Death is the Meaning of Night

I just finished The Meaning of Night by Michael Cox. I wasn't sure if I should write this blog post or keep reading Hopscotch right now, but it felt somehow treacherous to jump right into another book so soon. I actually really liked The Meaning of Night, much more than I anticipated I would in the beginning. It had a good ending, a likeable and believable protagonist, and the book had a pleasant surprise or two at the end.

Edward Glyver (the first of his many names) is a character damned. By himself, by fate. He becomes obsessed with, as he states in a letter at the end of the novel, righting a wrong that, though it directly robbed him of what was his, should have been left to the greater justice of time and, as Edward so strongly believed in himself, the workings of fate. The tale is a good one: Edward's enemy injures him not once, not twice, but thrice in his lifetime, and Edward, born to a mother who was extreme in her passions, was not much more clear-headed (he is switched at birth in an act of revenge against her husband, Edward's natural father). Though intelligent and calculating, Edward eventually must accept a life of exile in exchange for the final act of revenge.

The novel shows him to be a man prone to finding pleasure in opium; in the very opening of the novel, when he murders an innocent man, he is actually half wild with it, a fact the reader learns only at the end after having gotten to know poor Edward quite well. This proclivity does come up many times, proving that Edward, as I mentioned in another post, does have a dark side to his nature. This aspect of his is connected to theme the novel presents of the sinner in everyone. Most of the characters in the novel are revealed to harbor some type of secret, whether it be a secret loyalty, a secret pleasure, secret information, or a secret identity. Even the setting reeks of sin, as Edward usually finds himself in the worst parts of London and often ruminates on the sinful nature of the city. In the end, every one of us will need to account for our thoughts and deeds.

The novel ends with Edward losing sight of any hopes he ever had of gaining back his rightful inheritance but managing to completely destroy any chances of his enemy getting it in his stead.  Though his means of doing this were "sinful" and in the end not as satisfying as he anticipated, it is so for the reader. I personally would have been unsatisfied with any other ending. Yes, Edward "deserved" the inheritance he so deeply craved but circumstances were set from the beginning to bar this occurrence, and Edward's downfall is much more believable than his victory would have been. And that downfall would only be acceptable to me, as a reader, with the death of Daunt, especially since it was an event anticipated from the very beginning.

Overall, I loved the novel and would recommend it as a great summer read. I can't wait to read the sequel. Finally, a few words on Hopscotch. Referred to as a hypertext this novel is, by suggestion of Cortázar himself, best read in a specific order. That is: reading the first 50-something chapters consecutively but interrupted every other chapter or so by what he calls the "expendable chapters," these in a jumbled order. I mistakenly read the first 56 by themselves, thinking the order he gave would only include those extra chapters, so now I have to read those first 300+ pages again. I don't mind it though, because every re-reading clarifies everything up a bit more, as do the additional chapters. I also think it was good to read it the way I did because the order he gives would have been quite confusing otherwise. My reading gave me a clear look of the plot, so that I can read it as he intended but with an advantage :).

Goodnight, readers!