Anne Patchett’s latest novel, State of Wonder, has been described as a kind of modern Heart of Darkness, and at least once Patchett echoes a famous line from that novel. Nevertheless, the use of the word wonder in the title is a clear indication that Patchett, while willing to grapple with darkness, believes too much in people's ability to make the right moral choices to be the second coming of Joseph Conrad.
The plot is somewhat complicated: Vogel, an American pharmaceutical company, pays Dr. Swenson, a research scientist, to study the Lakashi tribe in the Amazon to find the secret of the lifelong ability of the women to have children so that the company can produce a drug that allows all women to conceive into their seventies or beyond. When Dr. Swenson refuses to stay in touch and seems to have become a Kurtz, Mr. Fox, the CEO, sends Anders Eckman, another scientist, to find her and bring back information about how close she is to producing the drug. Several months later, Dr. Swenson writes to say that Anders has died and been buried. Mr. Fox then sends another scientist, Anders’ friend and office mate, and as it happens, Mr. Fox’s lover, Marina, to the Amazon to find out what happened to Anders and return with news of the drug.
When Marina finally gets to the Brazilian jungle, after waiting for weeks in Manaus to find out where Dr. Swenson has her lab set up, she does indeed experience the wonder—including the terror—of the Amazon: cannibals, giant anacondas, poisonous snakes, and friendly natives who steal her luggage so that she spends months wearing one of two native dresses. The Lakashi tribe is friendly and trusting and grateful when they find that Marina, who at one time planned to be a surgeon rather than a researcher, can perform cesarean sections and sew up wounds with course thread and large needles. Marina herself is surprised that she remembers how to do these things and in doing so lays one of her greatest fears to rest.
Some critics accuse Patchett of writing about Amazonian tribes as if they are children or incapable of managing their own lives. I disagree. In fact, I think one of the great strengths of the novel is Patchett’s refusal to romanticize natives and demonize white people who live with them. As in Bel Canto, a better novel, Patchett illustrates a well-developed ability to see different sides with a kind of clarity and compassion, the great strength of her writing.
Unfortunately, Patchett is not able to create this world so fully that she draws me in and compels me, like Peter Pan, to believe. From the beginning—and despite strongly drawn, sympathetic characters—to almost the end, I often thought, “I don’t believe this would happen” or “I don’t believe that person would put up with such treatment or act in that way.” The novel didn’t compel me to suspend disbelief the way that any creative work but especially a work about wonder must do.
Having given that caveat, I would say that the greatest strength of the novel is Patchett’s unwillingness to take the easy way out. Despite her sympathy with women who want children and who want second chances, she understands that every choice comes with a price. The profound moral choices characters, especially Marina, make in the last section kept me awake and haunt me still. I don’t know that Dr. Swenson and Marina were altogether fair to Mr. Fox, and their choices caused one character to suffer in ways that he should not have—I won’t give that away—yet their choices were made on the hard rock of morality, a rock that exacts a real price, and in the end, Marina prioritized her love and remembered who she was, as we all must sooner or later.
We live in a society where people seem to think they should and can have it all with no real sacrifice. The strength of this novel is that Patchett says, Nonsense! She seems to think that the basis of moral decisions is a self-sacrificial love that costs, no only the lover, but sometimes the beloved as well.
I recommend this novel with the simple caveat not to expect another Bel Canto. Halfway through, I wouldn’t have thought I would read A State of Wonder a second time but now have it on my list.
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