Progress, such as it is, depends upon our increasing ability to measure. Time has been measured using the sun's rays, the swing of pendulums, barometric compensation, and now we have the quartz clock. But can we truly say that these sundry devices have actually measured the same thing? We want to speak to others, and we want what we say to mean something, but even words betray us. We are caught by the impossibility of communicating the colour blue.Uncertain Weights and Measures makes for a good example of why historical fiction isn't really my jam: Author Jocelyn Parr takes a historical factoid that caught her attention – the Moscow Brain Institute (Institut Mozga), which was founded in 1928 in an effort to study and preserve the genius brains behind the glorious Revolution, and which fell out of favour as its showcase brain (that of V. I. Lenin) became overshadowed by the growing Cult of Stalin – and by imagining how the lives of the workers at the Institute changed as the times around them evolved, Parr attempts to capture and lay bare the historic moment. This book does achieve these ends, but it felt a little dull to me, a little shallow; I think I'd prefer a nonfiction account of the times and do my own imagining as to how the proletariat were affected. And yet, I know many intelligent readers who want exactly this – a history lesson told through the experience of the people involved. Not my jam, but deserves to find its audience.
We were building something totally new. Of course it was difficult. All great endeavors are difficult. Art, love, science – they all dream big and fight hard before they achieve the grace of being settled. We didn't want to be held back, but it was human nature to want to return to the familiar.Tatiana is a particularly gifted young scientist and a true believer in the Revolution. When her mentor, Dr. Bechterev, brings her along to help set up the Institut Mozga, Tatiana is honoured to be the one to arrange the display of Lenin's brain; is gratified to learn that the German scientist, Dr. Vogt, has located the unique structures within Lenin's brain that were the wellspring of his genius. Although in the beginning Tatiana had been attracted to the challenging viewpoints of her artist husband, Sasha, the more she is trained to disregard anything that can't be weighed or measured, the greater the gulf that's growing between them; matters aren't helped by Sasha's state-assigned job as a propaganda colourist: this isn't art but Tatiana doesn't see the problem if this is what the state wants. As the years go by and acquaintances disappear or die under mysterious circumstances, it becomes unclear if anyone can be trusted.
This was when the new feeling started, though at the time I wouldn't have described it as such. It wasn't fear exactly, but fear's beginning: a stranger seen once too often.As a history of the Institut Mozga, Uncertain Weights and Measures contains all the details of an interesting story that I hadn't heard of before. But as the story of young people coming of age on the cusp between the idealism of Lenin and the totalitarianism of Stalin, it doesn't really capture the growing paranoia, fear, or disillusionment – Tatiana is an idealist who remains committed to the cause and Sasha is secretive with his wife, and therefore, with the reader. This is more a book of facts than of emotions, and where Tatiana periodically thinks like a feeling human, I didn't recognise her:
For months afterwards, I had a recurring dream that my heart was not muscle and blood and flesh but a cave-like bone, inside which I could stand upright and barely touch the roof, and there I could yell out I and it would echo back as if I were in a magnificent outdoor amphitheatre. Or, as if I were inside an operating theatre. From all sides I was surrounded. The sharp points of infinitely long needles stabbed me. Some were so sharp that their points were invisible, and these stung the deepest parts of me. Then, I would wake up thinking of Sasha, of how he had, inside him, an ocean.So, I didn't really relate to much in this book – but will again add the caveat that another reader likely will. I am not disappointed that this book's Governor General's Literary Award nomination led me to pick it up – I am always happy to try something outside my routine.
The 2017 Governor General's Literary Awards Finalists:
- All the Beloved Ghosts by Alison MacLeod
- Lost in September by Kathleen Winter
- The Water Beetles by Michael Kaan
- Uncertain Weights and Measures by Jocelyn Parr
- We'll All Be Burnt in Our Beds Some Night by Joel Thomas Hynes
Won by We'll All Be Burnt in Our Beds Some Night - which seems an odd choice to me. I liked it, but would have personally given the award to The Water Beetles.
