My
book list goal was to study works in which the reader’s experience hinges upon
what we know and when we know it. This plays a crucial role in the books I’ve
chosen, but I’m starting to wonder whether it plays a crucial role in all of
fiction. Information management was the theme of one of our craft talks this
summer. Surely “what we know and when we know it” covers a vast percentage of
what constitutes writing?
Speak
had to be my first reading because it’s all about an unknown. As readers, we
have no idea what has happened in Melinda’s life to make starting ninth grade
so unspeakably horrible. This is not an overstatement. She has lost all of her friends
and her family communicates with her only by post-its. Everyone seems
terrifying and cruel. But everything was fine before this summer, so we know
that there was an event—just not what it was. There was a before and an after,
clearly defined.
Melinda can’t admit or express to herself what
happened, either, which makes this a particularly interesting example to study.
The secret is a secret from herself. Burying it has turned her silent,
literally unable to speak when she tries. She has bitten her lips into scabs.
Functioning in a new and unfamiliar high school seems to be beyond her.
The
first person narrative voice carries all of this while still maintaining a dry
and ironic humor about things. Speak follows Melinda’s school year,
quarter by quarter, including her grades, but most of all follows her gradual
understanding of what happened, admitting it to herself in tiny steps, then
getting free of it as she’s able to tell others bits of the story. It’s the
most effective silencing I’ve seen, one that only really becomes apparent after
we see it unravel into speech.
One
of the more evident ways that Anderson conveys this is through Melinda’s names
for the senior boy who committed the crime. Melinda calls him “IT” in all
capitals at first, does not even see or describe him as a person in any sense
but a terrorizing force. Only gradually does IT get part of a name, as “Beast”
and then “Andy Beast” and then his full name. Melinda only breaks her silence
to protect her former best friend, when IT begins dating her, and even then
only in silence, first articulating what happened to her by writing her friend a
note in the library after being hushed by the librarian.
Managing
this information puts us in the mind of the narrator, not just because we’re
privy to her thoughts, but because we’re blocked from the memories she won’t
allow herself to remember. The graphic moment when Melinda first faints in
biology class lets us know what we’re in for. Her lab partner splays a dead
frog on its back, pins its four limbs, and then slices down the center of its
abdomen with a scalpel. Confronted with this image, unable to escape it, Melinda
collapses. And after this brush with the truth, she begins to run away from
everything in an effort to avoid further confrontation, hiding out in closets,
the mall, the hospital, anywhere she can get away from memories and interaction
with IT.
Would
this novel be as effective if we knew everything going in? Definitely not. That
position of power and knowledge has to belong to Melinda. In fact, nobody knows
what really happened except for her and the boy, and when he’s finally
confronted with his actions, he denies that he did anything wrong. Her best
friend denies the truth of it when first told. The truth withheld forces us to
judge Melinda as much as her friends and family do from the beginning, as
someone acting out and going silent without giving anyone the reasons why. We
judge her because she’s starting ninth grade and being dramatic about who sits
where on the bus. It’s easy to judge when we don’t know the truth and she isn’t
telling us anything.
Keeping secrets from the reader: I’m
a fan. It has to be done carefully, though. This is a masterful example.
Dramatic irony is as old as fiction, but putting it right into the narrator’s
mind seems like an extra level that takes finesse. The narrator’s repression of
the truth and gradual realization and acknowledgement of that truth has to be
absolutely central to and part of the unfolding story, as it is here.
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