Author: Emma Pozak

Throughout the course of the semester, we have studied a number of different works. Finding one text that adequately wraps up all that we’ve been learning is almost impossible. However, The Water Cure by Percival Everett is a novel that encompasses what we’ve been learning in our course and functions well as a final text. The main reason that The Water Cure works so well as our last text is because of the recursion that is evident throughout the novel. Throughout the novel, Percival Everett uses a looping narrative to create a sense of repetition and circularity. This is something that we have been studying and practicing throughout our course. For example, African Fractals. An African Fractal is a pattern that takes on the form of a seed shape. This seed shape pattern is something that will always reoccur. Although the pattern becomes smaller as it grows, the pattern will never stop recurring and is infinite. The Water Cure is a novel that embodies the same concept of recursion as seed shapes. The recursion that happens in the novel and in seed shapes is similar to how our course is structured. Learning how to be able to loop back to concepts and connect them to different works is the biggest way I have grown as a student in this course. This is why The Water Cure serves as a great final text because it symbolizes my semester’s final story by its recursion. 

            There are many examples of recursion throughout The Water Cure by Percival Everett. The first place that recursion appears is in the narrative format itself. The narrative often circles back to certain elements in the story, giving the reader a sense of recursion. The story is centered around Ishmael Kidder, a man who lost his daughter to murder. Throughout the narrative, we are questioning if Ishmael has who he believes to be his daughter’s killer locked in his basement. The reason we are left to question if Ishmael Kidder has someone locked in his basement is because of the way Percival Everett writes the story. Everett does this by telling multiple story lines at once and shifting between the past and present. For example, there is a flashback that says, “It was cloudless and sunny the day Charlotte and I brought Lane home. Shewa’s small, they said, five pounds, but not that small, they said, but I had never seen anything so small. I took it on faith that those little fingers were completed with nails and the very suggestion that they be trimmed with something sharp sent me into a panic. A nurse had seen me studying them, one nail at a time, especially the little toes, and she, being one of those people who find comfort in nervous chatter, said, ““Just wait until you have to cut them..”” This flashback talks about the day Ishmael brings Lane home from the hospital as a bay. However, as we know Lane dies before the start of the story. The next page of the text says, “Secretary of State: Pull my finger..

President: Okay.

I can do what I like at any moment I like in this document or text or however we name it because this is my world, universe, neighborhood, note ((though I hate seeing the word note in my notes), and I can do what I damn well please and fuck you if you think I’m ignoring rules and fuck you if you think that I’m being indulgent and fuck you if you think that references to archaic philosophical notions are mere erudition, which they are not, but fuck you anyway because this is my world and you’re welcome to it if you want to enter and if you don’t want to enter then fuck you twice anyway and if you do want inside then fuck you trice because you fucking deserve it.”. This shows how in the story the narration changes from flashback to present tense. The page before this it was talking about Lane coming home for the first time and then the story jumps to Ishmael being angry because she is dead. This is an example of the recursion that happens within the story because it is not linear. It goes back and forth between past and present. This is similar to African Fractals because they also reoccur. They keep the same shape going over and over again just as The Water Cure goes from past to present over and over again.

Another example of recursion in The Water Cure is the number of times a word or phrase is repeated within the novel. For example, one page of the text says, “The words on these pages are not the story. The words on these pages are not this story. The words on these pages are the words on these pages, not more, not less, simply the words on these pages, one after another, one at the beginning and one at the end, bearing possibly some but probably no relation to each other, but they can, if you desire to find a connection, need to, or if it irresistibly, axiomatically, ineluctable reveals itself to you. When you leave, desert these words, the words on these pages, you might use words very much like these to report what meaning you have found, but not these very words. You perhaps will leave these pages, the words on these pages, with an idea or two and maybe, just maybe, the order of a few of these words and so it goes.” The repetition of “the words on these pages” reminds me of African Fractals because of how they repeat as well. This relates to how I feel about our course. Repetition is something we have talked about plenty during this semester. For example, rereading texts, going back to look at older texts we have read, and going over assignments with feedback. Repetition is something that I have taken into further consideration after this semester because it is very important to look back on old texts and concepts and be able to connect them to other texts. 

