I went through Boston recently on my to Dublin, so my old book group moved up their monthly book group meet-up by a week so I could attend. Eager to see old friends and engage in a classic after which we could tear apart, I was intrigued by what book I’d need to read that I had not anticipated reading, one of the beauties by the way of a book group.
I learn that the group had chosen The Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks, which is the story of an English village decimated by plague in 1665. Really, I thought? Sure, I want a break from technology and business but something so sorrowful? There were clearly parts where I cried and parts that were not good to read before going to bed, but by the time I finished the book (the last chapter of which was completed on an airplane), my overall reflection of the novel was one of courage and strength, particularly attributed to women during a hard gruesome time. Losing husbands to plague and other diseases meant that women had to do it all and remarry was not only necessarily an option, but a choice.
One such “friend” character Anys says to lead character Anna Frith, a young housemaid who works for Michael Mompellion, the village rector, “Why would I marry? I’m not made to be any man’s chattel. I have my work, which I love. I have my home — it is not much, I grant, yet sufficient for my shelter. But more than these, I have something very few women can claim: freedom.”
And now for one of my favorite lines from Anys: “Sometimes a woman needs a draught of nettle beer to wake her up, and sometimes she needs a dish of valerian tea to calm her down. Why cultivate a garden with only one planet in it?”
Anna on the other hand has learned to view the world as dark and light. She ponders, “The Puritans who had ministered to us here has held that all actions and thoughts could be only one of two natures: godly and right, or Satanic and evil. But Anys Gowdie confounded such thinking.”
Although death and suffering surround Anna, she finds strength, love, and true community in the wreckage the disease leaves. Says one description of the book: its true strength is a deep imaginative engagement with how people are changed by catastrophe.
And she has an interesting journey along the way in the midst of trauma and sorrow. At one point, she discovers poppies and their healing quality, healing of pain that is by losing yourself in its power. She writes of her experience with it, “Time turned into a rope that unraveled as a languid spiral. One strand widened into a broad, swooping curve on which I could glide, drifting easily like a breeze-borne leaf. The zephry that carried me was mild and warm, even as I soared in its currents high over the White Peak, breaking through the gray clouds and into a place where the sun so dazzled that I had to close my eyes.”
Who wouldn’t want a bit of that I thought as I read her state. Of course, the substance is addictive so she must make a moral decision about whether to continue using it or to move on and Anna, being a bit of a “good wife-like character” does the right thing. Before she gives it up entirely, she writes of yet another experience and its beautifully spun: “I poured boiling water over the remaining poppy resin (her last batch), stirring in a half cup of heather-scented honey to mask the bitterness, and carried the mug up to my bed. In my dreams that night, the mountains breathed like sleeping beasts and the wind cast a rich blue shadow. A winged horse flew me through a sky of black velvet, over shimmering deserts of golden glass, through fields of falling stars.”
Her poppy experience was one of her happier times as she could escape from the death around her, as friends and family, including her husband and children dropped like flies. She has other uplifting moments but they are few. After riding wildly on a horse, she realizes her own freedom, her strong spirit and her youth and the power of it. She says, “It is a great thing to be young adn to live without pain. And yet, it is a blessing few of us count until we lose it.” So true Anna, so true.
She speaks again and again of the strength and courage she has found through other strong women in the village as things literally unravel around her. And, as villagers begin to die, the rest face a choice: do they flee their village in hope of outrunning the plague or do they stay? The lord of the manor and his family pack up and leave. The rector argues forcefully that the villagers should stay put, isolate themselves from neighboring towns and villages, and prevent the contagion from spreading. His oratory wins the day and the village turns in on itself. Cocooned from the outside world and ravaged by the disease, its inhabitants struggle to retain their humanity in the face of the disaster.
We Blog the World gives Year of Wonders 4 Thumbs Up: A must read!
Renee Blodgett is the founder of We Blog the World. The site combines the magic of an online culture and travel magazine with a global blog network and has contributors from every continent in the world. Having lived in 10 countries and explored nearly 80, she is an avid traveler, and a lover, observer and participant in cultural diversity.
She is also the CEO and founder of Magic Sauce Media, a new media services consultancy focused on viral marketing, social media, branding, events and PR. For over 20 years, she has helped companies from 12 countries get traction in the market. Known for her global and organic approach to product and corporate launches, Renee practices what she pitches and as an active user of social media, she helps clients navigate digital waters from around the world. Renee has been blogging for over 16 years and regularly writes on her personal blog Down the Avenue, Huffington Post, BlogHer, We Blog the World and other sites. She was ranked #12 Social Media Influencer by Forbes Magazine and is listed as a new media influencer and game changer on various sites and books on the new media revolution. In 2013, she was listed as the 6th most influential woman in social media by Forbes Magazine on a Top 20 List.
Her passion for art, storytelling and photography led to the launch of Magic Sauce Photography, which is a visual extension of her writing, the result of which has led to producing six photo books: Galapagos Islands, London, South Africa, Rome, Urbanization and Ecuador.
Renee is also the co-founder of Traveling Geeks, an initiative that brings entrepreneurs, thought leaders, bloggers, creators, curators and influencers to other countries to share and learn from peers, governments, corporations, and the general public in order to educate, share, evaluate, and promote innovative technologies.
