Station Eleven

There are numerous instances of art and life overlapping that occur throughout Station Eleven. Arthur’s performance as King Lear, an aging monarch who must separate the superficial from the sincere in his relationships with three daughters, is particularly relevant as Arthur reflects on his relationships with his three wives. The snow that falls during the performance captures Jeevan’s imagination, just before he steps outside into real snow. In the Symphony’s performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Kirsten plays Titania, a fairy queen who falls in love with someone other than Oberon, her husband, who is fittingly played by Sayid, Kirsten’s ex-boyfriend. Less coincidentally, Miranda crafts Dr. Eleven as a semi-autobiographical creative outlet, even drawing on the lobby of Neptune Logistics for some of the space station’s design; her fictional universe gains added depth when it accurately predicts some of the philosophical and moral dilemmas that face those who survive the collapse.

These and similar examples all raise a question, implied but never stated explicitly, about the value and function of art in human society, a question that has “dogged the Symphony since they’d set out on the road” (137). Their motto, “Because survival is insufficient” (137), is a partial answer. The implication of the motto, and of the way that the Symphony puts it into action, is that art enriches and ennobles life in ways that a focus only on physical needs cannot. The exact nature of the Symphony’s contribution to human welfare is not, and perhaps cannot be, concretely measured, but Kirsten tries to define it while collecting clothes for use as costumes from an abandoned house: “What the Symphony was doing, what they were always doing, was trying to cast a spell. […] The lives they brushed up against were work-worn and difficult, people who spent all their time engaged in the tasks of survival” (151). More than a distraction, then, their performances, and art generally, serve to redeem them from an otherwise dreary existence. When life imitates art, it is elevated, not cheapened.

As the novel’s antagonist, the prophet espouses views that the other characters find repulsive. Specifically, he asserts that “everything that has ever happened on this earth has happened for a reason” (58), a fatalistic philosophy that he inherits from his mother, Elizabeth. Mother and son both use this philosophy to absolve themselves of wrongdoing: Elizabeth repeats it to Miranda when her affair with Arthur is discovered, and the prophet cites it when Sayid, then his captive, questions the morality of the prophet’s actions. By transferring responsibility from the individual to an implied cosmic or divine entity, this belief becomes a blanket excuse and justification for any kind of behavior. Applied to the Georgia Flu, such thinking allows the prophet and his followers to assume superiority over those who did not survive.

The novel’s other characters respond with various objections. Miranda tells Elizabeth that she would “prefer not to think that I’m following a script” (106), suggesting her fundamental belief in human agency. Kirsten points out that, with such a philosophy, “there’s nothing that you cannot justify” (139). Clark tells young Tyler, before he becomes the prophet, that “some things just happen” for no apparent reason (259), suggesting that chance, not divine intervention, was responsible for the Georgia Flu. Miranda and Clark’s words have little effect, since the philosophy cannot be proven or disproven: “It’s not for us to know” the reason behind something (261), Elizabeth tells Clark. Proven or not, the prophet’s philosophy proves powerful enough to attract genuine believers to his cause. “That kind of insanity’s contagious” (261), explains one of Clark’s friends after Elizabeth and Tyler leave the airport. Its flaws become apparent, however, as human costs pile up around the prophet. Eleanor flees her intended marriage to the prophet, and a boy under the prophet’s tutelage eventually kills him. Their actions, more than anyone else’s, demonstrate that individuals can make choices and take initiative, even under the most desperate circumstances.