Barbara Kingsolver, Unsheltered

I’m reading Barbara Kingsolver’s recent novel Unsheltered (2018). First, I haven’t finished it, and second, it’s the first Kingsolver novel I have read, so my response may be unbalanced, but my reaction to the novel has been somewhat mixed. Let’s start with the difficulties:

First, the novel is narrated by the author herself. What could be more authentic? But Ms Kingsolver has a very lilting delivery. Although it is perfectly intelligible, she makes the content seem almost sugary. I find the experience of reading the text, rather than having it read to me, and imagining the characters for myself, a much more balanced experience.

The novel itself is vast, and incredibly detailed. We know when the baby's nappies are changed, and if he has started on solid food yet. It’s as if Northrop Frye in his Anatomy of Criticism had created one additional mode, the ultra-Ironic, where we sit watching the clock ticking.

As for the plot, alternating chapters present two separate narratives, linked because they take place in a single, decrepit house – hence the term “unsheltered”. The present-day story is based around Willa Knox and her family. Willa is sharing her house with her husband, two grown-up children, Tig and Zeke, a new-born grandchild, and her elderly father-in-law. Willa discovers that a pioneering female scientist lived in the neighbourhood in the 19th century. As the book blurb states: Could this historical connection be enough to save their home from ruin? And can Willa, despite the odds, keep her family together?

In parallel with the modern story is a 19th-century historical narrative, about Greenwood Thatcher, a biology teacher, his struggles to introduce his students to Darwinian evolution, and his meeting with the real pioneering botanist, Mary Treat, who corresponded with Charles Darwin.

Although I have only read two-thirds of the novel, I don’t think it really matters what will happen by the end. 

The rather worthy theme of the 19th-century plot is the opposition of Creationism and Darwinian evolution. Greenwood Thatcher is trying to introduce his pupils to the theory of evolution, while the school principal firmly resists any departure from a Biblical interpretation. Unfortunately, this plot is hammered to us repeatedly and insistently, and we of course from the benefit of hindsight know that Thatcher is right; it doesn’t make for much drama. I feel as if I were reading a gently dramatized version of an introduction to 19th-century views on evolution by a well-meaning secondary school teacher, who makes it very clear indeed what the right interpretation is. Secretly, I admire the school principal (although perhaps that's just my perversity). 

The present-day plot concerns the efforts of Willa to protect her family in the ramshackle old building that is structurally unsound. A less charitable interpretation might be a mother’s forlornly clawing back her children from their adult life, trying to pretend they never stopped being dependent. The novel is narrated from Willa’s point of view, so we never learn what the now adult children think of their mother’s behaviour.  

The modern plot of Unsheltered is very maternal. Willa likes to have something to worry about, and continues to fret about her offspring even after they have fled the family home. Their return, whether or not intentional, is an opportunity for her to care for them even more, to provide Wilma, with something to worry about. Perhaps this represents an entirely new strand in the novel: after the epistolary novel, the confessional novel, the picaresque novel, here is the maternal novel: everything in the present-day narrative is narrated from the point of view of the mother. While the mother may not be Kingsolver, the combination of the maternal concerns and the winsome narrative voice grates on this listener.

Overall, the novel is rather insistent in pushing its points home, and at the same time rather idealistic, while being almost smug in its defence of bourgeois family values. By way of example, Kingsolver was criticized for a Los Angeles Times opinion piece following the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan in the wake of the September 11 attacks. She wrote, "I feel like I'm standing on a playground where the little boys are all screaming at each other, 'He started it!' and throwing rocks that keep taking out another eye, another tooth. I keep looking around for somebody's mother to come on the scene saying, 'Boys! Boys! Who started it cannot possibly be the issue here. People are getting hurt."

The present-day plot of Unsheltered seems almost to be a plea for the mother’s point of view. A typical exchange is between Willa and her son Zeke:

“Your dad always used to carry Tig on his shoulders like that in crowds. So she could see more than just people’s belt buckles. Remember?”

“I remember childhood, yes. I understood it was supposed to end.”

“Of course.” People like Willa and Zeke never stopped being surprised when it didn’t.

And here are some typical Kingsolver views:

It kills you to see them grow up. But I guess it would kill you quicker if they didn't.

Sometimes the strength of motherhood is greater than natural laws.

If you see the world like that, you will enjoy Unsheltered.