The final thing that connects African Fractals and The Water Cure is that both don’t have an ending. African Fractals are mathematical equations that continue in the same pattern without stopping or changing. The Water Cure is also a novel that is left open-ended. The fate of the characters is left up to the interpretation of the reader. Ishmael is still left questioning his life. The final lines of the novel are “I ask only to find the answers I need, but then there are the other questions: Will my daughter grow older in my dreams? Why do reasonable people entertain the ontological l argument? and What kind of dog was it? And the answers are: No, Because they can, and Some kind of retriever.”. This shows that there is no real ending because Ishmael is still left with questions. This is why I think that The Water Cure is a good text to use as our final text for our course. It is left really open ended which I think is how a college course should end because we are never done learning, just as African Fractals never end either.  

A fractal is a mathematical geometric shape. As Ron Eglash describes in his Ted Talk, they are known to be used in modeling structures because they have a recurring pattern that progressively gets smaller. They take on a seed shape. Fractals are used to model many different things, one of them being African culture to model architecture. We learned about fractals our first day of class and have been building on the topic ever since. As we have learned, fractals apply to more than just math or architecture, they are also seen in pieces of literature. A fractal can be created in one piece of literature, as it connects the beginning, middle and end of a story. Fractals can also be created by connecting one piece of literature to another. By connecting pieces of literature, we are creating patterns. The patterns are seen at the heart of the readings. Although each reading is different, there are still underlying patterns that create this metaphoric seed shape. They all have similarities that relate to one another making the literature in our class a fractal seed shape.

The first piece of literature in our class that I feel adds to our seed shape is Everyday Use by Alice Walker. The story Everyday Use talks about an African American family who struggle with different perspectives about their heritage. In the story, Dee, the more educated prettier sister, wants the quilts their grandmother made as a symbol of their heritage. This is an issue because the quilts were promised to Maggie, her sister who is less educated but still very much appreciates and understands the value of the quilts. Dee believes that she is more deserving of the special quilts because she very outwardly displays her heritage. She even changed her name to Wangero to represent her African culture more. She says, “I couldn’t bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppress me.” However, just because Dee outwardly expresses her heritage more than Maggie it does not mean that Maggie is not close to hers. In fact, Maggie is the one who learned how to make quilts. The difference between Maggie and Dee is that Maggie represents her heritage through practice not public displays. The message behind this story is that heritage and culture is truly honored and respected through practice, not outward displays. The story creates a seed shape in it. It does this because the pattern of the importance of practicing your heritage is prominent throughout. The quilts in this story are symbols. They symbolize their heritage. The quilts are passed down through generations and represent family, something Dee doesn’t understand. The quilts in the story also have patterns. They are the Lone Star and Walk Around the Mountain pattern. Just as the patterns symbolize their family and the repeated traditions they practice. Just as the repeated patterns in the literature for our class create a fractal shape. 

Another piece of literature that creates our fractal shape is Narrative of the life of Fredrick Douglass by Frederick Douglass. He wrote this narrative to document his experiences as a slave. Throughout the story he talks about how dehumanizing slavery is. He emphasizes the horrors that slavery is by talking about the malleolus intentions of slave owners that include treating slaves as property and keeping them illiterate and uneducated. In the narrative, Douglass explains how he learns to read first from his slave owner’s wife and then is able to keep going and teaches himself with some help. After Douglass learns how to read, he starts to realize even more how wrong slavery is. After his final escape, he marries and writes his narrative to try and shed light on the truth about slavery. The pattern in this story is that knowledge is everything. The power of reading and writing helped Douglass while he was a slave. It got him through it and educated him, giving him hope and power. After his escape, Douglass used writing as an outlet to fight slavery. He wrote his narrative to tell his tale and the horrors he went through in order to help get change. In the narrative he says, “The paper came, and I finally read it from week to week with such feelings as it would be quite idle for me to attempt to describe. The paper became my meat and my drink. My soul was set on fire. Its sympathy for my brethren in bonds-its scathing denunciations of slaveholders-its faithful exposures of slavery- and its powerful attacks upon the upholders of the institutions-sent a thrill of joy through my soul, such as I had never felt before!”. This quote describes the joy and importance that literature brings in Douglass’ life. That knowledge is the most important tool.

These are two examples from our literature that show our fractal seed shape. The fractal seed shape can be used for many different things. They are just to represent patterns being repeated. The pattern for our class is that we must take a deeper dive and really pay attention to what the author is telling us. This is shown in Everyday Use because it shows that the importance of heritage is practicing it and not the public displays. It is also seen in Narrative of the life of Fredrick Douglass because it shows how powerful reading and writing is. This pattern will keep showing up in our class. We will have to look further than a first glance or what is being obviously displayed and we must dive deeper in the literature.