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Susie . . . a 'Presence', not a 'Body'

What a novel or a drama means to you and what you get out of it depends very much on where you are coming from and what you are hoping for. Having declared my hand (a professional interest in violence, trauma, loss, bereavement and adjustment) I was not prepared for a study of heaven and the afterlife which explains why my Reflection came out as it did, studiously dismissing all those loose ends and unanswerable questions as an incidental sub-plot. 

Though well aware that such issues are important to many people and should not be overlooked or tactfully avoided, the difficulty in handling them is that they bristle with problems, and words and phrases mean different things to different people. This therefore is a limited attempt to redress the balance, focusing on one or two thought-provoking issues of interest to other readers starting with what I can only describe as The Traditional Heaven.

With no single definition of what we mean by heaven, either in Christian or secular society, and no scientifically verifiable evidence that any such place exists as a geographical entity, the Traditional Heaven can only be either an act of faith or a figment of the imagination or both, and we don’t all start in the same place. What the Traditional Heaven offers, however, is not so much a unified structure as a variety of common features, mostly handed down through the generations and fortified by countless assumptions in hymns, songs, poetry, general literature, specific readings, misreadings or interpretations of scriptural passages, all kept alive either for lack of alternatives or fear of causing offence to believers or ‘the gods’.

Common features are ‘where we go when we die’ (‘in the skies’ or ‘somewhere up there’); ‘a place of perfection’ (no more suffering, heartache, loss or discord); ‘where we will be reunited with friends and relations, forbears and ancestors’ (instantly recognisable by us, of course, and we by them). Meanwhile they can see us, watch over us, and in some cases communicate with us.

Maybe nobody believes all this but there are not a few who would subscribe to some of it¹ though probably not nearly so many as did a few generations back. Today, many who have doubts are content to live with a degree of agnosticism: they just 'don’t know' but the issue does not weigh heavily with them. Others (whose numbers may be growing) would cautiously dismiss it all as ‘old wives' tales’. or (in extreme cases} ‘rubbish’.

 The Lovely Bones

Both Novel and Stage Versions assume something akin to a traditional Heaven, but whereas in the novel Susie is the absent narrator of everything that ensues, in the Stage Version she is on stage throughout, observing and commentating but unheard, unseen and unrecognised by the rest of the cast: ‘a presence‘ but not ‘a body’.  

Whatever view we hold, what we have here is the juxtaposition of . . . of what? Earth and Heaven? . . . this world and the next? . . . here and there? . . . this side and the other side?  ‘Earth and Heaven’ is probably the most acceptable and accessible description and it would be difficult in this case to find any other, but one consequence is that Lovely Bones offers three doors to three stories: one, the story of Susie (violence); two, the story of human reaction (bereavement and trauma); and three, ‘life in heaven’.

You ‘pay your money and take your choice’ but whichever door you choose, once inside you find yourself in Open Plan. I ’bought it’ for the second, hoping simply to enjoy the first and soft pedalling the more debatable and questionable elements of the third due to my reservations about Heaven (the word rather than the reality) for two reasons: 

Bryony Lavery, who handled the Stage Version, acknowledged the complexity when she said it was

Narrating the novel is one thing; it doesn’t require you to to locate Susie or Heaven anywhere except in the mind of the reader. A more direct role, with a voice and ‘an identifiable place’ on stage, inevitably raises questions about the place, the possibilities and problems of what is or is not achievable, but may in the end provide alternative interpretations. 

My predilection, therefore, is to avoid traditional terminology, which sees heaven as a place or a package, in favour of something approaching a ‘way of life’ more in line with Susie’s ’ruled paper’ and ‘writing across the lines’.  This way focuses on 'heaven’ as a different lifestyle with a different set of values, more in line with a religious training, social customs or simply good manners, which may then be honed on earth rather than dreamed up and promulgated as a reward for achievers after death, putting flesh on old bones and bringing them to life in today’s world. This, at best, may only take us part way, but once through Sebold’s third door, Susie’s experience opens up a different set of of issues worth exploring: Surprise, Frustration and Maturity are but three.

