Monday, September 27, 2010
Under the Volcano Intro
As you mentioned in your e-mail response and I commented on in my cover letter, this novel is incredibly dense and involved. I attempted to write an essay that discussed both the specific style and language choices as well as glossed over the main points that I focused on in my reading. In itself, this was a difficult task to take on. Each character and their story would be enough for an involved essay, let alone all the style choices Lowry makes, the historical and political points of reference, and the setting of the novel which becomes a character and story in its own right. However, this essay is intended to show the effect the novel had on me as both a reader and a writer. I mentioned this in my cover letter as well, but when I read a novel like this, I am spellbound by the sheer vastness it is able to cover. When I sit down to write a short story, I usually choose a setting I want to work with or a type of character that I feel drawn to, either one producing a fairly simple story that I try to quietly morph into something of importance, or at least pertinence. It amazes me when a writer is able to tackle such a huge undertaking, especially when that writer is able to create such a beautiful story out of something that seems unbearably daunting to me. I felt the same way when I read Eugenides' Middlesex. I don't know if I am able to even apply that type of amazement to my own writing yet, but I do think that the appreciation I have for such a different approach is beneficial, that I am able to pick out techniques and language that speak to me from such a different place. And although I feel my essay may have ended up being a little scattered, that is what I was trying to accomplish, a record of my experience as both a reader and a writer taking the journey through the truly epic account of the human experience in Lowry's novel.
Under the Volcano
In Under the Volcano, Malcolm Lowry creates an industrious historical recreation of a confusing and chaotic period of both personal and national crises. Even the primary character of the novel, the Consul, exists at a very particular time when a position that would be considered fairly straightforward by today’s standards is up in the air, and as a result, he has become unsure of both his political/professional position as well as the circumstances that surround his personal life. By using the ex-pat model, Lowry is able to engage the reader in a certain type of hopelessness or despair rooted in the loss of one’s own roots. Furthermore, Lowry accomplishes multiple things through the style in his prose that would otherwise be left up to expository sections to establish. Obviously, were one to delve into the history, style, and class depths of this novel, an entire thesis could probably emerge, but this essay will look at a few examples of how Lowry accomplishes so much within Under the Volcano.
First, from the viewpoint of a writer, Lowry does something that has become both increasingly popular and difficult in his novel, which is the portrayal of addiction. I have become a workshop victim more than once by trying to describe that scenario, one which is both glamorous and destructive, eccentric and unflinching. My failure has always been certain because I have, both knowingly and inadvertently, relied on exposition to situate the reader in the life and mind of an addict. This is boring, tedious, and often pretentious. Where Lowry succeeds in depicting the depths of alcoholism is his reliance on both description and a type of functioning schizophrenic commentary.
I found it interesting that rather than investing in a description of the Consul and his behavior, Lowry uses a close third-person narration to show the restlessness of the Consul’s mind. Time disappears in much of the first few chapters, giving way to incessant details that create the novel’s setting, both in M. Laurelle’s letter, as well as the Consul’s house. As he approaches the home with Yvonne, who has just returned, Lowry describes the swimming pool, framed by the dead and dying garden as “still filling from a leaky hose connected with a hydrant, though it was almost full…blue on the sides and the bottom; the paint had scarcely faded and mirroring the sky, aping it, the water appeared a deep turquoise… the garden sloped off beyond into an indescribable confusion of briars” (71). The paragraph, though somewhat summarized here, employs a few different tools to establish what life has become for the Consul. First, it directly links the previous life with Yvonne to the current one; they used to paint the pool together in order to create a beautiful blue water that mirrors the sky, obviously showing their romanticism and shared interest in the beauty of nature and their own surroundings. It also brings Hugh into the picture (though not quoted) as a caretaker of sorts, that “someone” required to keep the Consul just barely hanging on. Lastly, the paragraph uses specific language to depict the sense of “things falling apart,” both physically in the garden and mentally/emotionally within the Consul. There are many such examples of what I’ve come to refer to in my notes as a type of “hyperrealism” that take the reader so deep into the obsession with Mexico, the surroundings, the animals, etc., but, as seen above, can be difficult to summarize in quotation. However, I thought this language pattern was important enough to at least mention and to give it some respect, since it is a pretty clever tool as an entry to the mind of an addict.
