Tuesday, July 20, 2021

Sovereign Wanderer

Love in the Ruins
Love in the Ruins 
“For the world is broken, sundered, busted down the middle, self ripped from self and man pasted back together as mythical monster, half angel, half beast, but no man...Some day a man will walk into my office as a ghost or beast or ghost-beast and walk out as a man, which is to say sovereign wanderer, lordly exile, worker and waiter and watcher.”   ― Walker Percy, Love in the Ruins



With an opening paragraph that explodes on the page with references to Christendom, Western civilization, and Dante, I immediately knew that this book was going to be good if not great. However I was thrown off a bit by the structure in which the first part was set on July Fourth and then went back to July 1st in the second part, but I got my bearings and began to enjoy the satire and the chaos of the world of the mid-80s in the United States where everything was falling apart around Paradise Estates, "an oasis of concord in a troubled land."

The protagonist is Dr. Thomas More (yes, namesake of the famous St. Thomas More) a heavy-drinking psychiatrist who has had his share of personal tragedy. He comments, "It is my misfortune---and blessing---that I suffer from both liberal and conservative complaints, e.g., both morning terror and large-bowel disorders, excessive abstraction and unseasonable rages, alternating impotence and satyriasis. So that at one and the same time I have great sympathy for my patients and lead a fairly miserable life."(p 20)

Tom hopes to turn his fortunes around with his invention, the lapsometer, with which he "can measure the index of life, life in death and death in life" --- This being a very scientific way to measure a sort of relative spirituality. The plot centers around his attempts to make progress with his invention while maintaining a semblance of normality, a vigorous love life, and interactions with a variety of interesting characters that include a Jewish atheist and a mephistopheles-like character who manages to persuade Tom to sign away his invention (i.e. his soul).

Through it all he maintains his own Catholic faith, while at the same time claiming, somewhat reasonably, to be a "bad" Catholic. At the same time he serves his fellow man in his role as a doctor while dealing with attacks from "Bantu" warriors and the impending collapse of society. The delight of the book comes from the savage satire and the potential for change in the life of Dr. Tom. 

Seldom have I read a book that brings to mind my personal history; Love in the Ruins is one of those books. Written in the early 1970s, but set in a not too distant future of the mid 80s it is filled with references that in lesser books would merely seem out of date and discourage the reader. Yet Percy has captured the time and place with specific cultural entities like Howard Johnson's and others. I found this intriguing and fitting in a way that made the deterioration of society in the story more believable. He succeeds (certainly not intentionally) in mirroring the ongoing chaos in our own contemporary world. Ultimately, this is a novel, as the title suggests, about ruin, but also love, and perhaps therein a glimmer of hope---read it and find out.


4 comments:

mudpuddle said...

i've heard a lot about W. Percy, but am hesitant about invading his personal space: lots of thorns, insects and snaky things lurking in the underbrush...

James said...

mudpuddle,
Yes - there a a lot of thorns here. One of my friends in our discussion group said she was reminded of The Master & Margarita which gives you an idea of the style and satirical bent of this novel.

mudpuddle said...

i'm going to be honest, here... i haven't read M&M either... my age is telling: i'm comfortable with old books. the new ones upset me and i don't like seeing or hearing about humans and their problems very much any more; they're just too dumb and thoughtless... you can tell my tastes by my blogs. i'll probably get worse as i get even older, lol... (78,now)

James said...

mudpuddle,
I appreciate your honesty and share your reverence for or at least interest in older books. I especially value the classics. But as a youngster of only 72 I still dip into more contemporary literature in search of a bit of silver or gold (rare, I know). Among others, I'm a fan of "Southern" American authors including Faulkner, O'Connor, McCullers, and Percy.