Thursday, March 21, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Intuitionist by Colson Whitehead




The Intuitionist was the first novel by Colson Whitehead, more famous now for his The Underground Railroad.  In that novel, Whitehead took the very real horrors of American racism, messed with the timeline a bit, and used a fantastical framing device (a literal underground railroad) to tell a really chilling and powerful story of the horrors of racism and oppression.  It was a very surreal way of writing and worked very well, and you can see the surrealistic form of writing as well in The Intuitionist - which is on its very outside surface a noir novel featuring elevator inspectors.

But as with his later work, The Intuitionist is a whole lot more than what it appears to be on the surface - a noir mystery novel featuring an alternate early 20th century NYC in which elevators are considered the marvels of technology and elevator inspectors are people of import and repute.   It's setting, characters, and plot are heavily metaphorical, with the ideas of the story having to do heavily with the struggles of people of color to deal with a world that only looks skin deep, and how they are often forced into reacting while striving for a potentially better tomorrow.   As such, it's a really strong novel, one which begs multiple rereads to really understand all that's going on.

Note: I'm using the word "colored" in this review because that's the word used in the book, not because such a term is proper. 


-----------------------------------------------Plot Summary--------------------------------------------------
Lila Mae Watson is the first colored woman - and second person of color at all - to be an Elevator Inspector in the City.  Elevators are a big deal in the City, having enabled the City to take a leap upwards in height and to transform into a new age, with magazines dedicated to elevator construction, marketing, and news, and a university dedicated to teaching all things about them - so Elevator Inspectors, and their Guild, are considered persons of notoriety and interest.

Lila Mae isn't just any Elevator Inspector though - she's the best inspector, and a practitioner of "Intuitionism" - the practice of using some form of seemingly-magic feel in order to do her job instead of the use of practical rigorous examination (known as empiricism).  The Empiricists have always been the big leaders of the Guild but with an election coming up, it seems the leaders of the Intuitionists might take over.

Then an elevator last inspected by Lila Mae collapses.  Soon she finds herself caught between the Intuitionists and the Empiricists, as well as the mob, in a game of deadly import as everyone jockeys for the potential leadership position and Lila's alleged failure makes her the perfect pawn for all of them.  To clear her name, Lila must search for what really happened, and find a way to obtain the thing everyone is searching for: the designs of the mysterious "Black Box"- the perfect elevator designed by Intuitonism's legendary founder, which could take the City to even newer heights.

But the truth behind the Black Box may be different than anyone could have expected, and only Lila Mae may be able to bring out the truth behind it to the world....
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The above description is bad, I know, because this novel, while short (it's around 250 pages), packs a lot of ideas into it and the basic plot - First WoC Elevator finds herself framed for disastrous work, finds herself on the run and between two factions and must find a macguffin in order to clear her name - is overly simplistic and doesn't do the book justice.  Everything about this book is clearly metaphorical even from its inception - the importance of the Black Box is the change the city by reaching "new heights" via the "second elevation" for instance - but what the metaphor truly is becomes more and more clear as the book progresses.

Not to spoil too much here, because this book really should be read, but the metaphor here is very much about race and about people of color living in a world that is allegedly giving them new opportunities, but is still set up to be run for and by those who are White.  Lila Mae has to deal with discrimination on all fronts and has only one friend among her colleagues - and that colleague is a slight oddball in that he wants to specialize in escalators, which is considered a lesser field.  The only other person of color in the Guild doesn't like her and seems to look down upon her as having not gone through the gauntlet he did as a pioneer.  And then there's the idea of intuitionism, the idea of looking at an object and judging its worth not based solely upon observations of who that object looks, but intuited ideas about its value instead - and you can see the glimpses of the metaphor with that description I'm giving, because Whitehead does a fantastic job of elaborating upon it and expanding it in ways I won't spoil.

In doing so, Whitehead relies upon strong character work with Lila Mae, who has responded to her wants and the discrimination by being a very introverted but strong-willed individual, who is very withdrawn with others, even those who aren't White.  And the plot is exceptional in how it twists at times in ways that are totally fair based upon what comes before, but also manages to twist what was previously known and written in very different ways.  The book isn't perfect in doing so - one fake-out by the book is incredibly silly (and kind of unnecessary honestly?) and the book has one character be a clear reference to a spider-man/daredevil character that is a little distracting, but these are minor quibbles.

In short, this is a short read, but it's a highly effective one with really strong themes, and is definitely recommended.
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)