The most noticeable technique Lowry uses to get inside the Consul’s addiction, and the most pervasive one throughout the novel, is the use of voices. However, similar to the failed exposition of my own addiction-focused writing, this is definitely a potential trap for a less-accomplished writer, trying to write the man who hears voices without being gimmicky or flat-out lame. Lowry gets around this by very rarely, if ever, actually referring to their existence as “voices”. Instead, he writes it as a standard scene of dialogue, as though the Consul were merely having a conversation, despite the manic and non-linear lines that are exchanged. As close as he gets to betraying this device is the necessity of presenting it by showing the Consul’s awareness that “he knew it was a hallucination and he sat… waiting for the object shaped like a dead man and which seemed to be lying flat on its back by his swimming pool, with a large sombrero over its face, to go away” (96). Past that, the exchanges that exist between the Consul and whatever it is he imagines are almost organic, as though they are completely acceptable and understood, despite the nature of the conversations. In fact, the justification for his condition, for his continued drinking, are usually presented to these manifestations as though it were a necessary prerequisite to a drink. By doing this, Lowry beautifully constructs the self-destructive nature of an alcoholic or any addict, that although they are aware of how terrible their actions are, they find a way to justify the necessity of another drink, and by doing so, establish a system where they avoid responsibility. If they ever had to take responsibility for what they did, it would be difficult to continue, but by finding an excuse each and every time, they keep moving away from what they fear even more than death; sobriety.
This brings me to my final point of appreciation, at least for this particular essay, because if I start diving too much deeper, we’ll be here for pages and pages and pages. The choice to have the novel cover, basically, one day is obviously a deliberate one since it takes such discipline and careful planning to accomplish. And by accomplish, I only mean to write a cohesive narrative that moves around fluidly and feels balanced. To create a work as impressive as UTV that uses that kind of time management is literally a stroke of genius. So then, the question that should be asked as a reader is why the author would do this, the answer to which is much too involved for a final paragraph, so I will simplify it as best I can. I believe Lowry did this to show the overwhelming nature of the human condition, not only that of an alcoholic, but for a human being. Now, the fact that this one day happens to be the final day in Geoffrey Firmin’s life, as well as the day when his wife comes home and his life intersects with her ex-lover as well as his half-brother is a convenient one, but not an unbelievable one either. These things happen. That even in a domestic existence, conflict comes from the smallest challenges and responsibilities, that our ability to reason far beyond the point of reason, the desire to explain anything and everything, is both what makes us entirely unique as well as doomed. After all, this ability is what leads the Consul to challenge and justify his drinking, which leads to hallucinations, voices, imaginary discussions.
Ultimately, the Consul’s condition is one of self-destruction. He is unable to allow himself to resume his life with his wife, even when she is willing to start over. Another impressive bit of Lowry’s novel is the subtle way in which he ties in the historical and political climate of the 1930’s and how this relates to the Consulate position in Mexico. I had to research some of the references made, especially in the final conversation of the novel, but was impressed with how seamlessly Lowry was able to integrate the political pressure into the Consul’s life as well as Hugh’s. A reader could even understand the implications of all Lowry’s insertions and references without a historical understanding; however, in order to fully understand the final scene that leads to Geoffrey’s murder, I primarily used an included afterword in my version of the novel. The Consul intentionally leads himself to his own destruction, a path he has been following slowly with his drinking. This vague synopsis does have a point: we are given the impression that the Consul has probably been in such a situation, or a similar one, before. So why now? Perhaps the point Lowry is making about the human condition is that how one responds is never predictable. Hugh realizes his own futility in impacting the world, yet in the very next sentence discusses his romantic plans. Yvonne sees the horrible alcoholism that plagues Geoffrey and the terrible way it has impacted his life, yet decides to come back to him, somehow sees a new beginning in him. And, of course, the Consul himself who sees his life coming back to him, literally given a second a chance, and decides to essentially seek his own destruction, which may be his only true success.
First, from the viewpoint of a writer, Lowry does something that has become both increasingly popular and difficult in his novel, which is the portrayal of addiction. I have become a workshop victim more than once by trying to describe that scenario, one which is both glamorous and destructive, eccentric and unflinching. My failure has always been certain because I have, both knowingly and inadvertently, relied on exposition to situate the reader in the life and mind of an addict. This is boring, tedious, and often pretentious. Where Lowry succeeds in depicting the depths of alcoholism is his reliance on both description and a type of functioning schizophrenic commentary.
