This Wednesday we met to discuss Passage
(2001) – a novel written by one of the most read American writers of science
fiction. In spite of the fact that the work received The Locus Award in 2002 (the
winners are selected by the readers of Locus: The magazine of the
science fiction & fantasy field,
hence the name) BLAST had some second thoughts about it.
On the one hand, we appreciated the generic blend: The Passage successfully combines the traits of detective novel,
medical thriller and science fiction. Secondly, Willis presented the topic of
death in a very interesting manner, namely, she introduced tension between cold
scientific approach and humanistic, metaphysical one. On the last pages, the
author gives her readers a hope that maybe there is indeed something after
death, be it Heaven or another realm. What is more, the plot of the novel is incredible.
Although the idea of Titanic as a metaphor of death may seem a little bit tacky
at first, the act of discovering its meaning by Joanna turns out to be
brilliant and engrossing: a reader devours the pages as s/he wants to find the
answer together with dr Lander. And finally, we also devoted some time to the discussion
of the role of literature in Passage.
Undoubtedly, various quotations from Shakespeare, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, John
Milton coupled with the last words, visions of both ordinary and well-known
people give power to the novel as they bring the chill of death and the breath
of agony to its readers. These quotations are an unshakable proof that Emily
Dickinson wasn’t the only person to have suffered from death anxiety.
 |
| The Ascent
of the Blessed (circa 1490)
Hieronymus Bosch
|
On the other hand, after the reading we were left
with mixed feelings. The biggest drawback of this novel is its repetitiveness
(concerning jokes or unsuccessful experiments on patients in the first part),
the excess of details (for instance, the elaborate descriptions of Titanic, as
well as those endless narratives of Mr Wojakowski), the unnatural, longish
dialogues and the lack of plausibility of the events (such as Joanna’s
inability to remember the plan of the hospital or the ease with which dr Wright
recruits the patients for his experiments (besides, is a chemically induced
death and a real death equal after all?). The abundance of details is tedious
and comes to the fore at the expense of the characters’ expressiveness. Many
protagonists are flat, transparent, cartoonish and even irritating.
We concluded our discussion with a following
observation: if the author halved the number of pages and introduced romance,
the novel would become much more interesting. Connie Willis had good intentions
but the result is rather mediocre. But regardless of its numerous shortcomings, it
is worth reading this novel inasmuch as it gives the reader an interesting
perspective on how the afterlife may possibly look like.
by Marta Makoś
