A Canticle for Leibowitz
by Walter M. Miller Jr.
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Book Summary Information
Author: Walter M. Miller Jr.Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2006-05-09
ISBN: 0060892994
Number of pages: 352
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Book Reviews of A Canticle for Leibowitz
Book Review: Haunting and unique
Summary: 5 Stars
Reading these reviews, you will find all kinds of disagreement - and that is exactly what you expect in great literature. Different events can be interpreted in different ways because the author allows us to find meaning for ourselves. And that quest for meaning is the theme of this book.
The author, Walter Miller, never wrote another full-length book. For that matter, this book is really 3 novellas strung together. I wouldn't really call this book science fiction any more than I would describe Plato's 'Republic' or More's 'Utopia' as science fiction. There are no aliens or the like; only a novel set in the future.
The 3 novellas concern 3 periods of times in the 2000 or so years following a nuclear holocaust in the 1960's (which would have been 10 years after the time the book was written). In one sense this book compares to several other post-nuclear holocaust books written in the same time-period - Frank's 'Alas, Babylon' and Shute's 'On the Beach'. These latter two works, though excellent reading, really are just novels set in such a period. They really don't have any depth or philosophical questioning other than blowing up the world would be bad. About the level of a medical school interviewer who once asked me what I thought of Nuclear War - trying to get at my politics to see if he would let me in. I, of course, responded, "Well, I'm for it, naturally" - and it was all downhill from there. Anyway, the point of this book is not necessarily that nuclear holocaust would be bad. Unfortunately, to the simple-minded, this seems to be the theme of the book.
In my opinion, the theme is the long battle regarding knowledge and its applications - a novel length exposition of the question "Was gaining the Knowledge of Good and Evil a good thing, or a bad thing?"
The unifying theme of the 3 novellas is that all are set in a future monastery named after a survivor of the holocaust named Leibowitz trying to preserve remnants of past knowledge for a brighter future. The book is never clear on who or what exactly Saint Leibowitz was. Clues are given such as finding his workbox with a grocery list and electronic repair equipment. Was he a scientist or an appliance repairman? You're never really sure since the author, wisely, never tells us. The only recurring character (other than the dead Leibowitz) is a wandering Jew who turns out to be that Lazarus who was raised from the dead and told to wait until Christ came again in some non-biblical legends. This character calls Leibowitz one of his people, though the basis for this is never made clear (could it just be based on the name?). This would be ironic because a Catholic monastery is based on this St. Leibowitz. At any rate, this Leibowitz seems to have tried to save lost knowledge at a time when the remaining people on earth were intent on destroying all such knowledge and anyone who was an intellectual or scientist was killed. From these vague origins, a monastery in the deserts of the Southwest, somewhere near Utah, becomes established based on trying to carry out Leibowitz's mission.
One of Miller's plot devices is being vague. Like mumbled dialogue or poor lighting in a movie, this leaves the reader with a sense of confusion, unease and wonderment that adds to the depth of the exposition. There is no neat wrapping-up of events and the author never explicitly states what he is trying to tell us. Another device is the Catholic hierarchy and teachings in the book. This is an important part of the book, but in spite of what anti-relgious reviewers rant about, this does not detract from the book but adds to it. There is also a lot of un-translated Latin. If you attended catechism (Catholic lay education), you would recognize much, but even so, you will still need a Latin dictionary or Google unless your Latin is better than mine. Still another device is the humor, much of which is quite dark. There is a surprising amount of humor in this book about a post-holocaust world.
The first novella is set 600 years in the future - in a kind of Dark Age where mutants roam the earth and there are no modern inventions. The monks of the monastery struggle to compile knowledge and store it - they really don't know much at all. For example, the main character in this part of the book, Brother Francis, spends his life illuminating a copy of a mundane wiring diagram, not realizing that this particular relic really has no utility. This book brings to mind the Irish monasteries of the Middle ages that copied and saved knowledge from the Romans and Greeks even though no new studies were done. This would place Miller ahead of his time since this is a fairly new theme.
