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In NOT WANTED ON THE VOYAGE, Timothy Findlay takes the legend of Noah and the Flood and turns it around. Dr. Noah Noyes is an egotistical, overbearing, arrogant man, who, nevertheless, is chosen by an old tired Yahweh to be the patriarch of the only human family to survive after Yahweh has destroyed the earth. Yahweh is tired and old and has been dissed once too often,so he is going to send a flood to destroy all life, except those who can be saved in the ark that Noah will cause to be built. This is a time when animals can talk. Mrs Noyes' old blind cat Mottyl wanders through the fields and forests, talking with the animals who are her friends. Noah blinded her in one eye during his "scientific" experiments, just as he has taken and killed all the kittens she has given birth to in her 20 years of life. She is going into heat once again but doesn't know how to avoid becoming pregnant, so she just accepts her fate. Shem, the Ox, a stolid farmer, is married to Hannah, who weaves fragrant garlands for the beasts Noah will sacrifice to Yahweh. Japeth has turned blue. He left the farm and started for the city, to see what the clouds of smoke meant, and was captured by cannibals who marinated him in liquid prior to boiling him alive, but he managed to escape and return home before ever reaching the city. But he is permanently blue, and he wonders why his 11 year old bride, Emma, won't sleep with him. Ham is a theoretical scientist who spends most of his time in the orchard, thinking. Mottyl, in going about her business, finds the faeries upset because a fallen angel has come. All Mottyl sees is a strange 7 foot tall, beautiful woman, who seems to float, not walk. The woman has webbed fingers, as do all angels, but when Ham sees Lucy, he falls in love with her and marries her, never seeing the differences. Old, arthritic, tired, disappointed Yahweh comes for a visit and the Noyes make him comfortable so he tells Noah to build an ark and he will destroy all mankind and all that live on the earth, except for a pair of each that lives on the earth. Noah takes this to mean that he is boss and gets even more unlikeable. Mrs. Noyes, like all wives and mothers, tries to keep the status quo. In fact, she refuses to get on the ark without her cat and his friend Crowe. Finally, she smuggles them aboard and the voyage begins. It is Noah's fault that the faerie are left behind, that the unicorn and demons are killed on the voyage, and thus not all animals survive, and innocence dies. And God never speaks to him again. And the animals no longer speak or sing. This is a morality tale using the Book of Genesis story of Noah and the flood as a starting point. Mrs Noyes, although she has to keep things together without her jars of gin, and locked in the dark hold of the ship with all the animals to take care of, manages to do just that, with the help of Lucy, the fallen angel. Noah, the patriarch, purports to look ahead to the new world, while Mrs. Noyes tries to keep the magic and wonder of the old.
Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, December 2002
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