazard tangle of colour instead of neatly trimmed and deliberately placed. Butterflies and hummingbirds flitting from bloom to bloom, crows pecking idly at the grass between the rocks. The wind whispering in my ear. I know this will end someday. Whether I end before, with or after it, I don’t know. Some things will endure. Natural things. The bugs and critters and plants and sky will continue as if we were never here. So will those of us who are left.

Will we create something better the next time? Or will we just want to go home?