Representation of Memory in Station Eleven and Monkey Beach
Many authors use memory as a theme to elicit feelings of nostalgia and a longing for the past, which can influence their present and future actions. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel is a novel set during the period when civilization collapsed. The book talks about a star, someone who would, later on, became his savior, and several nomadic people moving around the outpost in the Great Lake area. The actions of these itinerant actors risk everything for humanity and art. In station eleven, the author uses memory as her novel’s framework as flashbacks before the collapse is the memories in the present time. She creates the idea that the present has some elements of the past. Kristen’s memories affect their future and his relationship with the prophet and Clark. The Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson is a repository of memories triggered and influenced by trauma. Alongside many other topics, the novel addresses the damage that resulted from years of mistreatment and abuse of the Haisla people. The book addresses the issue of the residential school system, which is an instrument for assimilation and colonization for the First Nations Children. Tab, who is Lisa’s cousin, talks about the lasting damage that the institution has inflicted. Monkey Beach represents a narrative where a protagonist struggles to negotiate between the opposing world views of non-native and native.
The assumption that some people wish to go back to their homes even after fifteen years of moving around is, according to Miranda in Dr. Eleven, a comic book. This nostalgic, which originates from a Greek word nostos meaning “return home,” mirrors the characters in Monkey Beach and Station Eleven. Much of Station Eleven’s actions take place 15 years after the apocalypse. In Monkey Beach, Lisa thinks about her past and the strange events that happened during her childhood. The German flu in Station Eleven and the mistreatment and abuse of the Haisla people leaves the survivors to reminisce of a world now lost. Hirsch, Marianne & Leo, 65, highlighted that nostalgia was a disease when the term Johannes Hofer, a medicals student from Swiss. Therefore it is appropriate that Mandel of Station Eleven imagines it as a disease lingering after the eradication of the Georgia flu. Throughout the novel, the characters remember what happened during the apocalyptic era. For Mandel, the binary exists between those who imagine through memory and wish to go back to the past.
In the novel, we see August searching for issues for the TV guide. He claims to remember all the shows: sitcom living rooms with large sofas (Mandel, 39). When in the houses, Kristen search for celebrity gossip magazines. She did this because when she was sixteen, she would flip through a magazine and remembered her past (Mandel, 40). Within a few pages of the monkey beach, the author throws us into the past distance memories of Lisa’s childhood. Lisa explains how, together with Jimmy, convinced their parents to take them to Monkey beach to search for the Big Foot. In the first Dose of magical realism, Lisa examines how she first met the creature. According to Beran & Jan, 57, people tend to remember more emotional events than the non-emotional ones.
Many apocalyptic works of the 21st century have displayed objects that are now worthless that will liter and destroy the earth in the future. This belief is probably understandable if we are to consider the role that apocalypse play in the contemporary imagination. Hirsch, Marianne & Leo, 54, once wrote that it is easier to remember the end of the existence of humanity other than capitalism. Therefore the fact that old objects appear everywhere serves to remind the readers and characters of the loss of material of reality beyond where their imagination falls short. Station Eleven repeatedly shows objects treated in the same way. Throughout the novel, we see now useless objects like mobile phones, computers, credit cards, and passports that link the characters to their past. The nature of these objects helps to signify their numbers and dissipation. For instance, Kirsten says she kept the paperweight only because she found it beautiful even though she knew it was “nothing other than dead weight in her bag” (Mandel, 66). In one of the scenes of Lisa’s past in Monkey Beach novel, she sings a song that Mick and his friends wrote. Even though the song “fuck the oppressors’ may not be so at this time, Lisa still sings it probably because she loved the song’s theme, and it also reminded her of her past. Perhaps the object is a reflection of beauty. But what about the instruments of technology that is now in Museums? In her novel on technology, Isavella says that technological advancement is reduced to their material form and displayed in the museum. She argues that in this way, we repurpose technology and make it art (Beran & Jan et al., 28). According to Mandel,258, we live in a world recolored by nostalgia where the limitless objects that have no use but people want to preserve could be transformed into pieces of art.
Mandel’s writing on the issues surrounding memory is exciting and insightful. Dr. Eleven comic books by Miranda have several references to remembering that act as a mirror to what takes place in the rest of the novel (Sedikides, Constantine, Tim, 28). It mostly serves as a substitute for America’s destroyed landscape as a result of the apocalypse. More so, the divide between those living in the undersea and island reflects the argument that takes place in the larger narrative. Particularly between those dwelling in the past and those moving forward(Mandel,83). It is not a coincidence that the interview Kirsten had with Diablo took place 15 years after the disaster. Nor is it a coincidence that the people living in the undersea live their life under the flickering lights (Mandel, 86). It is therefore understandable that after 15 years of struggle, others long to go home. By depicting the retrograde and powerful sway of nostalgia, Mandel touches on some of the pressing issues of our modern lives: The focus we now have on nostalgia seems to mark our time as a time of exhaustion and bereft of imagination. In the Novel Monkey Beach, Lisamarie’s talks about a man she sees in her dreams. Ma-ma-oo acknowledges that Lisa has a gift, just like her mother. She uses her powers to talk to the spirits and also to get closer to Jimmy (Robinson, 234). Robinson explores a period on Lisamarie’s life during her teenage years, something that now gives us more insight into her present state of mind. After a drugged-out night, Lisa woke up to encounter a Tab who asks her to get her life together. During this encounter, she questioned whether the whole thing was a hallucination. The death of Jimmy is only the latest in the string of misfortunes and misery that the Haisla people suffer. Monkey Beach suggests that even though Lisa learned the troubling past of her people, her maturation signals her to return to the Haisla traditions. She acknowledges that indeed there are elements defying rationalism and notes that she feels comforted knowing that magical things still lived in the world (Robinson,123)
The novel Station Eleven talks about what people choose to remember concerning those living both after and before the Georgia Flu. In the face of diversity, some retreat into the past and memory while others imagine radical alternatives and come up with new perspectives of seeing the world. Robinson deployed the use of traditions and visions, which kept the novel alive and firmly planted in the mind of the reader. A decade later, the theme of memory is pertinent for all people, beliefs, and nationalities in both novels. While Kirsten remembers bits of her old life, these memories come as a surprise to her. Throughout Monkey Beach, Robinson switches between present times and flashbacks not to give the reader a deeper understanding of Lisamarie’s childhood but to make the reader understand how these events relate to her current state. Through these flashbacks, the reader can make sense to the role time has played in shaping Lisa’s mindset and thoughts while encountering the spirits. Hopefully, Station Eleven and Monkey Beach will reach a wider audience and also continue to stir emotions among their readers.
Works Cited
Beran, Jan, et al. Long-Memory Processes. SPRINGER-VERLAG BERLIN AN, 2016.
Hirsch, Marianne, and Leo Spitzer. “‘We would not have come without you’: Generations of Nostalgia.” Memory, History, Nation. Routledge, 2017. 79-96.
Mandel, Emily St John. Station eleven. Editions Rivages, 2016.
Robinson, Eden. Monkey beach. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2000.
Sedikides, Constantine, and Tim Wildschut. “Finding meaning in nostalgia.” Review of General Psychology 22.1 (2018): 48-61.