On the Calculation of Volume (IV)
Group dynamics;
Figuring out what makes a person a part of a larger categorization;
Deducing whether or not one can find a sense of home in a new place with new people;
Wondering what’s going on in a previous home (or rather, timeline, as may be the case) and if there’s still a place for you there;
Shared language, shared terminology, shared rituals;
A feeling of being pulled between two poles;
And…is it really true that “people are the same no matter where you go”?
Vol IV of On the Calculation of Volume is the apex of this 7-part mind-bender by Danish author Solvej Balle, and all I kept thinking while reading about the many, many, many (many!) November 18-ers who have entered the mix now — that is, bookseller Tara Setler and others she has found that are also re-living November 18 day in and day out — is that in this volume, Balle has essentially created an entire fictionalized world that embraces and ponders all the sorts of things I’m trying to piece together as I write about homesickness.
(And that’s why fiction — even really out-there fiction — can sometimes be the truest representation of reality that there is.)
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