by Carlene Phillips ·
Friday, August 16, 2024
Literary fiction has long been a vehicle for depicting societal truths that move people to action. Such is Harvard author Rich Marcello’s intention in his sixth novel, “The Means of Keeping.” In a recent conversation, Marcello said he wanted to write about the realities of climate change that confront us today. The theme is no surprise, given his carefully researched monthly climate column in the Harvard Press and his activism with the Harvard Climate Initiative Committee. But, “I couldn’t approach it head on,” he said. So it becomes important as the backdrop against which he returns to earlier themes of loss, resiliency, love, and the nature of goodness.
Marcello said he wanted to start with where the world is now, map something positive, and see how it worked. He poses the question of what would happen to two friends who survived a natural disaster in which they lost their spouses and children. Could they move on? What would happen to their friendship? What would they choose as their response to the continuing threat of the catastrophe that had changed their lives?
The novel is set in the near future, a world in which climate change has continued to accelerate, and it is a natural disaster that begins the book. A microburst hits the small Maine community in which longtime friends David and Tereza live, and their families are killed. Their grief initially separates them, but it is their grief that also reunites them. Through a series of flashbacks we understand their pasts—Tereza’s desire to be a writer, David’s troubled relationship with his abusive father, their time as lovers, their separation, and their reunion when they are both married, David with a daughter, Tereza with three children. And we learn about the suddenness and total destruction caused by the storm.
In an effort to work through their grief, together they relive that terrible day, including a moment of desperate hope that caused tension between them. Not only must they deal with their loss, but Tereza must confront the guilt she feels for the reason she and David were not with their families when the storm hit.
Looking for a place where they can heal, they go together to the Ashami Institute, a highly competitive institution of learning that Tereza had attended after high school. Its creed is “Individual exceptionalism can change the world.” Before long Tereza realizes that the mission of Ashami no longer fits with her current beliefs and lived experience. She had not changed the world for the collective good as the school promised a brilliant person could do. Her friendship with David is threatened, but just as she has decided she must leave, even if it means finding a life without David in it, the elders of the Institute announce it is closing for financial reasons. David and Tereza make a proposal to run the community differently and see if it can prosper.
The new community of Keeping, New York, becomes Marcello’s vision of what is a possible way to address climate change. Ashami transforms into a sustainable community, where residents work the land and share a common purpose. The Means of Keeping is a document of beliefs (as well as the title of the book) that will help to heal the planet by providing humanity with a better way to live. Members pledge to aspire not to individual success but to the collective good, to value equity and diversity, and to forego personal wealth. The document details all the ills of society that can be addressed when residents give up personal gain to work for the security of everyone. Marcello said guidelines in the Means of Keeping’s document reflect his belief that a strong sense of community is a way to fight the further threats from climate change.
Rich Marcello. (Courtesy photo)
In time, relationships become complicated, especially when new members are accepted into the community and bring with them secrets from the past. The community is threatened not only by human conflicts but also by the even greater test of a natural disaster. David and Tereza face difficult personal choices.
The book’s ending is neither tragic nor romanticized. Marcello wanted to show a possible way humans could bring balance to Earth but also to show how fragile that possibility is. People, like the characters in the book, need to make difficult and complicated choices.
The title refers to the document outlining the beliefs and practical measures for the community of Keeping. In a broader sense, the sustainable community, built with everyone sharing in the responsibility, is a way of “keeping” the Earth. Each person asks, “What checks and balances can I put in place through climate action to keep the planet’s balance?” It could also apply to David and Tereza and what it takes to keep a friendship.
The idea of platonic love is one Marcello has explored before. He said it is perhaps the deepest kind of love. In exploring what it means to be a good person, Marcello suggests that, partly, it is living a life guided by unselfish love for others.
Marcello spent three years on the book and did extensive research. He defended parts of the book that stretched this reader’s credulity by citing research. In reading about how grief affects people, he learned that for some people, there is an actual visualization of the deceased. One of his characters sees and hears members of the family who died and finds comfort and reassurance in their presences.
His research also supports the idea that in a natural disaster, there are indeed groups of people who resort to violence to take what other people might have stored up. The scene in the book where this happens is, perhaps even more than the storm itself, the most frightening of all.
Although his other books have been published by small publishing companies, Marcello said things have changed so much that for this book, he did the publishing himself. It’s easy and less expensive, he said.
Marcello will speak about “The Means of Keeping” at Volunteers Hall in October, in an event jointly sponsored by Fivesparks and the Harvard Climate Initiative Committee. His book will be for sale there and is currently available on Amazon, Apple, Audible, and at the Harvard General Store.