Amaryllis Night and Day
Encyclopedia
Amaryllis Night and Day is a 2001 novel by Russell Hoban
, incorporating elements of magic realism
and romance
.
Hoban's writing builds up a series of metaphors throughout the book so that, as in a dream, many things take on unusual significance, or seem to represent something else. The idea of the dream
itself seems to function for Hoban as a symbol of the way in which elements from the past come back to affect the present day, and in the characters' dreams various significant people and objects from real life appear in exaggerated forms, not all of which are fully explained. The names, too, are full of meaning: Amaryllis is linked to the botanical genus of Amaryllis
, related to deadly nightshade, and Lenore is explicitly linked with her namesake in Edgar Allan Poe
's poem "The Raven
."
The hypothetical object known as a Klein bottle
plays an important role in the book after Peter visits the London Science Museum. Klein bottles are four-dimensional one-sided bodies which can only exist in three-dimensional space by intersecting with themselves. This concept is built up in the book as a metaphor for the way people cross and re-cross important physical and emotional points in their lives.
Peter is a painter and Amaryllis a musician, and there is a lot of reflection in the book about art's ability to reflect and enrich a person's emotional life. A great many other artists are referenced during the book (see below). Early in the novel, Peter mentions a review of his paintings which comments on the ‘odd empty spaces’ in his work. Peter muses:
Russell Hoban
Russell Conwell Hoban is an American writer, now living in England, of fantasy, science fiction, mainstream fiction, magic realism, poetry, and children's books-Biography:...
, incorporating elements of magic realism
Magic realism
Magic realism or magical realism is an aesthetic style or genre of fiction in which magical elements blend with the real world. The story explains these magical elements as real occurrences, presented in a straightforward manner that places the "real" and the "fantastic" in the same stream of...
and romance
Romance novel
The romance novel is a literary genre developed in Western culture, mainly in English-speaking countries. Novels in this genre place their primary focus on the relationship and romantic love between two people, and must have an "emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending." Through the late...
.
Plot introduction
Peter Diggs has a vivid dream in which he meets a woman called Amaryllis. When he later encounters the same woman in real life, he discovers that the two of them have the ability to enter each other's dreams. A cautious relationship is begun, half in the real world and half in dreams, in which both parties struggle to overcome the emotional effects of previous failed romances.Characters
- Peter Diggs, the narratorNarratorA narrator is, within any story , the fictional or non-fictional, personal or impersonal entity who tells the story to the audience. When the narrator is also a character within the story, he or she is sometimes known as the viewpoint character. The narrator is one of three entities responsible for...
of the novel, an artist in his early thirties - Amaryllis, who has the power to ‘tune in’ to people's dreams
- Lenore, Peter's former girlfriend, an artist with emotional problems
- Ron Hastings, a student of Peter's who appears in his dreams and who may also know Amaryllis
Major themes
The novel is by turns romantic, philosophical, funny, sexy, and frightening, as the characters explore the different possibilities offered by their unique talent. Both Peter and Amaryllis have been involved in failed relationships before – exactly how many and how disastrously we only find out gradually – and they are haunted by the danger of repeating their past mistakes.Hoban's writing builds up a series of metaphors throughout the book so that, as in a dream, many things take on unusual significance, or seem to represent something else. The idea of the dream
Dream
Dreams are successions of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. The content and purpose of dreams are not definitively understood, though they have been a topic of scientific speculation, philosophical intrigue and religious...
itself seems to function for Hoban as a symbol of the way in which elements from the past come back to affect the present day, and in the characters' dreams various significant people and objects from real life appear in exaggerated forms, not all of which are fully explained. The names, too, are full of meaning: Amaryllis is linked to the botanical genus of Amaryllis
Amaryllis
Amaryllis is a small genus of flowering bulbs, with two species. The better known of the two, Amaryllis belladonna, is a native of South Africa, particularly the rocky southwest region near the Cape...
, related to deadly nightshade, and Lenore is explicitly linked with her namesake in Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
's poem "The Raven
The Raven
"The Raven" is a narrative poem by American writer Edgar Allan Poe, first published in January 1845. It is often noted for its musicality, stylized language, and supernatural atmosphere. It tells of a talking raven's mysterious visit to a distraught lover, tracing the man's slow descent into madness...
."
The hypothetical object known as a Klein bottle
Klein bottle
In mathematics, the Klein bottle is a non-orientable surface, informally, a surface in which notions of left and right cannot be consistently defined. Other related non-orientable objects include the Möbius strip and the real projective plane. Whereas a Möbius strip is a surface with boundary, a...
plays an important role in the book after Peter visits the London Science Museum. Klein bottles are four-dimensional one-sided bodies which can only exist in three-dimensional space by intersecting with themselves. This concept is built up in the book as a metaphor for the way people cross and re-cross important physical and emotional points in their lives.
