From The Discovery of Slowness:

It was an evening sky of infinite duration, shadows becoming gigantically long, and when swaths of mist rose, they turned at once into reddish clouds, changing colors up to the northern horizon.

John looked out on the ice, studied its forms, and tried to understand what they meant. It was true, then, that with its own power the sea could surpass itself. Here was the proof. Here he discovered the meaning of his dreams.

I loved this book.

Sir John Franklin was a real person and Nadolny follows his fascinating life with great care from what I can only assume came out of a formidable amount of research. The novel does so much more, however, than recount the facts of Franklin’s life. It investigates an aesthetics of thought.

On the surface the book is about Franklin’s passion for the ocean, for exploring and discovery. But Nadolny only uses this “fact” of Franklin’s life to engage with the more complex notions of intellect, empathy and honor (to oneself and to others). I was most interested in this idea of slow, deliberate thinking and how Franklin was aware of the way his mind worked. His “character” develops along with the movement of the story and the great events he lives through, but more interestingly, his perception and understanding of his capacity for reflection is subject to a more subtle, but ultimately more profound, revelation.

This book was originally published in German in 1983 and translated into English by Ralph Freedman in 1987.