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Years later his theory of relativity fundamentally changed our understanding of the concept of time. Einstein wrote: “There is not a tick-tock sound anywhere in the world that can be considered time.” What he means is that telling time as we understand it, the seconds, minutes, and hours that our watches measure so precisely are not accurate. It doesn’t exist physically in any way. Clock time is a human invention. It is a system that we have required the world to maintain in order. For our own sanity
Time in fiction works the same way. except in books The author alone controls the enterprise system. Measure time through sentences, paragraphs, and chapters and move time through the plot. Only in fiction is time travel, or stopping time completely, really possible. Readers can start a page on one day and finish on another. In her seven-part novel About volume calculation (The first two books, now out in English, were translated by Barbara J. Haveland.) Danish author Solvej Balle pushes writer’s privilege to the limit. Balle’s protagonist, Tara Selter, is a rare book dealer in France who finds That you are stuck in time which is a version reminiscent of groundhog day Seeing you repeat yourself endlessly, one day, the same day, over and over again: 18 November
“Every night I lie down … is November 18th, and every morning when I wake up it’s November 18th,” Tara explains at the start of Balle’s first installment (which has a long list of National Book Award Translated Literature Branch this year) About volume calculation It is a book of hours in the truest sense. A diary in which Tara describes her day on November 18th. and her efforts both hopeful and hopeless To break free from the cycle you’re stuck in After leaving the city in northern France where she and Thomas Her husband and business partner Run an antique book business to participate in auctions in Paris. Tara mysteriously wakes up one morning in disorienting circumstances. Time has “fallen apart” and Tara’s days are repeating themselves. That was a fact that became clear to her as she watched another hotel guest drop a piece of bread for breakfast at the time and place he had done the morning before. Tara’s observations show increasing desperation throughout the first and some of the second volumes as she tries to come to terms with her new reality.
Tara’s life is no longer yesterday. And there’s no tomorrow either. Instead, it has a fluid but consistent presence with its own set of internal rules. Some items traveled with Tara when she redoed November 18, such as a notebook, which was part captain’s diary and part prison diary. in which she records daily events, but in contrast to the most popular type of time loop. Her physical location remains unrestricted. If she falls asleep in a different city than where she started her day. Tara would still be in this new place into the morning. before being sent back to her hotel room in Paris
But these rules only apply to Tara. Not with anyone For other characters Time seemed to proceed normally. But every time the clock strikes midnight The day will roll back and wipe the slate—and the memories—clean. Only Tara can remember what happened during the previous iteration of November 18th. Thomas, for example, approaches every November 18th as if it were his first time. In the emotional sequence in the first book Tara had to face it every morning. He had to explain to Thomas what had happened. And what will happen again “We can’t find errors,” Tara writes. “We can find patterns, and we can find inconsistencies.” In the second book, she’ll have to do this with her parents, too. Relentless acceptance will follow. Meanwhile, Tara tries to forget herself as an individual with a past. “I spend my time like this. I threw myself into the crowd I let myself be carried I move…When I leave the subway or land on the sidewalk at the bus stop, I lose momentum. I slow down. Stop.” The meaning is clear: if there is no external signal that time has passed. Life—even on paper—was paused.
About volume calculationEvidence of may be reduced to mere mechanics. But in Haveland’s rendering, Balle’s detached prose has an unspeakable clarity that lends a philosophical resonance to this astonishing scene. Both of these volumes move quickly. Their brevity (less than 200 pages each) belies the sense of infinity attending to Tara’s situation. Balle’s work disrupts one of the basic laws of the universe: time moves forward. Only writing allowed Tara to feel in control of her time again. “That’s why I started writing,” Tara observes at the start of her first novel. “Because time has broken down. Because I found a ream of paper on the shelf. Because I’m trying to remember Because paper still remembers And there might be a sentence of relief.” But when no one else had experienced the same thing beside her, Do her actions matter? If you don’t have time, life will be stagnant. Duplicate journal entries all have the same date.
In the first book, Tara is still trying to understand the new order she must structure her life in. By the end, she has resigned herself to her fate and remains eager for how she will survive in it. “There is something beneath my November,” she muses at the conclusion of the first book. “And the forest drew me as if it wanted me to stay. It sticks to my shoes. It wants to tell me about September and October. In the second book Tara will devise a clever plan to experience the weather all year round with Europe’s varying climates. By traveling by train to different countries. According to the season you imagined both in the warmer south and cooler northern regions. Tara will find a way to feel the passing of time. But of course this is only an imitation of linearity.
As an antique book dealer Tara has made her life dependent on writing. But her connection to the book is purely passive. Her profession requires her to regard them as purely physical objects. “My relationship with books has always been in my eyes and my hands,” she admits at one point. But by recording your days Tara also became a writer herself. Even though her plans for life may be running away from her But keeping her diary has created order again. In recording her recurring events, Tara performs the kind of time travel that writing does. It’s not just science, technology or engineering that can do this. She creates a beginning and a middle. And hope that this is the end eventually.
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