These are important pages in this novel (I am going to hope we are on the same pages, and I have a hunch we are: I am using the 2002 paperback Perennial edition).
In these pages, Masuda, president of the unnamed country that is hosting the birthday dinner/opera singing, is notably not at the party. Mr. Hosokawa "barely noticed," as he is fixated on hearing Roxanne Cox. Ruben Iglesias, the Vice President, finds his mind...
These are important pages in this novel (I am going to hope we are on the same pages, and I have a hunch we are: I am using the 2002 paperback Perennial edition).
In these pages, Masuda, president of the unnamed country that is hosting the birthday dinner/opera singing, is notably not at the party. Mr. Hosokawa "barely noticed," as he is fixated on hearing Roxanne Cox. Ruben Iglesias, the Vice President, finds his mind wandering as well, from the party to an image of the president at home, watching his favorite TV program. An important quote from these musings foreshadows what is to come, though Iglesias is utterly unaware of it. He imagines the President's favorite TV show: "A picture of a beautiful girl tied to a chair . . . . She twisted her wrists . . . slid one hand free. Maria was free!" Soon Iglesias himself will be a captive.
The quiet irony of this passage is that these upper class characters are so caught up in their own thoughts and desires—their own bubbles—that they are completely unaware of what is about to happen, even when the lights flicker. They are competent people, but they are so privileged they are not living in reality. All Hosokawa cares about is an opera singer. The President of the country is so irresponsible that he subordinates his duties to his country to watching a melodramatic TV show. The Vice President daydreams about the President. They are a asleep at the wheel, as the the saying goes, unaware. The President and Vice President probably should have had a better awareness of the suffering in their country. You could mention that this bubble effect is reinforced by everything being seen from a highly privileged point of view, through the stream of consciousness thoughts of entitled, upper class characters, and by the lyrical, refined language Pachett uses to reflect their world. There is nothing blunt or crude about how these people think, nothing urgent. The fictional Maria as a captive is just a form of entertainment: her suffering is muted, separate from the president, a form of spectacle and consumption.
Then bang, everything changes in a flash: again, we are completely in the point of view of the guests of the party and Pachett narrates the events to convey their confusion: suddenly they are invaded, catching them utterly by surprise. The sense the event being like a natural disaster is conveyed in the important image of the dinner party as a cruise ship: "The house seemed to rise up like a boat . . . silverware flew . . . vases smashed." A wealthy, refined world is upended ("vases smashed"). People panic, but do not fight. Crude street fighting is alien to their world: "utter uselessness."
The guests begin to see their invaders, but despite noting such particular features as shingles on a face, the invaders are mostly undifferentiated, a "swarm." They "moved and spread" and couldn't be counted because they were "so similar." They have no reality to the upper class guests as human beings: they are simply an animal-like invasion. At this point, the guests view the violence as a natural, not political, disaster.
In summary, what we find here are upper class people so caught in their rarified bubbles that they are completely taken by surprise. They are more caught up in art—an opera singer, a TV show—than the hard realities of real life. The lyrical language and upper class images, such as "cocktails and hors d'oeuvres" and "creamy singing" reinforce this. Imageries of natural disaster—a tidal wave—are used to describe the rebel takeover in the minds of the guests, and the rebels are seen as a dehumanized swarm. All of this sets the scene for the growth characters will need to experience as the novel progresses.
No comments:
Post a Comment