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Christopher Priest Affirmation starts out as a manic exploration of the possible existence of truth in fiction and how the writing and rewriting of autobiography in increasingly veiled and distanced terms reaches a vanishing point where it suddenly becomes 'fiction' and all the attendant consequences therein: people, places, and events from 'reality' not merely transposedbut transformedyet retaining the shimmer of familiarity.
It explodes from there into a mad identity quest mapped out through a ragged manuscript, a memorymining expedition, and a splitlevel view of relationships and travel with the destination an archipelago comprised of seemingly endless numbers of islands stretching out toward the horizon.
A fundamental struggle occurs over what is real and what is imagined:
It scared me to know there was this dichotomy in the perceived world, as if to stop believing it could cause the ship to vanish beneath me.And what of those islands, . .
To her, each island represented a different facet of her personality, each one vested in her a sense of identity.While Priest's prose is measuredsome may even say restrainedthe pacing and depth of the story fully earn these terms.
She was incomplete without islands, she was spread across the sea,
The Affirmation is the eighth novel by British SF author Christopher Priest, originally published in, As with his later novels The Prestige and moreso The Separation, The Affirmation is a book about identity, truth, perception and perspective which rewards multiple readings and is open to many interpretations of what is happening.
Ayearold man named Peter Sinclair is tormented by the death of his father, an unhappy relationship with a woman named Gracia and the loss of his job in London.
Offered an opportunity to fix up the dilapidated country house of a friend of his late father's, he jumps at the chance.
Whilst performing this job he becomes obsessed with the idea of writing his autobiography and defining his life through words, But, anxious to protect the identities of real people, he changes their names, then the names of the places they live, then the very nature of the world they exist in.
But that may be a lie,
Ayearold man named Peter Sinclair is living in the city of Jethra, part of the great nation of Faiandland.
Unexpectedly, he wins the LotterieCollago, The prize is a course of treatment given on the distant southern island of Collago, which grants the recipient immortality but only at the price of total amnesia.
On his way through the islands he meets and falls in love with a woman named Seri, but is occasionally haunted by thoughts of a manuscript he wrote two years ago, the story of his life with some of the names and places changed.
That may also be a lie,
The Affirmation utterly defies any attempt to summarise it, It is a twisting and at times bewildering novel that moves between at least three different levels of reality, and each of those is open to multiple interpretations.
Peter is really a native of a different, although similar, world and our planet and everything on it is a figment of his imagination.
Peter is really a Londoner suffering a total mental collapse in the wake of personal tragedy, He is suffering from amnesia, or schizophrenia, or an acute solipsist, or all three, The manuscripts are real, or only exist in his head, The manuscript he is writing is the actual novel itself, forming a Mobius strip of narrative and causality that loops back in on itself: when you reach the end of the novel, which literally finishes in midsentence, you can go back to the start and reread it as its own sequel, with greater understanding.
Priest does his usual thing here of using a clean, easily readable prose style which lures the reader into a false sense of security until the story's second level of interpretation and reality kicks in, leaving the reader confused as to what is happening.
And just when you adjust for that, something else happens that hints at a grander but stranger truth yet, The Affirmation is a puzzle, but not necessarily a puzzle with a single solution, which makes it a fiendishly addictive read.
The Affirmation is one of the most original and mindblowing books I have read, somehow even eclipsing The Separation in what it asks from the reader and the possible answers it gives out.
The novel is available in the UK from Gollancz and in the USA from Pocket Books, The latter is out of print, but Amazon, com still has some copies available, Introduction
The Affirmation by Christopher Priest is one of the greatest books I've ever read, I read this book a couple of days ago but hadn't been able to write a review because I was unable to think straight.
This book has seriously messed with my mind,
I have never been a huge fan of simple and straightforward plots, Most of my favourite movies are filled with twisted, complicated plotlines and confusing narratives but it's a bit easier to create such effects on screen where you have a variety of tools available.
But to do that using written words is a much more difficult task but Christopher Priest does this exceptionally and the result is nothing short of mindbending.
