Shackles and Bondage
Kasia is a slave girl and her introduction to the reader is one that penetrates into the psyche that develops when fate deals one such an unlucky hand. Metaphorical language is a necessary accomplice in conveying this state of mind. “You never tried to think of home…You endured, behind the cloak…Until the day you understood they were going to kill you, and you realized—with genuine astonishment—that you wanted to survive. That somehow life still burned inside like the obdurate embers of a fire more fierce than desire or grief.” The simile touches upon what psychologists term the will to live. This desired for a continuance of mortality is an innate human urge that often exceeds even the most brutal living conditions.
To Know is Not to See
The mosaicist, Crispin, lies flat on his back and stares directly into the face of God. Or, an artistic representation of God, anyway. It is an overwhelming experience made all the more so because he had already known of its existence, “but knowing and seeing were so far from the same thing it was as if...as if one was the world and the other the half-world of hidden powers.” The meaning of this simile has perhaps been tempered by progress which allow almost everyone to see at least a reproduction of any great work of art. Crispin lives in a time before mass-produced reproductions and photographic imagery, however. The difference between knowing of the existence of something and actually seeing it—much less seeing the real thing—of which he speaks is almost unimaginable for anyone living today.
The Scaffold
For Crispin, the scaffold which his work requires is far more than utilitarian. Its height takes him some distance between the literal and into the realm of the philosophically metaphorical. “It was a refuge, in fact. High above the world, above the living and the dying, the intrigues of courts and men and women, of nations and tribe and factions and the human heart trapped in time and yearning for more than it was allowed.” Ironically, this philosophical perspective Crispin brings to his place on the scaffolding is borne from the fervently expressed—if not necessarily believed—insistence that he is merely a simple craftsman dedicated to his artisanship and not an artist who had to be concerned with all those intrigues in the world below.
Depression
The narrator describes what is going on inside Crispin’s head. “He felt something unexpected then, like a shaft of light through everything else that day. It took him a moment to recognize it as happiness. “To a certain extent—whether intentional or not—this book and its sequel is a portrait of clinical depression. The protagonist is dealing throughout the narrative with the overwhelming grief of having lost his entire family to the plague. The moment made more palpable through the use of simile being described here is just one example of a character behaving very much like someone suffering profoundly from clinical depression.
The Title
The title of the book itself is a metaphor. “To say of a man that he was sailing to Sarantium was to say that his life was on the cusp of change: poised for emergent greatness, brilliance, fortune.” This is the kind of use of metaphor that becoming a guiding force for following the narrative. The reader’s job becomes to identify which characters are the metaphorical seaman setting sail for Sarantium. Aside from Crispus, the mosaic artisan, of course. Or for that matter, is identification limited only to men, or is sailing to Sarantium an option available to Kasia.
