- Book Review -

I haven’t read any of her works before but The Shipping News is a wonderful film and I really enjoyed Brokeback Mountain so I was excited by the opportunity to read Annie Proulx latest novel "Barkskins".

"Barkskins" is an epic, tome of a novel -- over 700 hundred pages! –- that covers the fortunes of the descendants of two men who escape the poverty of 17th century France to try and find a new life in Canada (New France). Meanwhile, Proulx beautifully but painfully tells of the story of the gradual destruction of the forest of North America and in parallel, the destruction and dispersal of the native peoples. 

The novel is written in sections of uneven length some lasting just 10 years, others nearly 120, and oscillates between the two family trees, whose family fortunes ebb and flow. It follows a rather dizzying array of characters and generations. The one permanent character throughout the book is the rapidly shrinking ancient forest.

This book will appeal to anyone who loves epics, forests, and beautiful scenery. It is very upsetting. It follows the irreversible impact of destroying ancient woodland, the impact of humanity on the living world, and what that means for our future. The book is, intentionally, raising alarms:

“Men behave as overlords. They decide what will flourish and what will die. I believe human kind is evolving into a terrible new species and I am sorry that I am one of them.” (p. 658)

It starts at the colonial expansions in Europe and step-by-step covers the decisions and attitudes that have led us to the dire state we are in today. “So extensive are the forest here that Americans cannot see an end to them. Therefore, they have no interest in preserving them.” (p. 480). Proulx contrasts the successes and impact of the short-sighted capitalist machine compared to the native beliefs and attitudes.

There is also an undeniably feminist slant to the book. On the forest, “To Mari it was a living entity, as vital as the waterways, filled with gifts of medicine, food, shelter, tool material, which everyone discovered and remembered. One lived with harmony and gratitude. She believed the interminable chopping of every tree for the foolish purpose of clearing the land was bad. But that, thought Rene was woman’s talk. The forest was there, enormous and limitless. The task of men was to subdue its exuberance, to tame the land it grew on – useless land until cleared and planted with wheat and potatoes.” (p. 51)

For all its merits, however, this is quite a difficult novel to get into. For me, it suffered from real pacing issues. Some parts of the story are really slow, especially at the beginning, which I suspect will put some people off. There is a very long section on the original character Charles Duquet’s entry into international trade with abundant detail about the intricacies of 18th century international trade, which I would thoroughly recommend skim reading, unless you are that way inclined. By contrast, there are other sections of the novel where the author just seems to try and cover too much ground, covering the lives of so many characters in such a short period of time, that it makes it difficult to identify with any of the characters before they have been killed off in some sort of gruesome accident. It reminded me of going to see "The Complete Works of Shakespeare" in 90 minutes! I felt this was especially the case with the Sel family members. I assume some of this was deliberate, to show the short, brutal lives of the native peoples, especially as compared to the forest, but as a reader I felt a little short changed, especially after having read nearly 100 pages on how the Dutch East India company traded.

The book found its pace for me with the introduction of James Duke and his descendants. Without too many spoilers, the novel does end with some glimmer of light with the focus returning to the present day, to the Sel family and the works they were doing to save today’s forest. I particularly, enjoyed the character of Sapastia Sel, “She seemed to feel personal guilt for eroded slopes and dirty rivers. If she looked up she saw not the heaven’s blue but apocalyptic clouds in aircraft gouged sky” (p. 683). I would have enjoyed reading a lot more about her, but once again the pacing issues stepped in and the end felt rushed to reach a conclusion.

In the end though I really enjoyed this novel, but it is one that needs an investment of time and a fair amount of attention. As a tip for anyone starting to read it, there is actually a family tree laid out, but only at the end of the physical book. I felt that would have very much helped me navigate some of the more productive generations of the families. 

- Gemma -
Fresh Air Reads Contributor