Margaret Atwood - The Year of the Flood

“What is the point?” says Amanda, not to me but to Toby.

“This is not the time,” says Toby in her old Eve voice, “for dwelling on ultimate purposes. I would like us all to forget the past, the worst parts of it. Let us be grateful for this food that has been given to us. Amanda. Ren. Jimmy. You, too, if you can manage it.” This to the two Painballers.

One of them mutters something like Fuck off, but he doesn’t say it very loudly. He wants some of the soup.

Toby continues on as if she hasn’t heard. “And I would like us to remember those who are gone, throughout the world but most especially our absent friends. Dear Adams, dear Eves, dear Fellow Mammals and Fellow Creatures, all those now in Spirit – keep us in your view and lend us your strength, because we are surely going to need it.”

Then she takes a sip from the cup and passes it to Amanda. The other cup she gives to Jimmy, but he can’t hold it right and he spills half of the soup into the sand. I crouch down beside him to help him drink. Maybe he’s dying, I think. Maybe in the morning he’ll be dead.

“I knew you’d come back,” he says, this time to me. “I knew it. Don’t turn into an owl.”

“I’m not an owl,” I say. “You’re out of your mind. I’m Ren – remember? I just want you to know that you broke my heart; but anyway, I’m happy you’re still alive.” Now that I’ve said it, something heavy and smothering lifts away from me, and I truly do feel happy.

He smiles at me, or at whoever he thinks I am. A blistery little grin. “Here we go again,” he says to his sick foot. “Listen to the music.” He tilts his head to the side; his expression is rapturous. “You can’t kill the music,” he says. “You can’t!”

“What music?” I say, because I don’t hear anything.

“Quiet,” says Toby.

We listen. Jimmy’s right, there is music. It’s faint and far away, but moving closer. It’s the sound of many people singing. Now we can see the flickering of their torches, winding towards us through the darkness of the trees.

The Year of the Flood is fiction, but the general tendencies and many of the details in it are alarmingly close to fact. The God’s Gardeners cult appeared in the novel Oryx and Crake, as did Amanda Payne, Brenda (Ren), Bernice, Jimmy the Snowman, Glenn (alias Crake), and the MaddAddam group. The Gardeners themselves are not modelled on any extant religion, though some of their theology and practices are not without precedent. Their saints have been chosen for their contributions to those areas of life dear to the hearts of the Gardeners; they have many more saints, as well, but they are not in this book. The clearest influence on Gardener hymn lyrics is William Blake, with an assist from John Bunyan and also from The Hymn Book of the Anglican Church of Canada and the United Church of Canada. Like all hymn collections, those of the Gardeners have moments that may not be fully comprehensible to non-believers.

The music for the hymns came about by fortunate coincidence. Singer and musician Orville Stoeber of Venice, California, began composing the music to several of these hymns to see what might happen, and then got swept away. The extraordinary results can be heard on the CD, Hymns of the God’s Gardeners. Anyone who wishes to use any of these hymns for amateur devotional or environmental purposes is more than welcome to do so. Visit them at www.yearoftheflood.com, www.yearoftheflood.co.uk, or www.yearoftheflood.ca.

The name Amanda Payne originally appeared as that of a character in Oryx and Crake, courtesy of an auction for the Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture (U.K.). Saint Allan Sparrow of Clean Air was sponsored by an auction run by CAIR (CommunityAIR, Toronto). The name Rebecca Eckler appears thanks to a benefit auction for The Walrus magazine (Canada). My thanks to all name donors.

My gratitude as always to my enthusiastic and loyal but hard-pressed editors, Ellen Seligman of McClelland amp; Stewart (Canada), Nan Talese of Doubleday (U.S.A.), and Alexandra Pringle and Liz Calder of Bloomsbury (U.K.), as well as Louise Dennys of Vintage/Knopf Canada, LuAnn Walter of Anchor (U.S.A.), Lennie Goodings of Virago (U.K.), and Maya Mavjee of Doubleday Canada. Also to my agents, Phoebe Larmore (North America) and Vivienne Schuster and Betsy Robbins of Curtis Brown (U.K.); and to Ron Bernstein; and to all my other agents and publishers around the world. Thanks also to Heather Sangster for her heroic job of copy-editing; and to my exceptional office support staff, Sarah Webster, Anne Joldersma, Laura Stenberg, and Penny Kavanaugh; and to Shannon Shields, who helped as well. Also to Joel Rubinovitch and Sheldon Shoib; and to Michael Bradley and Sarah Cooper. Also to Coleen Quinn and Xiaolan Zhang, for keeping my writing arm moving.

Special thanks to the dauntless early readers of this book: Jess Atwood Gibson, Eleanor and Ramsay Cook, Rosalie Abella, Valerie Martin, John Cullen, and Xandra Bingley. You are highly valued.

And finally, my special thanks to Graeme Gibson, with whom I’ve celebrated so many April Fish, Serpent Wisdom, and All Wayfarers’ Feasts. It’s been a fine long journey.

Margaret Atwood was born in Ottawa in 1939, and grew up in northern Quebec and Ontario, and later in Toronto. She has lived in numerous cities in Canada, the U.S., and Europe.

She is the author of more than thirty books – novels, short stories, poetry, literary criticism, social history, and books for children.

Atwood's work is acclaimed internationally and has been published around the world. Her novels include The Handmaid's Tale and Cat's Eye – both shortlisted for the Booker Prize; The Robber Bride; Alias Grace, winner of the prestigious Giller Prize in Canada and the Premio Mondello in Italy, and a finalist for the Booker Prize, the Orange Prize, and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award; and The Blind Assassin, winner of the Booker Prize and a finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Her new novel is Oryx and Crake (2003). She is the recipient of numerous honours, such as The Sunday Times Award for Literary Excellence in the U.K., the National Arts Club Medal of Honor for Literature in the U.S., Le Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France, and she was the first winner of the London Literary Prize. She has received honorary degrees from universities across Canada, and one from Oxford University in England.

Margaret Atwood lives in Toronto with novelist Graeme Gibson.