by MARGARET ATWOOD
Poetry and prose. Two separate entities, right? Wrong! 'Surfacing' bears full-frontal, gob-gawping witness to that as 'one of the most important novels of the 20th century (according to 'The New York Times' anyroad) in this bizarre beauty naturally glides with sheer poetry within rasping prose.
Set in remote Quebec, this super slow-burning drama shadows a young woman's return to her parents' house when her father is reported missing, presumed dead. Accompanied by 2 friends and her lover, she attempts to suss out where her father could be, and the longer she stays around the house she grew up in, the more she comes to realise that the city-life she's since come to know-and-accept really isn't for her, as the vivid nature and sweet memories of her childhood haunt her to near-insanity, all the while clues to her father's whereabouts elude her and her pals.
Atwood's distinctive, uber-contemporary writing style is extraordinary and hugely challenging. In spurts it rumbles along with full-blown prose, before shards of jumpy, bitty, incisive poetry upset the rhythm and momentum and surprise the reader... 'I slid my arm between us, against his throat, windpipe, and pried his head away. 'I'll get pregnant,' I said, ' it's the right time.' It was the truth, it stopped him: flesh making more flesh, miracle, that frightens all of them.'
The bewildering detail in her detail is little like I've ever read before and her way with words is utterly captivating. I mean, barely anything happens at all in Surfacing's grand 186 pages and yet the settings, the characters and wordplay bring everything eerily to life, as the novel takes in a huge spiritual slant as it nears its open-ended climax to the tale.
The writing style takes some getting used to, yet 'Surfacing' is a must-read book and is affirmation enough that it's the little things in life that can be - and usually are - the most important.
Family, friends, life, love, death. It's all incorporated, and while the end may be disappointing as the reader is left to their own to work out if the woman is going to stay in the lonely country or return to the hustling city, the very fact that nothing is clear-cut forces 'Surfacing' to be damn thought-provoking stuff.
Baby's got the bends. (STEVE RUDD)