I found it interesting that rather than investing in a description of the Consul and his behavior, Lowry uses a close third-person narration to show the restlessness of the Consul’s mind. Time disappears in much of the first few chapters, giving way to incessant details that create the novel’s setting, both in M. Laurelle’s letter, as well as the Consul’s house. As he approaches the home with Yvonne, who has just returned, Lowry describes the swimming pool, framed by the dead and dying garden as “still filling from a leaky hose connected with a hydrant, though it was almost full…blue on the sides and the bottom; the paint had scarcely faded and mirroring the sky, aping it, the water appeared a deep turquoise… the garden sloped off beyond into an indescribable confusion of briars” (71). The paragraph, though somewhat summarized here, employs a few different tools to establish what life has become for the Consul. First, it directly links the previous life with Yvonne to the current one; they used to paint the pool together in order to create a beautiful blue water that mirrors the sky, obviously showing their romanticism and shared interest in the beauty of nature and their own surroundings. It also brings Hugh into the picture (though not quoted) as a caretaker of sorts, that “someone” required to keep the Consul just barely hanging on. Lastly, the paragraph uses specific language to depict the sense of “things falling apart,” both physically in the garden and mentally/emotionally within the Consul. There are many such examples of what I’ve come to refer to in my notes as a type of “hyperrealism” that take the reader so deep into the obsession with Mexico, the surroundings, the animals, etc., but, as seen above, can be difficult to summarize in quotation. However, I thought this language pattern was important enough to at least mention and to give it some respect, since it is a pretty clever tool as an entry to the mind of an addict.
The most noticeable technique Lowry uses to get inside the Consul’s addiction, and the most pervasive one throughout the novel, is the use of voices. However, similar to the failed exposition of my own addiction-focused writing, this is definitely a potential trap for a less-accomplished writer, trying to write the man who hears voices without being gimmicky or flat-out lame. Lowry gets around this by very rarely, if ever, actually referring to their existence as “voices”. Instead, he writes it as a standard scene of dialogue, as though the Consul were merely having a conversation, despite the manic and non-linear lines that are exchanged. As close as he gets to betraying this device is the necessity of presenting it by showing the Consul’s awareness that “he knew it was a hallucination and he sat… waiting for the object shaped like a dead man and which seemed to be lying flat on its back by his swimming pool, with a large sombrero over its face, to go away” (96). Past that, the exchanges that exist between the Consul and whatever it is he imagines are almost organic, as though they are completely acceptable and understood, despite the nature of the conversations. In fact, the justification for his condition, for his continued drinking, are usually presented to these manifestations as though it were a necessary prerequisite to a drink. By doing this, Lowry beautifully constructs the self-destructive nature of an alcoholic or any addict, that although they are aware of how terrible their actions are, they find a way to justify the necessity of another drink, and by doing so, establish a system where they avoid responsibility. If they ever had to take responsibility for what they did, it would be difficult to continue, but by finding an excuse each and every time, they keep moving away from what they fear even more than death; sobriety.
This brings me to my final point of appreciation, at least for this particular essay, because if I start diving too much deeper, we’ll be here for pages and pages and pages. The choice to have the novel cover, basically, one day is obviously a deliberate one since it takes such discipline and careful planning to accomplish. And by accomplish, I only mean to write a cohesive narrative that moves around fluidly and feels balanced. To create a work as impressive as UTV that uses that kind of time management is literally a stroke of genius. So then, the question that should be asked as a reader is why the author would do this, the answer to which is much too involved for a final paragraph, so I will simplify it as best I can. I believe Lowry did this to show the overwhelming nature of the human condition, not only that of an alcoholic, but for a human being. Now, the fact that this one day happens to be the final day in Geoffrey Firmin’s life, as well as the day when his wife comes home and his life intersects with her ex-lover as well as his half-brother is a convenient one, but not an unbelievable one either. These things happen. That even in a domestic existence, conflict comes from the smallest challenges and responsibilities, that our ability to reason far beyond the point of reason, the desire to explain anything and everything, is both what makes us entirely unique as well as doomed. After all, this ability is what leads the Consul to challenge and justify his drinking, which leads to hallucinations, voices, imaginary discussions.
Ultimately, the Consul’s condition is one of self-destruction. He is unable to allow himself to resume his life with his wife, even when she is willing to start over. Another impressive bit of Lowry’s novel is the subtle way in which he ties in the historical and political climate of the 1930’s and how this relates to the Consulate position in Mexico. I had to research some of the references made, especially in the final conversation of the novel, but was impressed with how seamlessly Lowry was able to integrate the political pressure into the Consul’s life as well as Hugh’s. A reader could even understand the implications of all Lowry’s insertions and references without a historical understanding; however, in order to fully understand the final scene that leads to Geoffrey’s murder, I primarily used an included afterword in my version of the novel. The Consul intentionally leads himself to his own destruction, a path he has been following slowly with his drinking. This vague synopsis does have a point: we are given the impression that the Consul has probably been in such a situation, or a similar one, before. So why now? Perhaps the point Lowry is making about the human condition is that how one responds is never predictable. Hugh realizes his own futility in impacting the world, yet in the very next sentence discusses his romantic plans. Yvonne sees the horrible alcoholism that plagues Geoffrey and the terrible way it has impacted his life, yet decides to come back to him, somehow sees a new beginning in him. And, of course, the Consul himself who sees his life coming back to him, literally given a second a chance, and decides to essentially seek his own destruction, which may be his only true success.
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