Evolution (Karen Connelly)

From the Latin verb, to roll out, evolvere. The common understanding of evolution relates to biology, and to Darwin’s famous theory—now widely accepted as fact—that all species have developed from earlier forms of life. A more general meaning refers to the gradual development of something—a system, a machine, an idea, an aspect of being--into a more complex and advanced form.

Evolution. Transformation. Transmutation. Change. These are some of our words for being broken, in small and large ways, continually. Form comes to the end of itself, inevitably alters, sprouts newness, a reordering in the mind, the body, the very genes, the molecules, the most basic grit of matter. Philosophy and religion meet biology without argument. They bow to one another and begin to dance. Evolution is the perpetual struggle: of the individual animal, of every species, of human society, of increasingly burdened ecosystems, of this single biosphere.

The evolution of human consciousness is mapped in the history of the novel. A fine novel portrays the evolution of a world, an imaginary ecosystem. Individuals, like the characters in a story, gain consciousness (or do not) by cracking (or not) out of the shell of unknowing, coming to the end of the system, creating a new one. We alter, evolve through decades of experience, stepping more deeply into aliveness (these rich, then richer years) as death rises up to greet us. The irony is so great as to be theatrical, arranged, tragicomic.

Love in the heart, terror in the heart: these are the twin sisters of the novel and of life. Terrifying, and lovely, this evolution of self into spirit, flesh into wisdom, into death, ashes, dust, molecules again, carbon and air.

Finally the wind scatters the heart.

Pour citer cette ressource :

Karen Connelly, "Evolution (Karen Connelly)", La Clé des Langues [en ligne], Lyon, ENS de LYON/DGESCO (ISSN 2107-7029), juin 2014. Consulté le 19/04/2024. URL: https://cle.ens-lyon.fr/anglais/litterature/entretiens-et-textes-inedits/evolution-karen-connelly-