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A God in Ruins,
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Patrick
I like to think of the ending as a bit of a nod towards Life After Life. That there were parallel histories in which he either lived or died on the night of the Nuremburg bombing raid. I don't think either version is what "really" happened and the other just a "fiction"...
Debby
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Laura
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Steph
‘Life After Life’ is overshadowed by Teddy's death in aerial battle over Germany. Deeply grieving for her lost lover, Nancy tells Teddy's sister Ursula: "He would never get married and have children, never live the wonderful life he deserved". But at the very end of the book, Teddy miraculously comes back from the dead. Ursula compares herself and Nancy, come to meet him, with the Marys meeting the resurrected Jesus.
Yet, as depicted in ‘A God in Ruins’, the life of the risen Teddy turned out to be far from satisfactory. His marriage was cut tragically short by Nancy's brain tumor, his fatherhood fatally blighted by the unrelenting hatred of his only child Viola, and his old age marked by humiliating degeneration and degradation at an inhuman "nursing home". Given at the last moment a chance to go back and change the way his life had gone, Teddy chooses to die as a young, self-sacrificing war hero - a bit reminiscent of the choice made by Achilles in Greek mythology.
And thus, this book ends with Nancy and Ursula once again deeply grieving for the dead Teddy. Nancy cannot ever know that, in renouncing his post-war life, Teddy had also created a future in which she would be saved from the brain tumor – though it would be at the side of another man.
Yet, as depicted in ‘A God in Ruins’, the life of the risen Teddy turned out to be far from satisfactory. His marriage was cut tragically short by Nancy's brain tumor, his fatherhood fatally blighted by the unrelenting hatred of his only child Viola, and his old age marked by humiliating degeneration and degradation at an inhuman "nursing home". Given at the last moment a chance to go back and change the way his life had gone, Teddy chooses to die as a young, self-sacrificing war hero - a bit reminiscent of the choice made by Achilles in Greek mythology.
And thus, this book ends with Nancy and Ursula once again deeply grieving for the dead Teddy. Nancy cannot ever know that, in renouncing his post-war life, Teddy had also created a future in which she would be saved from the brain tumor – though it would be at the side of another man.
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