Peter is a painter and Amaryllis a musician, and there is a lot of reflection in the book about art's ability to reflect and enrich a person's emotional life. A great many other artists are referenced during the book (see below). Early in the novel, Peter mentions a review of his paintings which comments on the ‘odd empty spaces’ in his work. Peter muses:
Allusions/references to other works
Many other writers and musicians are mentioned or quoted in the novel, including:- Nelson AlgrenNelson AlgrenNelson Algren was an American writer.-Early life:Algren was born Nelson Ahlgren Abraham in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Goldie and Gerson Abraham. At the age of three he moved with his parents to Chicago, Illinois where they lived in a working-class, immigrant neighborhood on the South Side...
's A Walk on the Wild Side - The Tom WaitsTom WaitsThomas Alan "Tom" Waits is an American singer-songwriter, composer, and actor. Waits has a distinctive voice, described by critic Daniel Durchholz as sounding "like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car."...
song Walking Spanish - Edward HopperEdward HopperEdward Hopper was a prominent American realist painter and printmaker. While most popularly known for his oil paintings, he was equally proficient as a watercolorist and printmaker in etching...
's painting Gas (which the characters enter during a dream) - The Sleeping BeautySleeping BeautySleeping Beauty by Charles Perrault or Little Briar Rose by the Brothers Grimm is a classic fairytale involving a beautiful princess, enchantment, and a handsome prince...
fairytale - Brer Rabbit
- The Negro spiritual There is a Balm in Gilead
- MiltonJohn MiltonJohn Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...
's LycidasLycidas"Lycidas" is a poem by John Milton, written in 1637 as a pastoral elegy. It first appeared in a 1638 collection of elegies, entitled Justa Edouardo King Naufrago, dedicated to the memory of Edward King, a collegemate of Milton's at Cambridge who drowned when his ship sank in the Irish Sea off the...
(which includes the line ‘to sport with Amaryllis in the shade’) - The film "DreamscapeDreamscape (film)Dreamscape is a 1984 science fiction horror film directed by Joseph Ruben and written by David Loughery, with Chuck Russell and Ruben co-writing...
" - The prisons etchings of Piranesi
- Thornton WilderThornton WilderThornton Niven Wilder was an American playwright and novelist. He received three Pulitzer Prizes, one for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey and two for his plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth, and a National Book Award for his novel The Eighth Day.-Early years:Wilder was born in Madison,...
's The Bridge of San Luis ReyThe Bridge of San Luis ReyThe Bridge of San Luis Rey is American author Thornton Wilder's second novel, first published in 1927 to worldwide acclaim. It tells the story of several interrelated people who die in the collapse of an Inca rope-fiber suspension bridge in Peru, and the events that lead up to their being on the... - Georg Christoph LichtenbergGeorg Christoph LichtenbergGeorg Christoph Lichtenberg was a German scientist, satirist and Anglophile. As a scientist, he was the first to hold a professorship explicitly dedicated to experimental physics in Germany...
- The self-help ‘life coach’ Anthony Robbins
- Barbara StrozziBarbara StrozziBarbara Strozzi was an Italian Baroque singer and composer.-Life:...
- The 1930s song "Life Is Just a Bowl of CherriesLife Is Just a Bowl of Cherries"Life Is Just a Bowl of Cherries" is a popular song with music by Ray Henderson and lyrics by Buddy G. DeSylva and Lew Brown, published in 1931. The song was revived in 1953 by singer Jaye P...
" - Oliver OnionsOliver OnionsGeorge Oliver Onions was a significant English novelist who published over forty novels and story collections. Originally trained as a commercial artist, he worked as a designer of posters and books, and as a magazine illustrator, before starting his career in writing...
's story "The Beckoning Fair One" - Walter de la MareWalter de la MareWalter John de la Mare , OM CH was an English poet, short story writer and novelist, probably best remembered for his works for children and the poem "The Listeners"....
's poem ‘Fare Well’ - MelvilleHerman MelvilleHerman Melville was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet. He is best known for his novel Moby-Dick and the posthumous novella Billy Budd....
's Moby-DickMoby-DickMoby-Dick; or, The Whale, was written by American author Herman Melville and first published in 1851. It is considered by some to be a Great American Novel and a treasure of world literature. The story tells the adventures of wandering sailor Ishmael, and his voyage on the whaleship Pequod,...