The Overstory

The Overstory by Richard Powers is a big, Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about humanity's relationship to nature. Specifically, it's about trees. In one respect, the novel is a huge achievement. I look at trees, as I walk through my neighborhood, with a greater sense of wonder. Powers vividly described their interconnectedness; their myriad, animal traits; their place in time--much more patient than humans can comprehend. For this, The Overstory was a worthwhile read, changing the way I experience the natural world.

I wonder if a novel was the right medium for this message, as some literary elements were clunky (plot), some were unbelievable (dialogue), and some were ridiculous (character). Reading The Overstory was a strange experience, then, as I deeply enjoyed the science but cringed, often, at the fiction. The beginning was auspicious: each of the many main characters inhabited their pages believably and colorful trees bloomed in the background. But a third of the way through, the characters all coalesced into desperate environmental activists.* Their actions and speech morphed into didactic ranting. The women were beautiful and motherly; the men simple and loyal to the women. None of them had a sense of humor. They made wild life changes on whims or feelings. Driven hard by plot, the novel propelled these characters to dramatic gestures of awareness and compassion that, we are led to believe, the rest of the world was too selfish to understand.

Apparently, this characterization problem has dogged Powers's fiction. In a remarkable passage, Powers actually addresses it--a man reads great novels and complains that the literary element character seems to be "all that matters in the end," that "no novel can make the contest for the world seem as compelling as the struggles between a few lost people." This meta, Postmodern self-awareness was perhaps the most interesting device in the text. But the statement is incorrect. Many fine novels are centered on theme, not character. And they don't need to sacrifice realistic dialogue or character motivation to explore the idea. Writing about politics is uniquely difficult, but not impossible. Joyce Carol Oates's A Book of American Martyrs is a brilliant, theme-driven novel--about abortion--that absolutely held up. I was invested in the characters and believed in their decisions, however extreme, however misguided. If I were passing out Pulitzer Prizes, A Book of American Martyrs would have won long before The Overstory.

*As the son of an Oregon logger, I was struck that there was no room in this huge book for people in the Timber Industry. When they did appear, they were uncritical yokels that developed a grudging respect for the costumed hippies putting them out of work. It was an absurd characterization, one that made me want to go back to Ken Kesey's masterpiece Sometimes a Great Notion.