Things I'm Glad a Five-Year-Old Can't Understand

The effect of having a 5-year-old as the narrator for Room is similar to that of the childlike art style in Persepolis. We discussed that Marji's young voice and simply drawn visuals make the gratuitous violence of the revolution somehow both more and less palatable. The drawings of torture and murder don't make you squeamish at first, because they eschew the gore that would be in say, a photograph of these events, but then you remember the cost of this clean portrayal is its being filtered through the eyes of a child, who should not have to process these things.

Similarly, reflecting on Room, at first I can't help but feel very relieved the story is not told from Ma's perspective. Its an emotional portrait I can't even imagine trying to write, and it would be incredibly heavy to read. Ma is kidnapped at 19, sexually assaulted, held in isolation, brings a child into a life of captivity, and attempts suicide (among any number of other accompanying ordeals). Jack, on the other hand, has had a pretty happy life, from his perspective. There have been some very stressful episodes, but there weren't any sections of this book I found hard to read because of emotional intensity, the way there definitely would have been if Ma told the story.

That being said, immediately after expressing this relief to myself, I felt guilty. It's like I'm saying "I'm glad there was a child there to experience this horror with Ma, or else I'd have to hear about it from someone who has the experience to know they're being ill-treated and the words to convey that," which is horrible. We, the reader, are exploiting Jack's innocence for a degree of separation from Ma's story. Obviously that's not all we get from having Jack's perspective. I think it's fascinating for a whole plethora of other reasons besides this one. But I'm still struck by that same guilt I had reading about the prisoners of war in Persepolis. We get to read about Ma's suicide attempt in relatively inoffensive terms, but at a great cost to Jack, who nearly loses his Ma and will surely have psychological blowback to come. After the initial softness of a five-year-old's language, their words almost make things seem worse, because of the loss of innocence that comes with it.

7 years, 15 days, 6 hours 18 minutes and 42... no, 43 seconds

Although Room is told from the perspective of five-year-old Jack, most readers can't help but identify more with the only other primary character, his young mother. Seeing how amazingly well Ma is functioning after seven years in cramped captivity, one is compelled to consider what their own state would be in such a situation, and which aspects of the kidnapping would be most trying. There is just so much about the situation to drive a person crazy, between the claustrophobia, the social isolation, the dependence on one's captor and the loss of one's friends and family. One of the more minor psychological taxes Donoghue draws our attention to is dealing with the passage of time. As with all of Ma's trials, it is painted with the subtle brush of Jack's perspective.

The book opens on Jack's fifth birthday. His present, a drawing of himself sleeping, is tied with ribbon from the last Christmas. How does Ma know when either of these holidays occur? To my recollection, no reference is made to a calendar, and I doubt Old Nick is coming in every night after nine and updating Ma on the date. I considered the idea that she might find it on TV, perhaps on the weather channel, but she's very strict about only showing two programs a day. The only other explanation I could think of is that she keeps track daily, in her head. (Not on paper, as they only have one pencil, and they had the same pen from when Jack was 2 to 4). I know I would lose track, but upon reflection, it is totally consistent with Ma's character. She compulsively tracks time.

I don't mean she has an unhealthy, debilitating obsession, but rather a minor fixation. She claims she spent her two years in the Room before Jack came just laying there, counting the seconds, millions and millions of them. One doesn't need to believe that counting is absolutely all she did for the idea to serve my point. Certain idiosyncrasies of Jack's speech, which is influenced only by and thus reflects Ma's speech, indicate the same idea. His habit of referring to passing time in the units of seconds or hours when minutes or days would seem more appropriate conveys the sense of minute attention to how much time passed, even if they're in a clearly exaggerated figure, like "hundreds and hundreds of hours". This implies Ma speaks about time in the same precise manner. Their strictly regimented schedule, which they are constantly checking Watch in order to keep on track with, also seems out of place in the circumstances. It's not as if they have any appointments to keep or know any people with whom to keep them. But to Ma, keeping a consistent schedule may be her best attempt at normalcy, and knowing when Christmas is may be her best connection to the outside world. So I think that all of these little things, although none of them are dwelt upon in the text, add up to one of primary Ma's coping mechanisms, and a little insight into how she manages to keep it together faced with such fierce psychological adversity.