A nurse came out then to fetch me, and I turned and followed her inside, and it was if I were walking into the sea.

Max Morden is a man adrift. His wife Anna has died after receiving the diagnosis every one, every couple fears.

It was as if a secret had been imparted to us so dirty, so nasty, that we could hardly bear to remain in one another’s company yet were unable to break free, each knowing the foul thing that the other knew and bound together by that very knowledge. From this day forward all would be dissembling. There would be no other way to live with death.

His grief is quite overwhelming and evokes in him a tortured battle to not only obsessively replay the past in his head, but also to torture himself with a host of what ifs and regrets. He finds himself distant from his daughter Claire and questioning his relationships with the living. In many ways, the death of his wife has forced him to redefine himself. That search is not pleasant, nor is he happy with the results.

This quest for nostalgia, redefinition of self, and respite from the pressures of grief brings Morden back to seaside town where he summered as a child. There, he once found the first blush of love with the Grace family. He also experienced a tragedy that has stayed with him, perhaps subconsciously, all these years later. By returning, he attempts to somehow make sense of not only his past, but also his present and future.

As written by John Banville [ b. 1945-], The Sea [Random House, 2006, 208 pages, winner of the Man Booker Prize], his 14th book, tells a parallel story as it tracks Morden’s thoughts and movements through his past and his present.

Banville writes with a measured cadence. His prose is full of asides within flashbacks as he captures Morden in thoughts, both the rejected ones we have as we work something out, and the ones we keep close to our vest until revealing. Banville writes a fully dimensional portrait of a man at great distance from himself even though his pain is easily revealed through even the most surface of cuts. Morden’s grief is very much apparent throughout and it is to Banville’s great credit that he has written a portrait of grief that holds many universal images and truths within.

“You’re not even allowed to hate me a little, any more,” she said, “like you used to.” She looked out at the trees a while and then turned back to me again and smiled again and patted my hand. “Don’t look so worried,” she said. “I hated you too, a little. We were human beings, after all.” By then the past tense was the only one she cared to employ.

“…how could you go and leave me like this, floundering in my own foulness, with no one to save me from myself. How could you.

“Send back your ghost. Torment me, if you like. Rattle your chains, drag your cerements across the floor, keen like a banshee, anything. I would have a ghost.”

And, within the story of Max and Anna, there is also the exploration of Morden’s past with the Graces, which serves as a mystery on one level, even as it also reveals the power of grief and the human costs of tragedy.

Max Morden is not the most sympathetic character, nor does Banville attempt to bring about some easy and tidy transformation within the two tales (the summer with the Graces vs. the year-long descent with Anna and Claire). Morden is transformed at the end, not through a writer’s miracle, but through the grief process. The truth is not that there is closure for grief, but there is a sort of sustained detente with one’s soul in order to carry on perhaps.

Morden is still adrift, but he is a man not afraid to reach out for the lifeboats of others. The sea has not yet claimed him.

Banville is a superb writer and more than once I found myself reaching for the dictionary as he uses words in ways I haven’t found before. His word choices are quite original and there are passages that I found myself re-reading just for the beauty of it.

The Sea is not the most pleasant of novels. It conjures up a story that really hits home for anyone who has struggled with grief within the confines of a marriage. That said though, the journey that Banville takes the reader on is well worth experiencing and reflecting on afterwards [four stars].

Sources
www.aaknopf.com
www.randomhouse.com/author/results.pperl?authorid=1347
www.contemporarywriters.com/authors/?p=auth13
www.themodernword.com/scriptorium/banville.html

Recommended: Yes