The Memory Artists by Jeffrey Moore

I initially read The Memory Artists when I was fifteen, and it was the first time that I realized that contemporary fiction had something different and interesting to offer that the brilliant old books couldn't.

Which - and I must emphasize this before I get pelted with stones - doesn't mean that they're better. Or even a fraction as good. Or worth the paper they're written on. Or whatever.

What it does mean is that by virtue of being newer, they can act as reactionary commentaries of the times in which they're published. A current commentary of the universe as it stands at a particular moment. (Which is also a reason why I like television so much, should anyone care.) There are also printing methods available now that Homer couldn't really get his hands on. Books can include pictures, colors, different font types and news article clippings. The comprehensive view of the world has changed from now from back in the good old days, and we can be more connected to people half way around the world than we are with those next door. It's not to say that these 'bells and whistles' can't become crutches that novels lean on, but when these little tricks work? The results can be pretty cool.



So I read The Memory Artists by Jeffrey Moore when I was fifteen, and at the time I thought it was the best book in the world. The story is thus: Noel Burun is a thirty year-old man with synesthesia - an ability to hear colors and shapes when he hears sounds. This ability has left him with a near-perfect memory, intense interpersonal issues, and very much alone. Just when Noel starts to properly navigate his gifts, his mother - Stella - becomes sick with Alzheimer's, forcing him to set aside his own life in a desperate attempt to find a cure. Surrounded by his best friend Norval - an ex-novelist/professor/rabble-rouser  devoted to a life of excess and sensuality after a betrayal from his mother, JJ - the optimistic and childish herbal guru with a love for terrible puns after the deaths of his parents, and Samira - an Arabic student trying to recover missing memories, escape her past, and get over her abismal taste in men. Connected through the memory studies being conducted by Dr. Emile Vorta, the group band together to help Noel and to save his mother. The book itself is the collected observations from Dr. Vorta (whose lengthy footnotes add color (pun intended) to the story), diary entries from various characters, a chapter from Norval's book, a sampling of articles, and even a chemical equation or two.

When I was fifteen, this seemed like a synergy the likes of which the novel had never seen. Everything that connected them had something to do with memory! It was ingenious! Ingenious! No one had ever thought of doing something like this before! No one!

Well, I've since found out that yes, actually. Stuff like this had been done before, and a great deal more artfully than Jeffrey Moore manages in The Memory Artists. But that doesn't mean that I have the heart to dislike the book, or think that it's anything other than impressive. More than a synergy of literary forms, this novel attempts to be encyclopedic about memory, both it's presence and absence, and how it shapes people and - indeed - the book itself. Only by going the excessive footnotes can readers get insight into the poets, artists, and medical masterminds who are shaping Vorta's/Moore's work. It's only through reading Noel's diaries that we're able to comprehend the babbling loss hinted at (but never remembered) in Stella's halting entries. Norval's past is the only thing that explains his rip-roaring present, and Samira's journey is placed in a different sort of context when we discover why she's trying to reform herself.

None of it in of itself is that interesting, or even brought together all that subtly, but it is comprehensive, and it is fascinating, almost because it is all so blatant. Memory is the thing the book is trying to preserve, even as it is being lost on all sides. Ultimately, the novel itself becomes the preserving force of the world it creates, and the characters who are both found and lost through it's writing.

Of course there are other interesting aspects. The story is set in Quebec, and one of the major characters is Arabic and another is Swiss, allowing for an interplay of culture, language, and nationality as the book progresses that creates a nice ambiguity that the reader is forced to (in a very unskilled fashion in my particular case) navigate. Since the book was written in 2002 there are a ton of delightful references to game shows, current (at the time) Alzheimer's theories and treatments, and the wonders of Canadian politics. (Yes. I had to look them up because I don't know anything about Canada. Shame upon my family name, etc.) And Moore's exploration of synesthesia is downright fun, even while we feel sympathy for Noel's plight.

In sum - this is a good book. It combines form, poetry, prose, and language to create an ode to the importance and loss of memory. Which I like. Even if I'm not a teenager anymore.