You are right about the threads and sewing. I didn’t think about it. The book went so many different directions it’s a lot to absorb.
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I wish slightly less time in the book was devoted to wretchedness and suffering and a bit more to happiness and positive things. It really felt like the hopefully and happy aspects were given very short shrift, even though we were fortunately spared slightly about the violence and pillaging of the conquered area.
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I think boredom and ability is exactly what initially motivates Seymour. But then, in sabotaging Ilium’s Atlas, he finally finds his own way of carving out meaning and usefulness (to quote @packacards). He is able to protest in a non-violent way. “He turns fifty-seven, fifty-eight; the insurgent inside him lives still” and “…for the first time since finding the severed wing of Trustyfriend on the side of the road, he feels better. Calmer. Less frightened. Less like he has something to outrun” (p. 600).
Seymour is an interesting contrast to Omeir. Both love animals deeply and humanize them more than most. But Seymour does not seem able to channel that care and sensitivity into a human connection; whereas Omeir can.
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Thanks for reminding us of that section. With so many characters, it’s hard to keep things all straight. I found Seymour quite lonely and so much wasted potential—him and all the people in the book, really. They had such talents that they never were able to share as widely as they could due to circumstances far beyond their control.
From Doer’s website - he mentions how the Atheon tale was comic relief, playfulness, throughout the novel. I guess it did lighten the tone, but I wondered if there religious overtones throughout that tale - the time in the whale, and then the heavenly aspect of Cuckoo land.
** https://www.anthonydoerr.com/cloud-cuckoo-land Though we only have a few extant fragments of Antonius Diogenes’ writing, it’s clear he was interested in mashing up genres: myths, travel narratives, natural histories, romances
, ghost stories, historical treatises, etc. I wanted my book to embrace that sense of playfulness, too,
and I wanted to continually rotate the story around the running theme of a sieges-inside-sieges,
libraries-inside-libraries,
worlds-inside-worlds.
Because what is a book if not a little self-contained universe that you get to hold in your hands? So, yes, I think it’s safe to say that Cloud Cuckoo Land was my attempt at a literary-sci-fi-mystery-young-adult-historical-morality novel.
Q: What do you hope readers will take away from Cloud Cuckoo Land?
A: I hope readers are reminded of our myriad interconnections: with our ancestors, with our neighbors, with other species, with all the kids yet to be born. I believe that the more we can remember how much we’re all in the same boat—the more we can train ourselves to imagine, recognize, and remember our connections—with the bacteria in our guts, the birds outside our windows, the meals on our plates, and the children in our futures—the better off we’ll be.
Doer’s words about what he hoped the readers take away from novel
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I agree about Seymour, and his mom was one of those who had lots to give (so much love for her son, such a hard worker), but whose life was mostly a trial. And the other seamstresses in Anna’s story met a tragic end.
However, on the whole, I found the stories of the main characters to be uplifting: they rose above circumstances to do extraordinary things. Konstance lived in a vault without human contact for a year – I would have curled up in a ball and withered away. Anna is a force of nature, from secretly learning to read ancient manuscripts to shimmying up monastery walls:
“If any child ever born,” Chryse whispers, “can outsmart them, outlast them, or outrun them, it is you. There is still life to be had. Go tonight, and I will send prayers at your heels” (p. 380).
I think the line “There is still life to be had” is one of the themes–the threads–that runs throughout the stories. Seymour finds purpose despite serving forty to life in prison. Zeno may have led a melancholy existence, but late in life, he finds fulfillment, marveling to himself: “To be eighty-six years old and feel this.”
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Yes, Bunny could have been an amazing as a teacher or caregiver. She got bad break after bad break. Seymour would have been an amazing forest ranger, or zoologist, wildlife biologist, so many things.
Anna could have done miraculous things in a different setting—opened a school, been an explorer, done so many things!
The seamstresses could have put Etsy to shame and made beautiful and useful things and had better lives.
Konstance and her parents could have escaped to another place and worked to improve the world around them.
Omeir was so good with animals, he could have cared for more of them and taught others to nurture their animals.
Zeno did accomplish what he wanted and I feel he felt he had served his purpose in saving the children and library from the bomb.
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@HImom, all those things about missed opportunities and lost potential are true. And I suspect the same could be said for many real-life human beings, not just the characters in the novel. But I think Doerr is saying…that’s okay. Near the end, Seymour reads the play as edited by the children:
In a child’s cursive, beneath the crossed-out lines, Aethon’s new line is handwritten in the margin, “The world as it is is enough.”
