Faith in Free Fall

“It was reasonable to struggle, to suffer, perhaps even to die, for a more just, a more
compassionate society, but not in a world with no future where, all too soon,
the very words “justice,” “compassion,” “society,” “struggle,” “evil,”
would be unheard echoes on an empty air” (112).
P. D. James's The Children of Men (1992)

Points for Reflection

Children of Men, chps. 9-16

1. do our characters find more solace in silence than in sound?
2. does sex provide a reliable pleasure for any of the characters we meet?
3. is science utterly impotent in the post-Omega world?
4. do the female characters evince the same agency as their male counterparts?
5. has the future world envisioned by P. D. James managed to transcend the racism and nationalism that beset her own era?
6. how efficacious do the Arts prove at tempering sadness and depression?
7. Julian tells Theo she’s involved with a secret group calling for social change because God has called her to this course of action (109 bottom).  Has the novel, to this point, exploded religious ideas so completely that Julian’s faith sounds either misguided or crazy?
8. do the rules of morality governing Britain owe their fundamentals to tradition, or do they hinge on radically new criteria?
9. Theo notes that the current government’s primary goal is to provide the people with freedom from not only fear and want but boredom--something Xan also hopes to avoid by continuing to lead the country (89, 101).  Does such ennui seem to be a pervasive problem in the lives of those characters we have met thus far, or are they successfully staving off boredom?
10. given the responsibilities and temperaments of the four members of Xan’s council, does there appear to be a neat balance between “masculine” and “feminine” sensibilities?
11. do the council members’ justifications for their decisions hold more merit than Theo’s calls for reform?
12. how does the government deal with criminal behavior?
13. of the three reasons Xan cites for rising to power as Warden, and staying in the position, which does he claim is the real reason he has stayed in power for so long? Given what we learn of his character, do you think his claim valid?
14. have class divisions dissolved alongside humanity’s ability to procreate?
15. is Theo the misanthrope he believes himself to be?
16. does Theo slowly undergo an emotional renaissance, or do his feelings remain buried and undeveloped?
17. do Theo’s memories buoy him, or drag him down?
18. is Theo beginning to better understand himself, or does he grow increasingly adept at hiding important truths from his conscious mind?
19. does Theo’s aesthetic sensibility assess only inanimate things, or the living as well?
20. does the omniscient narrator provide any evidence that Theo is practiced at self-deception?
21. what did Theo’s parents do well in raising him?  Can you identify any mistakes they may have made?

Children of Men, chps. 17-26

1. consider those moments where Theo and others draw attention to the power of particular words--to the importance of diction choices, naming, and so on.  Does this novel implicitly counter or reinforce the notion that a single word choice can have profound ramifications?
2. how do Theo’s dreams change over time, and what does this shift suggest about his mental and moral state?
3. when and why does Theo “tell himself” something?  Dos these moments tend to indicate efforts to recover truths he already, firmly holds, or to prevent adoption of uncomfortable ideas?
4. does Rolf’s criticism of Theo--as a pompous, educated man who lives in the past and does nothing that matters (159-60)—hold water?
5. does Theo’s developing emotional self overwhelm and supplant his intellect, or does he achieve a healthy synergy combining the powers of the mind and those of the heart?
6. Theo “half-resents[s]” his concern for Julian, his apparent “obsession with her,” and asks himself “what else had brought him to this rough unencumbered place?” (153).  Does the novel provide an answer to this seemingly rhetorical question?
7. during his informal interrogation of Theo, Chief Inspector George Rawlings wonders aloud whether the Five Fishes group that has been blowing up Quietus ramps and the like is a Christian group, since their symbol is a fish (125). Given what the reader learns of this group in these chapters, would it be inappropriate to characterize this group as “Christian”? [sec 01: Carson C]
8. does Theo’s deepening self-knowledge involve a reconsideration of his hostile attitude towards faith and religion, or does his rejection of Christianity grow ever stronger? [sec 01: Chris B]
9. does what we have learned about Helen accord with Xan’s teenage prediction of the sort of woman Theo would one day marry (152)?
10. why might Theo grab his diary the night that Miriam shows up on his doorstep? He claims the diary is not particularly incriminating, so why take it with him?
11. does the narrative encourage the reader to side with Rolf in his aspirations to supplant Xan as leader of England? [sec 03: Alli C]
12. back in chapter seven, we met Theo’s old mentor Jasper Palmer-Smith, a history don whose approach to humankind’s slow death is detached and cynical. Jasper looked forward to being “spared the intrusive barbarism of the young” (45 top). Does the nature of either his wife’s death (74-75) or his own (162) validate this approach to life? Does the narrative, that is, serve up Jasper as a hero?
13. is Theo in any way responsible for Jasper’s death?

T. S. Eliot's "Rhapsody on a Windy Night" (1911; 1917), PDF

1. does the spell cast by the moon aid the narrator in ordering his memories (ll.2-12)?
2. Eliot often references objects without describing their specific type.  Why might he identify the madman’s flower as a geranium (l.12)?
3. would the utterances of the street lamp carry the same significance if uttered instead by a bird, horse, dog, or other animal?  Why an inanimate, immobile, and artificial street lamp?
4. why does the light of the door opening to welcome the unidentified woman evoke the notion of a grin (ll.16-18)?
5. what do a polished, twisted branch (ll.25-29) and rusty, weakened spring (ll.30-32) have in common with the memory that spawns them?
6. whatever does the specter of a cat eating rancid butter have to do with a child’s pocketing of a toy (ll.34-40)?  Are these two images meant to be thematically related?
7. what do the voyeur (ll.41-42) and old crab (ll.43-45) have in common?
8. does “she” (l.52, etc.) refer to the moon, or a woman?  Has the moon lost her own memory, or someone else’s (l.55)?
9. does memory serve a positive, salutary function in this poem?
10. does the narrator’s return to home (ll.71-77) constitute a reentry into the mode of memory which involves “clear relations,” “divisions and precisions” (ll.6-7), or a continuation of the alternate form of memory illustrated within the body of the poem?
11. is sleep here regarded as something which brings rest and rejuvenation (l.77)?

Philip Larkin's "Church Going" (1955), PDF

1. analyze the narrator's diction in the opening stanzas. What tone and attitude is shaped by the adjectives used to describe the church's interior?
2. the narrator concludes early (l.19) that it was not worth stopping by this church. Does he end the poem with the same conclusion?
3. what array of functions does the narrator imagine old, unused churches playing in the future (ll.21-31)?
4. does the narrator conclude that religious belief has already died (l.34)? What does he mean by the query, "what remains when disbelief has gone?" (l.35)?
5. what did churches once contain which, according to the narrator, is "since [. . .] found / Only in separation" (ll.49-50)? What does he mean by this cryptic observation?
6. why does the narrator keep returning to churches, given that he "always end[s] much at a loss like this" (l.20)? What does the final stanza suggest about this complex motivation?

The Merry Go Round (1934)
Cyril Power

Dr. Paul Marchbanks
pmarchba@calpoly.edu