Life Before Man

Life Before Man / 0-385-49110-7 One of my best memories of this book involves an arrogant young man sneering at me (with regards to the title) about my choice of "feminist literature". He paled and immediately backed off when I calmly informed him that the book centered around the inner workings of a dinosaur museum. I think he learned the inherent dangers of judging a book by its cover! Indeed, while Atwood is often identified as a feminist writer, she is more accurately in my opinion described as a humanist writer. Of the four main sympathetic actors in this book, two are male, and - in some ways - they are the most sympathetic of all. Atwood excels here in her art of making us see both sides - what seemed cruel and petty to one character was really an act of desperation and pain to another - and we are able to understand, at the same time, why the act was both, without contradiction. The actors here are a married couple who no longer love each other yet cannot seem to totally break free from one another, and the respective lovers of each. The lovers are most sympathetic, because they suffer without being given the "right" to suffer - after all, a girlfriend can't really be hurt, frustrated, or upset when her boyfriend cancels a date to go see his estranged wife and children, can she? Of course, she can, but she is denied the social outlets to express her "inappropriate" yet completely legitimate pain. Similarly, a boyfriend "shouldn't" be devastated when his girlfriend ends their fling and dutifully returns to her husband and children, and yet that "shouldn't" doesn't stop him from feeling the pain or from suffering loneliness. Quiet pain and desperation are Atwood's forte, and her characters realistically suffer from it. Like most Atwood stories, there is no magical happy ending here, but there is at least one that leaves room for hope, as we wonder if man has perhaps evolved into a being that can understand the feelings of others, and not just his own. ~ Ana Mardoll

I related to every facet of this book. Lesje's feeling of being clothed in who Nate wanted her to be. Nate's clueless caring way. Chris's imbalance and suicide. William's dark side. But mostly I related to Elizabeth's rules, the way she was careful and secretive. Put all these characters together and there I will be. Atwood writes in such an intimate way that I was drawn closely to these people and all that they had.This story was well-told and quiet. It had a somewhat disjointed feel as the days were slightly mixed up. This is a book of secrets, and as such, I could see myself in it everywhere. Each word was unspoken in a way that I would unspeak it, and that held a certain sense of comfort. It was like the story was being told as the secrets could no longer be held in. Like it was all leaking out, and it was all just resigned to be leaking at this point. Because there were no choices left.I felt dragged through to the end, but I believe this was intentional. Or I'd like to think that it was.

I found this novel to be thoroughly compelling and enthralling, if not exactly life-affirming. It is a bleak tale, true, but to me its strengths lie in its uncompromisingly fatalistic outlook. The ordinary idea of heroes and villains in a story are eschewed by a set of protagonists who are each in their own ways pitiful and hateful; in other words, real people - in each one is visible some characteristic of ourselves that we recognise, but are probably not proud of. Elizabeth is manipulative and greedy, but only learnt that from her tyrannical Auntie Muriel. Her husband Nate seems likeable and mild mannered, but you become frustrated with his inability to maintain a relationship. The young Lesje, the object of Nate's desire, is the most agreeable but she allows herself to become embroiled in other people's cattiness. The standard of writing is exceptionally high, although a little hard going, for behind every line there is some hidden meaning, some clue to the personalities of the three main characters. Very little dialogue takes place, with most of the characters' motivation and feelings being revealed through inner monologue; this not only allows the characters total honesty with themselves and the reader, but it also makes us realise how little of our own feelings we communicate to those we know, and how this can create a feeling of resentment and isolation amongst people.I am a slow reader on the whole, and as I said, this book was challenging in its use of metaphor and subtext, but I polished it off quite quickly, as I found myself connecting with the characters. I did not particularly like any of them, but then they did not like each other. That is not necessary in the reading of this story, you just have to care about them. I would highly reccomend it to anyone who, like myself, enjoys a little melancholy.

