Jeffrey Ford
1997
I like books that ask questions but don’t necessarily provide neat answers. On one level, The Physiognomy explores “don’t judge a book by its cover.” But there is much more to it than that, with deepening levels of dream imagery that explore pride, falling on your face, guilt, and redemption. Throughout the book characters are reborn in surprising ways. All of this in an environment that isn’t our real world, but which is connected to our real world by threads, strings, ropes of familiarity. This book reminds me of Stanislaw Lem’s writing, except perhaps he would be dreaming this story. Samuel Delaney’s Dhalgren, with its first person narrative involving a fantastic city, also comes to mind.
Cley is a physiognomist, that is, a professional measurer of the human body. Physiognomy is phrenology, that 19th Century quackery, taken to its utmost level of illogicality. It declares that the physical arrangement of the body, that is, the shape of the brows, size of limb, amount of hair, existence of moles and warts, and so on, is precisely related to the moral and mental makeup of the person being examined. As Physiognomist, First Class, Cley has the power of life and death over those around him. Such is the belief in physiognomy that it is believed that he can find a thief simply by examining him. Cley can condemn people to death simply for how they look.
He is sent from the Well-Built City by his genius mad scientist of a boss, to a mining town out in the country in order to suss out a thief. And here is where his entire world begins to crack.
Wonderfully critical of science and modern industry, Ford expresses that criticism in ways that are both direct and yet nearly Jungian. Death and rebirth are treated as brutally yet as succintly as anything in the Brothers Grimm. Ford never flinches.
Despite the fabulous nature of his book, Ford’s writing is clear and uncluttered. I highly recommend it.
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