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Since you are the most recent poster, I'll respond to you in the hopes that we may have a discussion. Having read this book 3 times, I strongly believe that everything continues to be circular. If the book is read in a linear fashion, why would we start with her shooting Hitler and then, in her next life, she dies even before birth? Just those two scenes would indicate that Ursula has done this before, has reached the point of knowing what she should do, tried it, and she still went back to the very start. If killing Hitler the "first" time didn't stop the cycle, why would the "second" time stop it? Plus, again, if you go linearly, there are hints in the book where she senses things that have not happened, book wise. She has cravings for German deserts even before the life she lives in Germany. In the chapter where she lives in London and dies because the gas stayed on, she talks about how cabbages make her feel uneasy and some linkages to a dark cellar and she may even say Argyll street -- but this is before the sections where she lives on Argyll street and constant smell of cabbages from the lady with the baby. Near the end she talks to Dr. Kellet and find out he has no son. There is no way Ursula causes that. Similarly, there is no way Ursula has any really influence whether or not Teddy dies (unless she pulls a Bridget and maims him before the war.) So that life, that led her to that point, but at least partially dumb luck. She potentially saved Nancy, but Teddy was up to fate. And then we have the scene with the midwife which indicates that yes, the cycle continues. Whether Ursula continues to be so self-aware, or whether or not the trait is shared/passed on through Sylvie, why don't know. All we know is that it doesn't end.
Tell me what you think of my review. Ursula didn't kill Hitler. She MIGHT have if she had lived that life. But she didn't. There were points in her life where alternative existences presented themselves but circumstances intervened and she lived a linear life like the rest of us. The alternatives that Atkinson depicts were scenarios that MIGHT have happened but didn't.
Libby King, I really like your explanation the most of all of I’ve read so far. It makes the most sense to me. Everything is circular. This explains so many things, such as why when she and her fellow Blitz volunteers are clearing away the ‘mound’ of broken buildings she has a familiar sense that she has seen this mount before—but chronologically she hasn’t led the life yet where she’s playing with the sand castles and building a ‘mound’. This is on top of the things you mentioned that indicate she just keeps living all these lives over and over, a bunch of them, and they never end. As I wrote somewhere else here I wish she had figured out a way to kill Hitler and not get shot afterwards (such as sneak poison into his coffee). That way she could go on and see what the world would be like without him.
There's a point where Izzy says things just happen in life - they are neither good, nor bad. They just are. I think about that line, and about the part where her mother takes out scissors to save Ursula. You get the notion that perhaps many of them are living through these events more than once. When Silvie kills herself, I was struck wondering if she was resetting her own timeline. As to Teddy, much like her doctor, there was a life where his son, Guy, didn't die because he never existed. Showing that everyone has little possibilities, here and there, where things may have been different. Sometimes they see the futility, sometimes the possibility. I found Silvie so interesting because she married very very young, but seemed to be a forward thinking scientist/intellect trapped in the life of a housewife. She was very enigmatic to me.
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Libby
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Jul 01, 2015 07:36PM
Since you are the most recent poster, I'll respond to you in the hopes that we may have a discussion. Having read this book 3 times, I strongly believe that everything continues to be circular. If the book is read in a linear fashion, why would we start with her shooting Hitler and then, in her next life, she dies even before birth? Just those two scenes would indicate that Ursula has done this before, has reached the point of knowing what she should do, tried it, and she still went back to the very start. If killing Hitler the "first" time didn't stop the cycle, why would the "second" time stop it? Plus, again, if you go linearly, there are hints in the book where she senses things that have not happened, book wise. She has cravings for German deserts even before the life she lives in Germany. In the chapter where she lives in London and dies because the gas stayed on, she talks about how cabbages make her feel uneasy and some linkages to a dark cellar and she may even say Argyll street -- but this is before the sections where she lives on Argyll street and constant smell of cabbages from the lady with the baby. Near the end she talks to Dr. Kellet and find out he has no son. There is no way Ursula causes that. Similarly, there is no way Ursula has any really influence whether or not Teddy dies (unless she pulls a Bridget and maims him before the war.) So that life, that led her to that point, but at least partially dumb luck. She potentially saved Nancy, but Teddy was up to fate. And then we have the scene with the midwife which indicates that yes, the cycle continues. Whether Ursula continues to be so self-aware, or whether or not the trait is shared/passed on through Sylvie, why don't know. All we know is that it doesn't end.
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Tell me what you think of my review. Ursula didn't kill Hitler. She MIGHT have if she had lived that life. But she didn't. There were points in her life where alternative existences presented themselves but circumstances intervened and she lived a linear life like the rest of us. The alternatives that Atkinson depicts were scenarios that MIGHT have happened but didn't.
Libby King, I really like your explanation the most of all of I’ve read so far. It makes the most sense to me. Everything is circular. This explains so many things, such as why when she and her fellow Blitz volunteers are clearing away the ‘mound’ of broken buildings she has a familiar sense that she has seen this mount before—but chronologically she hasn’t led the life yet where she’s playing with the sand castles and building a ‘mound’. This is on top of the things you mentioned that indicate she just keeps living all these lives over and over, a bunch of them, and they never end. As I wrote somewhere else here I wish she had figured out a way to kill Hitler and not get shot afterwards (such as sneak poison into his coffee). That way she could go on and see what the world would be like without him.
There's a point where Izzy says things just happen in life - they are neither good, nor bad. They just are. I think about that line, and about the part where her mother takes out scissors to save Ursula. You get the notion that perhaps many of them are living through these events more than once. When Silvie kills herself, I was struck wondering if she was resetting her own timeline. As to Teddy, much like her doctor, there was a life where his son, Guy, didn't die because he never existed. Showing that everyone has little possibilities, here and there, where things may have been different. Sometimes they see the futility, sometimes the possibility. I found Silvie so interesting because she married very very young, but seemed to be a forward thinking scientist/intellect trapped in the life of a housewife. She was very enigmatic to me.
