Love in the Ruins, by Walker Percy
One of my favorite novels is Love in the Ruins, by Walker Percy. I think this work appeals to me because it pertains to one of my favorite topics—the role of religion in America, and because it seeks to answer why (if America has become so modern and enlightened as to no longer need a God) Americans are becoming more and more disconnected from one another and themselves. The novel follows an alcoholic yet absent, baptized yet non-practicing Catholic psychologist (tellingly named Thomas More') , who has invented a lapsometer—a device that measures and corrects malaise and centers of disconnect within an individual’s mind. American society has become completely polarized, between blacks and white, liberals and conservatives, (etc etc), and taken to illogical extremes--the opposites have been pushed so far apart that they are almost identical in ideology, separate in title only--and only Thomas More appears to be conscious of society's disintegration. The lapsometer technology is taken from him by a well-meaning but non-understanding government official, who mass produces it in an attempt to ‘free’ mankind. More, realizing that scientific correction is not the ultimate cure, resigns himself to the end of the world as he knows it—because man will no longer be the same, incapable of free choice. I particularly enjoy this novel because Will’s story is the journey of a dissolute, despairing man, who has retained a belief in God, yet searches for some reason to be comforted by the idea of God. It raises some fundamental questions about man’s role in his own salvation, and his responsibilities towards himself and his world around him.
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