![\"heart\"](\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-humanities\/files\/2016\/07\/heart-239x300.jpg\")
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Maylis de Kerangal, The Heart<\/em>. Translated by Sam Taylor. Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, US.<\/p>\n In the UK it is titled Mend the Living<\/em>, translated by Jessica French, and published by\u00a0MacLehose Press.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Reviewed by Elizabeth Glass, PhD student in Comparative Humanities, University of Louisville.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Heart <\/em>by Maylis de Kerangal tells the story of 24 hours in\u00a0the life, and death, of twenty-year-old Simon Limbeau. The narrative includes\u00a0snippets from the brief hours before a car wreck that ultimately takes Simon’s\u00a0life, moving through to the aftermath of his death\u00a0when his heart is transplanted into the recipient Claire M\u00e9jan.<\/p>\n At the beginning of The Heart<\/em>, Simon goes on a\u00a0surfing trip with friends. On the way home, they are involved in a car accident. The other two young men escape\u00a0with minor injuries, but Simon is critically injured. Once\u00a0it has been\u00a0determined that Simon\u2019s injuries are fatal, and that his brain has ceased functioning, the doctor, Pierre R\u00e9vol, approaches Simon\u2019s parents to discuss\u00a0organ donation. Initially reluctant, particularly about donating\u00a0Simon\u2019s heart which they believe holds\u00a0his dreams, love and life, they eventually\u00a0agree. Thereafter we follow the journey of\u00a0Simon’s\u00a0heart.<\/p>\n The Heart <\/em>spends more time with R\u00e9vol than any other character as we observe him negotiating\u00a0with different aspects of the organ donation process. We also see Simon\u2019s mom, Marianne,\u00a0arrive at the hospital, her trauma heightened by being unable initially to get hold of her estranged husband, Sean, Simon\u2019s dad. We then follow the\u00a0interaction between the parents throughout the\u00a0horrendous process of losing their\u00a0adult son. We watch the hospital staff work with and around Simon. We are there when R\u00e9vol asks Marianne and Sean to donate Simon\u2019s organs. The most painful part of the novel involves\u00a0witnessing\u00a0Marianne\u2019s reactions to learning new information about Simon as he is dying. Though we spend more time with R\u00e9vol, we know Marianne better\u2013we can feel her emotions.\u00a0We meet Claire, who receives Simon\u2019s heart.\u00a0We also meet the transplant team and witness\u00a0both operations: the organ removal surgery and the heart transplantation.<\/p>\n The novel is not about Simon\u2019s life, and it is also not entirely about his death. Instead, it focuses on the donation and transplantation of Simon\u2019s organs, and his heart in particular which we follow to Claire. We care about Simon\u2019s organs as he is being kept alive awaiting surgery, and then it our own hearts that quicken as his is removed. The surgical scenes are the most tense in the\u00a0novel overall. They allow the reader to alternate between a distance of watching from afar\u00a0and that of being almost so\u00a0near to hand that we could imagine ourselves\u00a0passing\u00a0the sponge to the surgeon. This is when we are closest to feeling and understanding what the\u00a0characters experiencing. While the surgery and the donation process are both simplified, for someone who is only peripherally\u00a0acquainted with such processes, the medical procedures were described in a detailed and interesting manner without becoming\u00a0overly technical.<\/p>\n The Heart<\/em> is told from an omniscient narrator\u2019s point of view with a distance that gave me the feeling of being outside a glass door, or looking down from above in an operating theatre, an onlooker\u00a0on unfolding scenarios. The narrator is not only all-knowing but\u00a0is also an I<\/em> who addresses the reader as you<\/em>\u00a0on occasion. This had the effect of taking me out of the moment of the action and of\u00a0detaching\u00a0me from the story.\u00a0It caused me to wonder who I<\/em>\u00a0actually was, but the answer to this is never revealed and the identity of I<\/em> remained hidden throughout. At one point the narrator writes, \u201cYou undoubtedly remember the description of the books on R\u00e9vol\u2019s metal shelf, mentioning a copy of an issue of that magazine from 1959, so you will have already guessed that the article appeared in that very issue\u201d (p. 32). Instead of drawing\u00a0me into the story, this\u00a0aside had the opposite effect. Such asides were infrequent, but\u00a0when they did occur I found them\u00a0distracting. The narrator was not\u00a0a presence that I was aware of all the time; the opposite in fact, as\u00a0most of the time the narrator was\u00a0in the background. Thus,\u00a0when he or she appeared, it felt strange\u00a0and distanced me\u00a0from\u00a0the ongoing story.<\/p>\n This distancing, which creates the illusion of watching what is happening, of\u00a0being an onlooker instead of being directly involved, means that as readers we can\u00a0only access the characters’ thoughts tangentially. The things we know are told to us, but with the impassivity of overhearing a stranger\u2019s order at a restaurant. As a result, it is hard to care about the characters to the extent that\u00a0the subject matter deserves. However, if one did become very involved with\u00a0the serious content, The Heart<\/em>\u00a0would surely become a challenging and potentially harrowing\u00a0read. Thus, the sense of clinical detachment evoked probably\u00a0serves a useful purpose, and will, I suspect, ensure a wider\u00a0readership.<\/p>\n Each sentence in The Heart <\/em>tends to be a paragraph in length, containing many phrases separated\u00a0by commas. This makes\u00a0the novel a difficult read at times and is potentially distracting; yet it also encourages\u00a0a sense of urgency. The reading experience felt\u00a0halting initially, but this sensation\u00a0ceased as I progressed through the book. At the outset I found myself stumbling and searching for parts of speech to make sense\u00a0of some of the sentences, but there came a point later in the book when I found myself unable to put it down.<\/p>\n There are two versions of the novel translated into English from the original French: for the United States it is titled\u00a0The Heart, <\/em>and\u00a0for the United Kingdom Mend the Living<\/em>, which is a more direct translation of Maylis de Kerangal\u2019s original French title R\u00e9parer les vivants<\/em>. Mend the Living<\/em>\u00a0was nominated for the Man Booker Prize. The US reader will have difficulty with Mend the Living<\/em>, however. For example, in Mend the Living, <\/em>as Simon and his friends are getting ready to surf, they are said to have \u201cliquid rhinitis, sleep with your clothes on.\u201d In The Heart<\/em>, it says they have, \u201crunny noses, slept-in clothes.\u201d This type of difference exists between\u00a0the two translations throughout. The end of Mend the Living\u00a0<\/em>is as exciting as The Heart<\/em>, but elements\u00a0of the writing will limit its appeal to\u00a0the American reader. Thus, for this reader, Sam Taylor\u2019s translation was a more satisfactory\u00a0read.<\/p>\n In terms of the\u00a0Medical Humanities, The Heart <\/em>is an illustrative example of the arts interacting with medicine. The reader\u00a0witnesses\u00a0doctors wrestling with complex ethical issues such as how far to push the\u00a0parents to donate Simon’s\u00a0organs, decisions around to whom his organs will be donated, as well as the reality of the organ removal surgery\u00a0that ends his life. The reader also observes Claire\u2019s M\u00e9jan\u2019s difficulty coping with the fact of\u00a0receiving the heart of someone who has died, as well as her\u00a0transplant surgery. All these issues\u00a0render\u00a0The Heart<\/em>\u00a0a compelling read.<\/p>\n