Surprise 

Far from being in any sense ‘heavenly’, Susie’s first impression is boredom, combined with isolation and loneliness. That is eased after a few days when she is introduced to Holly, a 16-year old with a similar experience. When that wears off, other people, some undesirable, seem to come from nowhere, arriving suddenly on her ‘patch’ and then (like Holly)  disappearing as quickly to a part of heaven to which Susie has no access. But where are they? Who decides who lives where, and does this suggest there are ‘other heavens’ or (at best) segregated residential blocks. Susie needs help.

Enter Franny, 'Guide' to the so-vastly-different ‘Life on the Other Side’, a middle aged former social worker, counsellor or ‘mother-substitute’ for the homeless and destitute, who was shot when trying to get between an angry man and his wife in a domestic situation. Coming from a vocation to serve she continues her calling in her new environment as a specialist resource for young people, victims of a similar experience, as they try to settle in to their new world. This ‘heaven’ is obviously a place where you don’t automatically slot in. You not only have to capture the mood but also grasp the protocol.

Franny’s first response to Susie’s boredom is to ask her what she wants, because this is her heaven. If she doesn’t like it she can change it and have anything she wants provided she wants it enough. Sounds great, but is it true? Susie knows what she wants all right and it certainly starts a conversation but it doesn’t go far because what Susie wants most of all is to grow, and you only grow by living and that is clearly not on. The best she can hope for is to watch others live and grow. She also wants her murderer to be identified, brought to justice and get her life back, but that is not on either.

Turn where she will, her heaven just doesn’t quite come up to scratch. The door to the Other Side opens only one way and the condition of getting what you want seems to depend on learning what matters and (or) making the right choices. Once Susie grasps that, she can alter her compass, write across the lines and set off in a different direction, which in the end is what she does as we shall see, but we aren’t there yet. With surprises  go frustrations.

Frustration

In some cases, Frustrations were overshadowed by Helplessness. In a world marked by doubt and uncertainty as to what exactly happened (where, when and how) and not least what happened to the missing body, Susie alone now has all the answers for which police, family and friends, are searching, but has absolutely no means of communication. 'Heaven’, where omniscient transparency might have been  welcomed, turns out to be a place where there are some things it seems better not to know.

Exclusion and Anxiety 

With Helplessness comes Exclusion, as when (as if for the first time) she feels the pain of talking when nobody hears, followed more sharply in a one-ended telephone conversation with her father, and most poignantly with an awareness of the continuing social life left behind, unable to participate beyond a cheer and even that will neither be recognised nor noticed. Anxiety surfaces as she watches a family (her family) destroying itself but unable to do anything about it and nobody with whom she can share her sorrow or stress. If ever a person in ‘heaven’ needed help Susie did, and if she were typical, ‘heaven’ could hardly be a hopeful prospect for the rest of us.

Maturity

With less time watching earth and more time ‘walking the fields of heaven’ Susie discovers some of those ‘other heavens’, such as the habitat of javelin-throwers and shot putters where ‘a girl like me didn’t fit in’. Still no answers and the questions didn’t go away.² Given lots of heavens, where can she find her grand-parents? Oh for that world of joy, with . . . ‘no memory, no cornfield and no grave! That surely would be heaven. Somewhat to her surprise Franny agrees. She still says she can have it. ‘Plenty of people do', she says, but making the switch is ‘not as easy as you might think. You have to stop desiring certain answers’, (such as) 'why you were killed instead of somebody else, to stop ‘investigating the vacuum left by your loss and ‘wondering what everyone left on earth is feeling’. In a  word, ‘you have to give up on earth’.³

Is Franny trying to tell her that the roots or foundations of heaven are formed when you learn to live in the world where you are, not where you were nor where you would wish to be.  After only one session Susie is beginning to understand what it means to be dead4 ⁴

The concept is difficult, for us as it was for Susie, but Franny speaks truth as ‘a voice from heaven’, with one or two hints, not so much in formal teaching or theory but more in casual responses to Susie’s questions. Throwaway lines in everyday conversation, often marginal and barely significant, can stimulate a more mature understanding of the afterlife and maybe spell out a fresh approach for the one who has gone and for those left behind, opening a door to new life and a fresh beginning for all. 

