Week 13: Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin
Hi everyone! (Sorry my first try was publishing with a weird format so I uploaded it again here!)
I hope you all had a lovely weekend! For this week's book I read Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin. I thought that this book was a perfect way to wrap up the semester. I will say that it was a little difficult to keep track of what was going on in the book, but I am definitely more used to that with all the books weve read this term (Labyrinths… I not only enjoyed reading the book for its mysterious plotline but also for its semantics and writing style. The novel held my attention through a variety of ways, including the somewhat fragmented and reflective storyline, the intense bond and love between Amanda and her daughter, the difference between female characters and male (Amanda’s demeanor vs. Davids) and the environment symbolism.
It soon became clear that the setting in which the novel took place served more of a purpose than just descriptive imagery . Schweblin paints the picture of rural farmland amongst vast fields and land. When reading this imagery I was disturbed by the fact that this landscape was contaminated by pesticides, which ultimately are what are said to be the cause for Amadas sickness. From what I understood, the place in which the novel took place, not only literally impacted the health of the characters in the book but also served as a reflection of the impacts humans have had on the environment. I thought the clear conjunction of human health and environment helped build this fearful and anxiety induced tone throughout the novel, in which the characters are running from the conditions humans have created. Not knowing what has happened to Nina or where she is is made more stressful by the fact that we are given the perspective of her mother who misses and worries about her more than anyone would.
Additionally, From the first few pages of the novel, we learn that worms hold some kind of significance in relation to Amands health, “We have to find the exact moment when the worms come into being”(2). It was clear to me that worms must be some kind of metaphor or symbol within the book. Although, I originally wasn't quite sure how a worm would be reflective of Amanda's health. One of my thoughts was that it was like a parasite. Much like parasites, these worms were painted as an invasive and dangerous thing in the story . In the way that a parasite could be, in a metaphorical sense, symbolic of the pesticides and chemicals sneaking into the characters' water and air. They're something that stays beneath the surface and something we cant see. Although, why wouldn't Schweblin just use parasites as the metaphor then? I think the reason she used worms was because they are not only metaphorical but also physically representative of and related to the setting of the novel. The agricultural fields have worms filling the soil beneath the human grown fields and soybeans. I think Schweblin chose worms as they are an illustration of how pesticides can physically take over not only the soil but also the health of characters in the book. A quote that Jon used in his lecture that also stood out to me was “Unseen danger lurks around them, but nobody wants to think too hard about its cause”. This made me think of how often we don't see climate change at its worst, we don't see every plastic bag we throw out in a landfill, and we often don't necessarily want to. I think Schweblin’s work could potentially be more reflective of the human ability to be scared of destroying the planet we need to service while simultaneously turning our head away from what we are scared of, in the hopes of no longer being scared.
Overall, I thought the ending of this book was certainly a surprise. I was under the impression that Amanda was speaking to David throughout the novel and I was left slightly unsure at the end of the novel as we began to understand that Amanda may already be dead. Due to the fact that the novel was written in a way that felt like Amanda was reflecting back on her life and events that resulted in her sickness, the fact that she was already dead seemed to add to this level of reflection. As perfected by Jon “this is a tale full of ominous foreboding with no clear resolution. So maybe this ending was intentionally left unanswered and unsure. What do you guys think the purpose of this ending was?
Thank you Elisabeth for your blog post this week! I liked the way you are analyzing the novel, so you have helped me clarify some points. I think the worms also have another reference, perhaps less clear than the others you mentioned: that of seventeenth-century Spanish Baroque Literature. It is the time in which I specialized and I cannot avoid making that connection, although there is little evidence in the text. I say this because there is an obsession with the decadent part of the body, the one that is on the verge of putrefaction but that can be purified by words and rites. It is as if an ominous idea of Nature (and the Supernatural) returned just at the moment of the ecological crisis.
ReplyDeleteHey! I really enjoyed your interpretation and I completely agree with your theory about the ending. I think it was kind of meant to be written as an "open ending" in the sense that it is really not detailed what happened but it is not so ended on a happy not, that would allow the reader to beleive everything got better nd they all lived hapilly ever after.
ReplyDelete-Montserrat Avendano
Hi Elisa!!! I completely agree with your thoughts regarding this reading. To answer your question, I think the ending was meant to leave its readers in that anxious state, feeling uncomfortable, and potentially feeling motivated to find out answers for themselves. Personally, I watched the lecture after having done the reading and it felt like my questions were much more answered afterwards. I don't think that the lecture at all spoiled it, more so just left it more complete.
ReplyDeletehey! I love how you mentioned not only the environments impact on humans in this novel, but also the humans impact on the environment. I think that the idea of the Anthropocene can get lost when reading about how the environment is making people sick, when in reality it's just one huge cycle.I also kinda agree with your thoughts about the ending, the book was this constant state of anxiety and the unknown so I think that the ending really helped to accentuate these feelings as well.
ReplyDeleteHi Elisabeth!
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed your blog post. I enjoyed your interpretation of this novel, and your dissection (lol) of the “worms” and what they could possibly mean. I also thought that maybe the sensation of the burning on Nina’s hands could have potentially felt as though she was holding 100 worms squirming around along her skin.
In terms of the ending, I was also left feeling pretty unsure. I considered that Amanda could have been dead, and that David was just a voice in her head. Or maybe she hallucinating from the poison. What really stood out to me was when David said something to Amanda as she was trying to get to the “important parts” along the lines of “You’ve told me this story so many times but you always forget”. I think this line really emphasizes the bigger picture of humans being told relentlessly about the negative impact we are having on the planet, our ability to grasp and worry for a couple of weeks, and then forget about it again.
Hi Elisabeth! I think you wrote a great analysis of this book. It was definitely interesting to see how Schweblin wrote about climate/environment and the impact we as humans have on it. I think, to answer your question, like many of my peers, I also think the ending was left open intentionally. This is because I think maybe it could be due to her trauma and she is replaying it in her head, hence the lack of clarity in the text.
ReplyDelete