kraine66's Full Review: M. T. Anderson - The Astonishing Life of Octavian ...
The front cover description of Octavian Nothing compelled me enough to buy it. I really had no idea that the story was going to be so deep and profound. Told in first person and set in the pre-revolution time period, the story starts off with you knowing as much about Octavian's situation as Octavian does. He is a boy living in a house of scientists who conduct experiments in a pure scientific manner; doing what needs to be done in order to grasp the truth of things. In fact, they all go by numbers such as 03-01 in the beginning. They don't really worry about the concept of love, feelings, or any kind of affection, which is a big part of the "deeper meanings" in the book. Octavian takes part in heavy-duty classes every day, from Latin to music. He is given the education of a prince. Everything he does gets measured and recorded as well-how much food goes into him, and how much goes out. He doesn't find this strange though-it's what he's been brought up on. Octavian's mother lives in the house as well, she is very social and seems to be content with her life, and she often tells Octavian stories of her homeland, in which she claims she was a princess.
One day, Octavian's curiosity leads him into a room in which he has been told never to enter, and discovers that he is in fact one of the scientists experiments. He is being treated like an animal, observed and recorded into scientific data. Octavian and his mother are in fact African American slaves to the house. We get evidence of this by a small passage between Octavian and Bono, one of the house's slaves. Bono says to Octavian "see-you and I are alike in more than just our skin color." This is even before Octavian knows he is a slave. After I found out I realized that there was a good bit of foreshadowing before by the author-you just can't see it then.
Octavian and his mother are soon whipped and the story takes a fast turn. After thinking Octavian was a figure on a high stand in the house, it is alarming to suddenly realize the bitter truth.
As Octavian learns more and more about who he is and what he's doing there, he becomes shaken and angry.
The rise of small pox comes and Mr. Gitney (they all switch to their real names after awhile), decides to hold a "Pox Party". An ugly affair in which people come from all around to get vaccinated with the horrid disease-in order to do tests and record symptoms for further knowledge on the fatal disease. Even more ugliness comes as a result of it.
I thought the characters for the most part were well drawn out. My favorite was Dr. Trefusis, one of the house's scientists. He is different from the rest, however. He befriends Octavian and teaches him history about his culture, until he is ordered to stop. He is the only scientist that considers Octavian a human being, and not just an experimental subject. One amusing part of the story which I enjoyed was when Octavian explains one of Dr. Trefusis' theories; that all matter only exists because it is perceived by the human eye. Dr. Trefusis has his desk checked on hourly, to see if it has just disappeared because it hasn't been perceived.
However, Octavian Nothing is not for everybody. I personally enjoyed this book and thought it was well worth getting through a few tough aspects of it's contents-The 18th century writing style got very tiresome, and there are some slow parts to this book. Anderson really did his research on this one. He made sure everything from how people talked to what they wore was historically correct. The book is written in letter-format, so the perspective jumps back and forth a bit in the ladder part of the story. This was actually a pretty efficient method choice by the author, it lets us know what is going on in one place and another.
I should mention an important character to the first half of the story-Bono. Bono is a few years older than Octavian and is a regular (unlike Octavian) slave to the house. The two spark a friendship and Octavian looks at Bono as his older brother.
Octavian Nothing is a story that will make you think. It has a strong protagonist that you will get attached to, and intriguing side characters. This is a good, heavy read.
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