What is clear is that heaven is definitely not a re-run or a return to what was there before powered up to perfection, but may approximate more to ‘writing the other way’.  It is still a tough ask, even with Franny on hand to guide and reassure, and is still barely recognisable as ‘the place’ Susie had always been led to expect, but subsequent events suggest that Susie has grasped the ‘bare bones’ of Franny’s efforts and pave the way for the ‘lovely bones’ eventually to surface.  

Conclusions

Wisely, neither the novel nor the Stage Version (nor, apparently, the film⁵) make any attempt to address these issues. No reason why they should. They have their sights elsewhere. This is for us to do with the ingredients they have provided. The story of Susie is an earthly experience in all its earthiness with ‘Heaven’ (and Susie’s narration) as a theatrical device to bring out the inevitable associated issues, leaving readers or viewers to dig out the incidental consequences and come to their own conclusions. Novel and drama are life, not theology.

What I found most difficult was how to ‘read’ Susie’s heavenly interventions, oscillating between moments when I clearly felt she was describing what was happening in real time on earth and other occasions when I felt it was more her imagination and insight as her past enabled her to fill in the details and to some extent creatively to write her own parallel version of how she saw things working out. Insights we might otherwise miss were a byproduct to be picked up, mulled over and then taken on board or spat out for us to do the same.

For example, after witnessing a crucial moment in Lyndsey’ experience at the school camp when she suddenly sees a project coming up to develop a play on ‘How to commit the perfect murder’, Susie sees Lyndsey ’shutting out the whole world, including herself’ while saying (with mock-confidence) ‘I’m Fine’ as she walks away. But she wasn’t. Those around knew it, and Susie knew it when she said,

The words are Susie’s. But was Susie simply identifying with her sister and giving expression to what she well knew were Lyndsey’s feelings or was she trying to tell us something about her own experience in heaven?⁶

Or again, after Jack’s misadventure in the cornfield when his rash, misguided adventure led to his being hit with his own baseball bat, and Lindsey witnessing the anguish of her father at one of his lowest points, with 'no dead daughter . . . and no sweet daughter whispering  rhymes.⁷ Franny says, 

 prompting Susie to ask,⁸

Susie’s voice again  and Franny refuses to answer. Both know there is no answer, The dead have nowhere to go but, once again, is that Susie identifying with her sister and projecting Lyndsey’s feelings to avoid what none of them can handle? Or could it be that critical moment of crossing the threshold. Had Franny got there before Susie arrived and was therefore able to help her to face up to it? Susie is almost there, still struggling, but is it on her own behalf or on behalf of Lyndsey?

Susie and her father throughout seem to have a common problem — the inability to live in the world they are in and at the same time the impossibility of changing it. Susie cannot let go of earth and Jack cannot ‘let go’ of Susie, craving the body he once knew, and as Franny tried to explain there is no heaven for those who can’t. 

But if Franny has the theory, which is neither hopeful nor encouraging, can we find something approximating to the praxis in Grandma Lynn? Sharing Susie’s penchant for ‘writing the other way’, she too knew what it was to have to live with the consequences of an inability to grieve for her husband and only reached maturity when she shared the problem with Abigail, after which she achieved a new relationship with the family for the benefit of all.

Susie too, similarly, was only able to ‘let go of earth’ once she saw she could ‘hold the world’ without actually being in it. So what facilitated the change and enabled Susie to cross over? Might it have something to do with Franny’s counselling tactics?