I'm not sure how I finished this book. The characters are not all that sympathetic, the plot is slow and sometimes nearly nonexistent, suspense is minimal, and there are dark and somber overtones on practically every page. And yet, in the end I found this strangely compelling. The novel deals with the lives of basically four people, two couples, Nate and Elizabeth, Lesje and William. Elizabeth and Nate are married but only in name for the last few years, taking lovers to keep themselves happy while staying together for the kids. Recently, Elizabeth's last lover, Chris went and killed himself, casting a cloud over her life. Lesje and William are living together but that's about it there isn't much going on. Into that mix our characters intersect and threater to collide, with Nate becoming increasingly fascinated by Lesje. Most of this is admittedly a downer, none of these characters are ever happy, it seems. The individuals characters are all spotlighted in each chapter, with the narrator focusing on their thoughts and emotions (though Elizabeth gets some first person parts for some reason). Elizabeth is mourning her lover, after a fashion, and most of her parts feel deadened and numb, most of the time she comes across as a scheming manipulative witch, albeit an emotionally crippled one, hardly able to relate even to her kids. Nate likes his women, but is always trying to please everyone and manages to please no one and makes himself miserable all the time. Lesje remains the most fascinating character, her simple innocence and desire to just be happy and live her life within the bounds of that happiness, reading and discussing her dinosaurs (gal after my own heart), she seems to be the only character I could muster up some sympathy for, even if she remains a bit ineffectual because of her shyness and fear of making a fool of herself. William, on the other hand, gets no spotlights at all in the story, except for the fact that he is with Lesje when the story starts, he might as well not be in the story. But that's probably a good thing because he seems to be about the most boring man alive (hard to believe but seems to be true). All of these people are unhappy and as the plot winds inexorably on, you get the feeling that you're basically driving slowly past a car wreck, as they become more tangled, as emotions become even more frayed. All the characters are detailed, maybe too much so, since they all turn out to be mostly unlikeable, but Atwood's prose tends to redeem most of the slower parts, her descriptions of the texture of emotions and the characters' musings over their lives are almost sheer poetry and while sometimes her metaphors can be a bit ponderous, the effect mostly lifts this over the standard "love triangle" novel. It's an analysis, true and not for everyone, don't expect to come away from this book with a warm fuzzy feeling (or any at all, the ending is strangely pointless and leaves too many things wide open but tha

What is the nature of a fossil? Using a quote from Bjorn Kurten to precede this novel, Atwood illuminates much of what is to follow: a fossil is not necessarily a part of an organism, but could be a record of its activity: a footprint, perhaps. It could be a prehistoric equivalent of graffiti.Using the fossil as the central metaphor for her novel, Atwood tells the story of three individuals whose lives collide with cataclysmic effect. Told in episodes from the three different perspectives the reader uncovers the story much like an archaeologist might uncover the treasures of a prehistoric site. Elizabeth, Nate and Lesje are put under the microscope and steadily stripped down to their essential components by a narrator (although a few of Elizabeth's episodes are told in the first person) who is as objective as a scientist. We all know, however, that scientists are not always objective. What makes this novel so fascinating is this interplay between cold fact and emotional involvement. Atwood refuses to follow easy paths to happy solutions and the reader senses early on that a tragic outcome is as inevitable as the eventual extinction of Lesje's beloved dinosaurs. Her characters are neither heroes nor villains, neither heartless monsters nor innocent victims. They are driven towards their fates by forces as much in their own natures as in the natures of those around them.As any true Atwood devotee would expect, the writing is sharp, witty, observant and totally compelling. It is perhaps richer in symbolism than many of her other novels, yet it does not tread the mystical and poetic waters (so to speak) of "Surfacing". It reads deceptively easily and the bubbling volcano at its core is implied rather than stated. If the novel has a possible downfall it could lie in this subtlety, which many readers might not perceive. "Life before man" is a landmark novel, even for an author who is surely one of the greatest literary minds of our age. Its effect is devastating in the best possible sense, making the reader reflect on the consequences of actions which might seem insignificant at the time, but can leave traces far beyond their original scope.