Absolution
“It’s all about value assigned.” This was the key line, for me, in Alice McDermott’s latest, Absolution. Interestingly, I had been sort of turning over this idea of “value” that we assign to things even before reading that line. Said another way: “What’s the point?”
For instance: What is the value of knowing stuff? We’ve started playing trivia at a brewery with friends. So far, our team has placed each time. (Admittedly, we really gain an edge when we have the help of various college-aged offspring who join us.) It’s super fun — and I think that’s basically the point of it. Because, really, what’s the value of knowing stuff like South American capital cities or commercial jingles? Party trick? Some sort of amorphous approval? The idea that “knowledge = power”? Gift cards to Edge City Brewery? (Well, I suppose yes.)
There’s so much of life where, if you really try to boil it down, the value — the “point” — is nebulous. McDermott’s novel — mostly taking place in Saigon during the early 60s — quietly zeroes in on this. Tricia, wife to an attorney “on loan” to American intelligence, gets roped into a sort of cutesy fundraising project that enables expat wives to give what are essentially trinkets to hospitalized children. Is the value in the supposed altruism? The actual objects that might make a kid momentarily happy? The sense of purpose for these women who live in a different era? McDermott mines at that throughout Absolution. We’ve got people making sandwiches to distribute to the homeless or, as she writes, “…the detritus of … fundraising efforts: auction items and donated gifts, prettily arranged ‘baskets of cheer.’” Who’s the real beneficiary…and by how much? (i.e. what’s the value?)
Given its primary setting, it’s not surprising that Absolution prods us to examine, mostly, the value of a human life — McDermott’s characters certainly do. And, to reference the book’s title, is it ok to absolve ourselves (or others) when we momentarily fail to value another’s humanity if it’s for some apparent greater purpose?
Value can’t always be quantified or assigned an easy tick in a “pro” or “con” column. I think that’s the point of this one.
originally published on instagram