In Franny’s new and timeless world ‘physical growth’ is no longer appropriate but the life (spirit, impact) of the deceased may continue to blossom, enable growth and bear fruit in those left behind. Not surprisingly, Susie finds it a difficult pill to swallow, but Franny’s patient guidance eventually helps her to see how her spirit, picked up, reinforced and practised by Grandma Lynn is still very much ‘alive’ in those left behind, enabling growth and development  in them, denied to her but the product of  her lovely bones. New life from old bones. No longer a long-lost ‘body’ but an ever-present and more powerful 'spirit’, achieving what no ‘body’ could do, with a hint of joy as she is driven to run round her heaven 'like a chicken with its head cut off',⁹ with the news that Lindsey has become engaged to Samuel, significantly designated 'fixer of broken things.’¹⁰

Growth in Heaven 

This still leaves Susie’s ‘maturity and growth’ in heaven as one of the most challenging aspects of the story. It is a gift to readers whose traditional heaven includes something akin to purgatory, but for others the idea of change ‘on the other side’ will prove difficult, so how are we to handle it? Some resolution is called for and, as often, there is more than one way of looking at it.

One possibility, since we are in the realms of fiction, is to see growth potential simply as a literary device. Having opened the door and let us in there has to be some way to find closure. For many people the very idea of thousands of spirits existing anywhere at all is difficult enough, but the idea that they are all capable of continued growth or morphing into something entirely different surely goes beyond all reason. 

A second possibility is that Sebold’s ‘device’, deliberately or accidentally, enables us to see the sort of person Susie might have become if she been allowed to go on living. Would she have become another Grandma Lynn? Who knows? Speculation is all. 

A third, more positive possibility (thought-provoking if questionable) is to see Lynn as a Susie redivivus. With no ‘body’ Susie is ‘dead’. But then are we to see Lynn as the embodiment of ‘Susie’? We have already noted similar characteristics, and moving into Susie’s room and a new relationship with Jack both seem to  point in that direction. Certainly Lynn is the one who has brought the family together again in a way Susie might well have held it together had she lived. This, together with the change in her family and friends (Ruth and Ray) might have been reason enough to enable Susie to apply closure as she sees something ‘lovely’ emerging from her bones. When even Jack has managed to ‘let go’ it is time for her to do the same and bow out.

Starting from there and with hindsight, can we then re-read much of what went on in that corner of the stage allocated to 'heaven’ as a reflection of what was going through the minds of the friends and family as they tried to explain the inexplicable, to heal the wounds caused by the shock and to come to terms with the consequential trauma? It is their way of groping and coping with the disaster until they can find a way forward. In that case we too may see Susie in Heaven as mirroring our experiences and anxieties as a way of coping in our (very) different world, to the point where Susie’s positive grasp of the situation, what has happened to many others, what is happening to Grandma Lynn, the family, Ruth and Ray (all her lovely bones) give us hope. This then is more than fiction and the bones are not simply a symbol but the groundwork of a foundation for a new way of life all round. Long shot it may be, but might explain why I chose that second door.

‘New life’ is bursting out all over, with Lynn, the one who most embodied Susie’s spirit, leading the way, carrying the torch. Closer observation, tinged with a wisp of imagination may spot other sparks from that torch lighting the way, such as determination, hope and experience, all far more effective than candles in the field calling to mind the horror of the past. Abigail, daughter and mother, had a point. So too did Franny, because it was only as they let go that they began to live.

For Susie, satisfaction is not the imaginable luxuries of heaven (traditional or otherwise), not the discovery of answers to unanswerable questions but the light of dawn as her death, tragic though it was, was not an end. Her lovely bones were but the beginning.  Not here, not there. Not dead, but alive. Not ‘a body but ‘a presence’. Easy to say. Not easy to see, and difficult to believe, but possibly a hint that the search can open doors, not to go back but to go on.

Can 

these bones live?

 Ezekiel 37:3

Lovely Bones Pt 1                    Lovely Bones Pt 2                   Lovely Bones Pt 3