Tolog Review: Station Eleven

Station Eleven
by Emily St. John Mandel
reviewed by Catherine Ziegler

Station Eleven, by Emily St. John Mandel, is an intriguing book that allows the reader to travel through the lives of actors during a plague that wipes out the majority of the world’s population. Mandel’s novel has many anecdotes and affairs that captures the attention of readers. Station Eleven is an immensely wonderful sci-fi book that is a guaranteed good read for all types of readers. 

In Station Eleven, there are four main characters that largely impact and progress the plot. Arthur Leander can be easily considered the most important character in the novel. Arthur has built hidden connections with most characters featured in the plot of the novel. Although Arthur is the first person introduced to the reader, he’s also the first to die. Arthur dies onstage from a heart attack that Jeevan attempts to save him from. Arthur’s attempted savior, Jeevan Chaudhary, starts the novel as an unimportant character until he becomes a significant doctor in one of the few remaining cities that has electricity, meaning they have lights. Kirsten Raymonde is first introduced into the novel as a young girl working on the same play as Arthur. She later is reintroduced after the plague has struck as a brave young woman. The Prophet can be considered a villain in Station Eleven. The Prophet controls a ghost town that shuns people that leave his town by creating graves for them, even if they are still alive. He believes that the plague was sent by God to “clean” the world. 

Station Eleven has a plot that takes it’s time to build throughout the story. In Station Eleven, a plague strikes the world rapidly and before long traveled around the planet, killing all people it infected. In 15 years, 99% of the world’s population was dead and civilization no longer exists. The Traveling Symphony travels from settlement to settlement to perform Shakespeare to the remaining people of America while having interesting run-ins with other essential characters. 

Emily St. John Mandel frequently uses symbolism in Station Eleven. The first example of symbolism occurs when Jeevan describes a stage, “It was too transitory, all those doorways and dark spaces between wings, the missing ceiling. It was more like a terminal” (Mandel 5). In this case, Jeevan was talking about an airport terminal. Airport terminals are considered to be temporary or transitional places, like many settlements during the plague. Also, many settlements are established in airport terminals, so Mandel could also have been foreshadowing the settlements. Another example is where Arthur was raised. Arthur notes, “It’s not a hometown, actually, it’s a home island. ‘It’s the same size and shape as Manhattan,’ Arthur tells people at his parties all his life, ‘except with a thousand people’” (Mandel 72). Arthur was raised on Delano Island, an island with a population of about 1000 people, representing around the total amount of people still alive after the plague. 

In the end, I would highly recommend Station Eleven as a good “meantime” book. For readers who already love sci-fi, this novel is a must read and will grow your appreciation for sci-fi novels. If you’re a reader that dislikes sci-fi, I still recommend this book because I believe that it will change your opinion on sci-fi for the better. Readers who love dystopian novels will also enjoy reading Station Eleven. I thought the structure and plot was easily followed and well built. The details and anecdotes provided by Emily St. John Mandel were strongly influential and appreciated in the novel.