Cbr13bingo Cityscape, bingo #4 Row 1
The Pulitzer-Prize winning novel All the Light We Cannot See, set during WWII, is the story of two teenagers who share an unusual connection. Marie-Laure Leblanc is blind and trying to survive the war in St. Malo, France. Werner Pfennig is an orphan with a genius for math and engineering in Zollverein, Germany. While they are on opposite sides of the war, they share a love of science, knowledge, and the world. Yet when we meet them, during the fire bombing of St. Malo in August of 1944, their love of these pursuits has taken them to very different places, made them different people. What happens to one’s dreams when the brutality of war intrudes on them?
There is a quote frequently repeated in this novel that seems to sum up the overall message of the story:
“Open your eyes … and see what you can with them before they close forever.”
For Marie Laure, this is might be a literal exhortation. Born with sight, Marie Laure gradually loses her vision to congenital cataracts and is blind by the time she is 6 years old. Yet despite this disability, Marie experiences the world around her in a deep, rich, meaningful way. Her father, locksmith for Paris’ National Museum of Natural History, takes her to work with him every day. There, she travels the galleries, learning from the experts in residence. She is especially drawn to mollusk expert Dr. Geffard and from him learns about the intricate and delicate world of snails. Her father, her only parent, also opens worlds to her through Braille books, particularly Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. Daniel Leblanc also uses his skills as a locksmith to build models of their neighborhood, allowing Marie Laure to feel her way around so that she can become independent when she walks on her own. The bond between father and daughter is strong, and every year for his daughter’s birthday, Daniel builds her a small wooden puzzle box containing some treat. The puzzle boxes become more involved and difficult with the years, but Marie Laure is adept at solving them. While she has lost her vision, she perceives the world around her with skill, precision and an abiding curiosity and love.
“To really touch something … is to love it.”
“Open your eyes … and see what you can with them before they close forever.”
For Werner Pfennig, this quote is also quite apt and will come back to his mind when he is a soldier for the Reich. For Werner, “closing your eyes forever” equals death, but there are other ways to lose sight. Werner and his little sister Jutta are orphans in Zollverein, a coal mining town. They have white blond hair and blue eyes, and Werner has a very active imagination and curiosity about the world and how everything works. The director of the Children’s Home, Frau Elena, is kind to all of the children and gives Werner much encouragement. He is exceptionally smart and learns how to repair and build radios. Through radio broadcasts, Werner and his sister will learn about rising German nationalism, but they also can tap into transmissions from outside Germany. From somewhere in France, they hear a man giving scientific lectures for children and Werner is enthralled. Eventually his genius with math and mechanics draws the attention of authorities who will put Werner in a special school. Jutta is alarmed by this because it is a Nazi school that teaches boys to be hateful and brutal, but for Werner it is an opportunity to study what he has always wanted. The bullying and violence at the school leave him cold, but he turns a blind eye to it in order to succeed. Eventually, he is conscripted to work for the Nazis during the war, using his intelligence to track down the sources of resistance radio transmissions so that his companions can kill resistors.
Unraveling the connection between Marie Laure and Werner is what this novel is about. Even if I could describe it well, doing so would probably spoil the novel for anyone interested in reading it, and I do think it’s a wonderful read. I am always up for a novel set in WWII, and this one covers a lot of interesting ground. In Werner’s story, the characters Jutta and Frederick, who is a fellow student at the Nazi school, provide a glimpse of what might happen to those who see the world differently from the majority. Werner’s story also illustrates the pressures on children under the Nazi regime. In Marie Laure’s story, we learn about the generation that experienced the First World War through her great uncle Etienne and his housekeeper Madame Manec. Their fears, sorrow, and bravery inspire and fortify Marie Laure even as her courage inspires them.
The novel is told in non-linear form. It begins in August 1944 with the firebombing of St. Malo, but then we go back in time 10 years, and the story continues switching between the characters’ pasts and their current situation in August 1944. The narration also switches back and forth from Marie Laure’s life to Werner’s. While this may sound confusing, Doerr makes it work and the storytelling is quite exciting. This would be a good choice for a discussion group, as it raises interesting questions about our choices, responsibilities, culpability, resilience, and the possibility of redemption.
