60 pages • 2 hours read
Ann PatchettState of Wonder
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2011A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Civilization as a Corrupting Force
Though Amazonian tribes like the Lakashi and the Jinta initially seem far removed and isolated from the influence of modern life and civilization, Marina discovers that the desire for economic and social power can spread and corrupt even in the Amazon Basin. For example, during a trip down river to the Jinta Trading Post with Alan and Nancy Saturn, Dr. Budi, Benoit, and Easter, Marina is startled t to find several white tourists so far up the Amazon. As well as their presence, Marina notices the considerable impact the tourists on the behavior of the Jinta Indians, who pander to them and their cameras, transforming their traditional ceremonies and dances into public entertainment. In addition, those Jinta not dancing or performing, dedicate their efforts to selling trinkets and crafts for financial gain. Rather than having an authentic encounter with another culture, the tourists are given what they want, a spectacle and a few exotic pictures that they can brag about with their friends and colleagues back home. The superficial nature of this encounter is made clear by the fact that the tourists mistake Marina for a Jinta Indian.
For the Amazon tribes, however, even the most minor intrusion from the outside world poses a grave threat to their culture and behavior. Of these intrusions, the introduction of money represents a particular threat. For example, during their return trip from the Trading Post, Benoit is so desperate to prove himself as a potential tour guide in the booming Amazon tourism industry that he attempts to single-handedly capture an anaconda, hoping to cement his reputation as a guide. His brazen attempt nearly kills Easter, and clearly traumatizes his passengers. Though civilization can be a source of social and economic progress, the Anaconda scene draws a darker portrait; it is an unfortunate microcosmic example of how just a drop of profit motive in the Amazon can lead to wide-ranging socio-cultural contamination.
The Power of Medicine to Aid and Exploit
From a macro-economic perspective, State of Wonder is a novel about a powerful, global biomedical and pharmaceutical corporation, Vogel, attempting to exploit the natural resources of a fragile Amazonian eco-system for financial gain. For the Vogel Corporation, Dr. Swenson’s research and development of a new fertility drug that can sustain female reproduction indefinitely represents huge potential profits. However, there is no profit potential for the Lakashi who discovered the source of such extended fertility, and the drug poses a potentially devastating public health risk to elderly women who might seek to undertake such a pregnancy. This latter danger is poignantly illustrated in the novel by Dr. Swenson’s pregnancy which occurs as a result of testing the fertility drug on herself. Her subsequent miscarriage and the delivery of the fetus by C-section nearly kills her.
While Dr. Swenson’s experience of pregnancy represents only a singular, fictional case study, it has universal moral implications. People in first world nations will likely pay a lot of money for this medication, however, what is the value of these medications in terms of improving global health and eradicating deadly diseases? Shouldn’t this be the true moral aim of medical research and drug development? How do we reconcile the desire to make money with the humanitarian need to heal the sick? In State of Wonder, the Martin bark is the nexus where these questions and conflicts co-exist.
Though the financial value of the Martin bark compound lies in its ability to extend women’s fertility, its real value in terms of human health is its ability to inoculate against malaria. Unfortunately, as Patchett’s novel makes clear, promoting and valuing public health is rarely the primary objective of global pharmaceutical corporations. Instead, the mass production of medicine has more to do with corporate profits than with solving or curing global health crises, particularly crises that, like malaria, primarily affect the third world. Patchett’s novel dramatizes the systemic problems of the global pharmaceutical industry through the conflict between Dr. Swenson, who hopes to end the scourge of malaria, and Mr. Fox, who hopes to cash in on a drug that will damage a unique ecosystem in order to extend the reproductive capacity of first-world women.
Finally, by shifting back and forth between the corporate campus in Minneapolis and the research station in the Amazon, Patchett’s novel attempts to shed light on the social, cultural, economic, and geographical gulf that separates the first-world--where the pharmaceutical giants are based, the production decisions are made, and the profits are realized--and the third-world region that provides much of the raw material for these companies in exchange for minimal economic gain.. All in all, it is a system that depends on and perpetuates exploitation.
The Trauma of Separation and Loss
This is not simply a novel about macroeconomics and third world exploitation; it is also a novel about the human struggle to cope with traumatic separation and loss. Virtually every important character experiences a devastating loss of some kind: Marina is abandoned by her father; Barbara Bovender loses her father in childhood; Dr. Swenson loses the love of her life, Dr. Rapp; Mr. Fox loses his wife to lymphoma, and Karen Eckman, suffers through a long separation from her husband even before she is mistakenly informed that he has died.
As a result of their respective losses, virtually every character makes decisions motivated by of a need to salve their wounds. Marina is attracted to older men like Mr. Fox, who serve as symbolic father figures. Dr. Swenson, who spent her life loving a married man, seeks motherhood and familial connection by abducting Easter from his birth parents and using her own body in a life threatening experimental pregnancy. Mr. Fox seeks to avoid losing another loved one by dating much younger women, and Anders Eckman, in the absence of his sons, becomes a surrogate father and mentor to Easter during his stay at the research station. To live, the experiences of these characters suggest, is to deal with the universal inevitability of loss and separation. Through these characters’ personal struggles with loss, Patchett explores both the problems and the potential solutions for traumatic loss.
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