It is not uncommon when reading reviews of Lisa Genova’s debut novel Still Alice to come across comparisons to previous novels focusing on domestic dynamics in the face of mental or neurological dysfunction among family members. Among the more common titles that pop up for comparison are Ordinary People. It is an appropriate comparison because the dynamics of reader interest in both novels are similar despite not really being at all similar in narrative.
One way of going about presenting the gradual destructive deterioration of the life of a mind ravaged by Alzheimer’s would be to present it as an account written in the first person by the sufferer. The lapses in memories, the repetitions and the fears when the mind is in the present combined with the transformation of that mind into a completely different person could all be expressed artistically through an expression that replicates the systemic processes of a person’s memories slowly fading away forever. That particular book could potentially be a devastating glimpse into the experience of someone dealing with Alzheimer’s that is as close as any reader would ever want to get to the real thing. It would also be a work of literary writing above storytelling likely to challenge most readers and frustrate a great many.
Author Genova, coming at her subject with an academic background and training in neuroscience rather than literary studies or creative writing makes a different choice and, probably, the wiser one. No one who is trained in literary studies or creative writing is going to offer any seriously considered analysis that forwards Genova as a master stylist pushing the boundaries of fiction. The sentence construction and semantic choices reveal Still Alice to clearly be a novel about a woman suffering a neurological condition written by a person with a background in neuroscience rather than a story told by a writer with an interest in neuroscience as dramatic fuel. The sentences are simple, declaratory, and unadorned by fights of imagery and metaphor.
The trained eye can easily spot that this is a work of fiction composed by someone whose experience in writing had been steeped more in the more regulated conventions of medical reports and academic prose. That type of writing is done with a singular purpose in mind: conveying the necessary information without extraneous detail or superfluous digression. Genova has a purpose in mind here as well: gives readers a story that takes them inside the devastation of dealing with Alzheimer’s without forcing upon the unnecessary component of trying to replicate what is likely impossible to replicate anyway.
Novels like Ordinary People and Still Life gain their strength and popularity by making readers feel like they are part of the domestic unit dealing with the pain of mental illness or neurological conditions like Alzheimer’s which are capable of equitable personality transformations. One need not actually be made to experience the specific symptoms of the sufferer in order to understand the devastation any more than one needs to be sufferer in such situations in order to become a victim to the devastation. It is no Alice alone who suffers at the hands of the genetic time bomb which seems to suddenly explode upon turning fifty years old. Family and friends alike are part of the trail of devastation left in the wake of that explosion. And though nobody is ever going to confuse Lisa Genova with the greatest writers of our time, because she does successfully convey the experience, readers also become part of that trail because fiction works just like Plato feared: it makes the unreal feel palpably real.