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I don’t know, the book left me quite melancholy. I didn’t feel uplifted as several did. I want my world improving instead of staying the same or worsening. I’m glad the for the kids in the book that they felt it was enough.
For me, the saddest part was when Zeno went to visit Reggie, hoping for a relationship. That broke my heart.
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At least Rex’s boyfriend Hillary is funny and friendly and so very kind to Zeno. Hillary knows, I’m sure, that Zeno is in love with Rex.
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As a former teacher, I was really upset that Seymour’s school didn’t seem to put any effort into helping him succeed.
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I thought some teachers were willing to help Seymour, but the school as a whole didn’t seem to know what to do. I loved his high school papers and the teacher’s solution. (Revive the environmental club.) That was the closest he came to belonging. Such a missed opportunity.
I always felt sure the book was going to a good place. I’m reading another book right now and the author kills off characters right and left. I dread finding out how it ends.
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I loved this book, and I generally avoid long ones! I love all the comments about sewing and threads. It fits in with all the other “piecing together” paper examples in the book–Aethon’s story itself, of course, Zeno’s yellow pads full of translations, the pieces Konstance’s makes from the nourish sacks, Rex’s Compendium of Lost Books, even Mrs Boydstun’s puzzles. I’m sure there’s more.
Anna was really the heart of the book for me. She didn’t (couldn’t)go home, but she found a new, happy home. Things happened to her, yes, but she also made a lot of them happen. She wanted to read; she found a way to get someone to teach her. She wanted to help her sister; she found a way to get money. She escaped her expected fate, she learned so much, and she passed along what she found so it survived beyond her. I don’t know how realistic that was for an uneducated poor girl in 1453 Constantinople, but I liked it.
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@buenavista great observations. Anna’s storyline was central, but I thought it was the most revisionist compared to the other characters. The possibility of Anna doing those incredible things, becoming educated, climbing rock walls, saving an ancient manuscript seemed impossible.
Zeno, Omier, and Seymour were believable, well drawn characters, and the Konstance sections I enjoyed the most.
The siege at Constantinople, the cannon, 60 oxen needed to pull it all historic facts
Due to its size, it was dragged by 60 oxen and 400 men to Constantinople.[6] The cannonball, which could be shot at a distance of one mile, weighed 1,200 pounds.[4] It was horribly powerful, and when it hit, it caused massive damage to Constantinople’s walls. The cannon also killed some of its operators.[1] Additionally, due to the material the cannon was constructed of, and the intense heat created by the charge after each shot, the barrel had to be soaked in warm oil to prevent cold air from penetrating and enlarging the fissures.[3] The heat also prevented the cannon from being fired more than three times per day. Ultimately, it lasted all of six weeks before becoming non-functional.
- Length: ~24 feet (7.32 m)
- Diameter: 2.5 feet (76.2 cm)
- Cannonball: 1200 lb (270 kg)
- Range: ~1 mile (1.6 km)
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It never felt like a long book to me - maybe because in effect it was several shorter ones!
I’m a little disturbed by how carefully crafted the book is - I can almost hear Doer chortling “Oooh here is something else book groups can pick up on!”
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@jerseysouthmomchess, thanks for the historical info. The cannon “lasted all of six weeks before becoming non-functional.” Lots of living beings were collateral damage in the transportation and short-term use of that device, but I guess we humans have always loved our weapons of mass destruction. 
In one of the links posted earlier, Doerr mentioned that an image of the wall at Constantinople was an early inspiration for him as he began to write Cloud Cuckoo Land, and that walls became an important element in each of the stories – either physical or metaphorical.
Anna and Konstance need to get beyond physical walls. Omeir, Zeno and Seymour have built metaphorical walls, as a form of self-protection. Each one is different from the mainstream society of their respective times – Omeir set apart by his physical disability, Zeno by his sexuality, etc.
Seymour seems to have both psychological and physical issues. I tried to diagnose him and came up with this:
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To which I can only say, “Thank you!” because I’m enjoying our discussion. 
Seriously though, the book is carefully crafted, but the master in that regard is a previous CC Book Club selection, The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton. I’ve yet to see its match in complexity of structure and symbolism.
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Seymour reminded me a bit of my oldest who has a number of sensitivities and never liked going to movies because they were “too loud”. I’ve always thought he was on the normal side of the autism spectrum. He functions fine in society, but he doesn’t seem to need it.
Seymour’s problems are clearly more significant, but I was mostly fascinated the way he was able to be pulled into behavior that he should have known was wrong. I’d have found this less easy to believe a few years ago, but the last few years have taught me that it is very easy to manipulate people.
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Yes, Mathmom, as I read it I thought crafted for the cinema!