Antoine Volodine's Minor Angels
Des anges mineurs is a novel written by Antoine Volodine that was published before the turn of the century, in 1999. In a landscape of post-nuclear ruin, a series of 49 inter-related character narratives are developed, and over time, as the reading winds through this post-exotic landscape, a poignantly nuanced world comes into focus. It is a world of post-revolutionary capitalism, not the current one, but the one after the revolution that takes place after the nuclear disaster.
The tone of the novel is at times comedic, at times tragic, at times grotesque, but all of this is subsumed within a world of fantastical ruin. The pursuit of happiness, the hope of a better future and a better world is no longer a possibility, so the survivors are like stationary wanderers, unable to go forward, unable to go backward, barely able to subsist. Some are cannibals, others live for hundreds of years, a few are even immortal, and others are simply spectral presences, lamenting lost loves, or their hallucinations.
The spine of the novel is Will Scheidmann. He was created by a group of immortal women, banished to a nursing home, le blé moucheté, but who, using their shamanistic magic, secretly pulled out of the void this being who was supposed to be the new leader of humanity -- the son, or grandson, in this case, who would provide governance in a post-revoluationary, post-capitalistic ruin of a world. He, however, at age 48, betrays his functions, and in a last ditch effort to "re-invigorate humanity," re-establishes a capitalistic system, the dollar, and individualism with its accumulation of riches for the benefit of self. He sees his action as a last-ditch effort to re-invigorate a dying species in an inhospitable world. What was there to lose in a post-post world where there could be no catastrophe worse than the one that has already occurred?
The main area of survival of the human race is in the steppes of Mongolia, up north to Alaska and down the other Pacific coast ending in Vancouver; there are other pockets of survivors in the Mekong valley by Luang Prabang, another somewhere in the valley of the Pearl River, and another perhaps outside of the craters that Oklahoma has become. The oceans no longer move, but are shallow and stagnant bodies of saline, with floating islands of rotting sperm whales and giant squid.
And here is my translation:On touchait déjà à une époque de l'histoire humaine où non seulement l'espèce s'éteignait, mais où même la signification des mots était en passe de disparaître. ("Witold Yanschog" in Des anges mineurs by Antoine Volodine, Seuil 1999)
One is already at a period of human history where not only the species was dying off, but where even the meaning of words was beginning to disappear.Indeed, if in the beginning was The Word, then the end would be the lost of meaning of this very Word.
The tone of the novel is at times comedic, at times tragic, at times grotesque, but all of this is subsumed within a world of fantastical ruin. The pursuit of happiness, the hope of a better future and a better world is no longer a possibility, so the survivors are like stationary wanderers, unable to go forward, unable to go backward, barely able to subsist. Some are cannibals, others live for hundreds of years, a few are even immortal, and others are simply spectral presences, lamenting lost loves, or their hallucinations.
The spine of the novel is Will Scheidmann. He was created by a group of immortal women, banished to a nursing home, le blé moucheté, but who, using their shamanistic magic, secretly pulled out of the void this being who was supposed to be the new leader of humanity -- the son, or grandson, in this case, who would provide governance in a post-revoluationary, post-capitalistic ruin of a world. He, however, at age 48, betrays his functions, and in a last ditch effort to "re-invigorate humanity," re-establishes a capitalistic system, the dollar, and individualism with its accumulation of riches for the benefit of self. He sees his action as a last-ditch effort to re-invigorate a dying species in an inhospitable world. What was there to lose in a post-post world where there could be no catastrophe worse than the one that has already occurred?
The main area of survival of the human race is in the steppes of Mongolia, up north to Alaska and down the other Pacific coast ending in Vancouver; there are other pockets of survivors in the Mekong valley by Luang Prabang, another somewhere in the valley of the Pearl River, and another perhaps outside of the craters that Oklahoma has become. The oceans no longer move, but are shallow and stagnant bodies of saline, with floating islands of rotting sperm whales and giant squid.
And where is art and culture in this post-post world? My guess is that there is likely no "contemporary art" per se. If there are artists, they are shamanistic loners who perform magic, or they pretend to. Their poetry is in a language where words are already disappearing and the meaning of language dispersing into dry inhospitable hinterlands. Their art is for nobody and everybody; in the backwoods of an enclave in Mongolia, situated by a lake whose water is persistently warm, there is a magician. In order to get to this magician, one has to go by a nuclear power plant whose core has been in uncontrolled fusion for 372 years. This magician is able to resurrect dead squirrels and otters by embalming them in his magical salve. He eats them as quickly as they come back to life ("Rachel Carissimi").
Perhaps there are a few individuals who would pretend to create contemporary art in the hope of selling to the newly-monied post-revoluationary capitalists, but these monied few prefer to buy window panes for their newly-reoccupied mansions. What pretension can contemporary art assume in this world where there can be no pretension of spiritual or intellectual betterment or superiority? Most survivors are reduced to beast-like subsistence and cannibalism and the few lone enlightened minds are simply awaiting the post-revolution revolution that would overthrow the post-nuclear-post-revolution-apocalyptic capitalism. They are enlightened because they may kill, but they do not kill for cannibalism. They sporadically murder neo-capitalists in the name of the Revolution although they never eat the bodies of their victims.
One of the few poets remaining is Will Scheidmann himself, whose greatest regret is having been pulled into existence from the primordial void by his shamanistic immortal grandmothers. Condemned to death by them for his betrayal and his restoration of capitalism in this post-post world, he escapes the firing squad composed of his creators and becomes a lonely but soothing voice which narrates enigmatic tales. His bandaged voodoo doll body is perhaps the skin in which Antoine Volodine has transubstantiated and instilled his own voice. As the bandages fall of his body, one finds texts which restore memory and meaning to those who are forgetting.
This fantastical world that Volodine describes may seem far from the one in which we live, but then again, perhaps he is only describing our world as it is, right now.
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