Pat Barker
Noonday by Pat Barker is the third book in her trilogy about World War II. The three main characters are Paul Tarrant; his wife, Elinor; and their friend, Kit Neville. Now in their middle-ages, the three were former art students attending the same school. The novel takes place during the London blitz. Paul works as an Air Raid Precautions warden, and Elinor and Kit drive ambulances. Woven within the main thrust of the narrative, which describes their volunteer activities during the blitz, are the occasional flashbacks of the past, most notably those centering around the death of Elinor’s brother, Toby, in World War I and Paul’s recollections of crawling through tunnels and trenches during the war.
The novel is weak on plot and character development. It is episodic in nature and shifts from one scene to another, seemingly without much purpose. Minor characters, like Bertha Mason, a medium who communes with the dead, are introduced to suggest a significant role, but then they fizzle out. There is mention of childhood incest, adultery, and rape, but little is made of any of these.
The main characters are floundering, aimless, and uninteresting. They come alive when they are driving ambulances or entering bombed out buildings to rescue survivors. Otherwise, they are bland and lack substance. But perhaps that is the point. At times of war when bombs are dropping, people readjust their priorities. They become casualties of war and have little choice but to adopt a flat veneer in order to survive the horrors they witness. It’s as if they bury their vitality in the rubble. They go through the motions of daily life, but little seems to matter other than surviving and helping others to survive.
The strength of this novel lies in Barker’s vivid description of the blitz. Her writing transports the reader to a London experiencing relentless bombing and destruction. The descriptions of the bombing and its aftermath on people and infrastructure vividly evoke the horrendous conditions people endured. What also emerges is the bravery and self-sacrifice of individuals tasked with rescuing survivors in bombed out buildings teetering on the edge of collapse. Barker describes rescuers crawling through small, claustrophobic spaces; listening for survivors; and painstakingly digging tunnels to get to people trapped in the ruins. Ambulances navigate through rubble, debris, unexploded bombs, and gas leaks. The images are haunting and relentless.
Barker successfully evokes a historical time and place through her use of descriptive detail and vivid imagery. The immersive sights, sounds, and smells of the blitz coupled with the camaraderie and courage of rescue workers constitute the highlight of the novel and redeem it from its lackluster characters and meandering plot.