The second novella is set in a renaissance where the world has begun to rebuild and a scholar from a new power-center comes to the Abbey and reviews the records kept from the last millenium. The theme of this section concerns government and secular knowledge and power versus individualism and spirituality.
The last novella portrays another advanced civilization - so advanced they even have space exploration, though this is never of major importance other than a place for refugees to flee to. Again, Miller was ahead of his time because all they really had were a few satellites at the time Miller wrote this book. I personally found this last section the most haunting. A major part of this book is spent on euthanasia and suicide with the head of the Abbey trying to teach one person at a time that life is too valuable to waste or end prematurely even if one is suffering.
As a physician I see suffering 20 to 40 times a day. It always seems to surprise many of my patients, but all of us suffer and all of us will die. (Except for me, of course.) There is a modern-day malaise that exists in so many of my patients that wasn't there only a few years ago. And the only people who really avoid it are the spiritual - not necessarily the religious - but the spiritual. So many people with suffering that is really minor when compared to the suffering of those who lived in the past with death, disease and pestilence being the rule rather than the exception like today. A minor arthritis brings despair, oxycontin addiction, and a wish for socialism where all the patient's neighbors should be forced to fund every possible medical desire of the patient. These patients seem so alone, even as they lash out and make everyone around them, even their loved ones, miserable. And they frequently become suicidal. And for these reasons, I found the last part of this book haunting as the poor Priest struggles desperately to prevent people from using a government-sponsored euthanasia/suicide center.
We all suffer and we all die. Some suffer and die early and some late. My patients who have lost loved ones seem to suffer more than those dying of cancer. This theodicy, the vindication of God and the reason for suffering and pain, is at the root of this last novella. The author does not give an answer to this most basic question, but only lots of food for thought.
Overall 5 stars because of the quality of the theme, the humorous almost whimsical happenings in the midst of such tragic occurrences, and the imagination shown by this author. The only negatives would be too much un-translated Latin, an expectation of understanding the Catholic hierarchy, and occasional slow parts. Vincet Veritas, MEB
Summary of A Canticle for Leibowitz
Winner of the 1961 Hugo Award for Best Novel and widely considered one of the most accomplished, powerful, and enduring classics of modern speculative fiction, Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz is a true landmark of twentieth-century literature -- a chilling and still-provocative look at a post-apocalyptic future.
In a nightmarish ruined world slowly awakening to the light after sleeping in darkness, the infant rediscoveries of science are secretly nourished by cloistered monks dedicated to the study and preservation of the relics and writings of the blessed Saint Isaac Leibowitz. From here the story spans centuries of ignorance, violence, and barbarism, viewing through a sharp, satirical eye the relentless progression of a human race damned by its inherent humanness to recelebrate its grand foibles and repeat its grievous mistakes. Seriously funny, stunning, and tragic, eternally fresh, imaginative, and altogether remarkable, A Canticle for Leibowitz retains its ability to enthrall and amaze. It is now, as it always has been, a masterpiece.
Walter M. Miller's acclaimed SF classic A Canticle for Leibowitz opens with the accidental excavation of a holy artifact: a creased, brittle memo scrawled by the hand of the blessed Saint Leibowitz, that reads: "Pound pastrami, can kraut, six bagels--bring home for Emma." To the Brothers of Saint Leibowitz, this sacred shopping list penned by an obscure, 20th-century engineer is a symbol of hope from the distant past, from before the Simplification, the fiery atomic holocaust that plunged the earth into darkness and ignorance. As 1984 cautioned against Stalinism, so 1959's A Canticle for Leibowitz warns of the threat and implications of nuclear annihilation. Following a cloister of monks in their Utah abbey over some six or seven hundred years, the funny but bleak Canticle tackles the sociological and religious implications of the cyclical rise and fall of civilization, questioning whether humanity can hope for more than repeating its own history. Divided into three sections--Fiat Homo (Let There Be Man), Fiat Lux (Let There Be Light), and Fiat Voluntas Tua (Thy Will Be Done)--Canticle is steeped in Catholicism and Latin, exploring the fascinating, seemingly capricious process of how and why a person is canonized. --Paul Hughes
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