The following quote captures the essence of this extraordinary book better than anything else ever could
"From things that have happened and from things as they exist and from all things that you know and all those you cannot know, you make something through your invention that is not a representation but a whole new thing truer than anything true and alive, and you make it alive, and if you make it well enough, you give it immortality.
"
Ernest Hemingway
If you've read this book you'd truly understand and appreciate how apt this quote is for this particular book.
Plot
The story is told in first person and in the very early parts of the book, Peter Sinclair establishes himself as a somewhat unreliable narrator.
Whether this is because of two or three worlds colliding and merging into each other or because of the state of his mind is unclear.
The story begins with Peter telling us that "Already there is an uncertainty, and my sureness recedes, " And he's not lying.
Peter is twentynine years old or is he and has recently lost his father, his job, his apartment and his girlfriend they broke up.
All this happen in a matter of weeks, crushing and destroying him,
Most people experience these unfortunate events in their lives but to go through them all at the same time must truly be devastating.
In his intentions of finding himself and finding some meaning to his life, he decides to write an autobiography which only leads to more uncertainty and confusion.
The narration is somewhat flat but that only helps the book in later parts, The prose is written in a way that you believe what is being said and this makes it even more baffling when things are questioned or disproved.
Characters
The characters are extremely well created and realistic, Even the characters who might or might not be real are as well rounded as the other ones,
The best part about the characters is probably the fact that every character has a personality which makes them unique as they express different emotions and exhibit different sides of themselves.
But the narrator is not without bias towards the characters and that bias usually draws you in as the biases become your own.
Before you know, it's not only Peter who distrusts the other characters, it's you who distrust them, This doesn't stop the characters from coming across to you, making you believe things and question them at the same time.
World
This is probably the most complex part of the book, There are more than a singular world and both of them appear to be equally real, But are they We might never truly know, There is an alternate reality set inside the reality we know to be true,
One of the worlds is the world with which we're quite familiar London,
The other world is a fascinating, dreamlike world aptly named as Dream Archipelago, a seemingly endless number of islands, full of endless possibilities.
Both of these worlds are described in flat, matteroffact manner, making you believe in both of them and the yet reader ends up questioning the existence of both of them.
Conclusion and Questions
Some scifi novels are filled with aliens, hightech weapons, time travel and such.
The Affirmation, however, deals with much grandeur things, It poses questions about but not limited to the reliability of one's memory, the meaning of life, and the morality of immortality.
What about Immortality
Would you want to be immortal if you could, knowing that everyone you love will die and you will be forever alone Is there any meaning to such a life Do you deserve to be immortal Would you do something worthwhile with your neverending life or would it be just a waste
Let's talk about something a lot more personal.
Something that you always rely on and consider the utmost truth Memory
Can you really trust your memory Can you trust anything
How reliable is your own memory Do you remember the things which happened in your childhood We always seem so sure about the things we witnessed or experienced when we were children.
We never question them, do we And yet there are moments when you're talking to your parents or elders and they give you a somewhat different account of the events.
Does that mean that you made things up Our memories are a part of us, They are what shapes us and define us, But it's also true that the memories depend on your perception of the events and your senses which might be affected by a number of reasons.
If the things you remember from your childhood are flawed, what's to say that everything else isn't What's to say that everything else you remember is correct How do you even know who you really are
These are only a few of the questions this remarkable book made me ask and to say that I can never see my life in the same way will be a massive understatement.
Nothing is
certain. Half your life could be a figment of your imagination for all you know, Memory is unreliable and so are the people you remember,
While writing this entire review, I couldn't help but think of Solipsism,
Solipsism is the philosophical idea that only one's own mind is sure to exist, It proposes that the knowledge of anything outside one's own mind is unsure the external world and other minds cannot be known and might not exist outside the mind.
But what of your own mind Is the knowledge we have of our own lives reliable Can it be trusted
TLDR : The Affirmation by Christopher Priest is one of the greatest things I've ever experienced.
It's fascinating, mindbending and twisted, By the time you finish reading it, you'll be looking at everything differently, I highly recommend it to everyone who likes to think and question things,
Note: This book is not for people who like their books to be simple, Despite not being long, this won't be a quick read because the ideas are simply too big,
Thank you for reading!,