The Negative Cutter
Patrick Chapman
[Arlen House]
In this volume, Patrick Chapman’s two novellas, Anhedonia and The Negative Cutter, are published together under the latter title, yet both are substantially different in tone, subject matter and treatment. The former is a snappily told, fairly conventional tale of doomed love: clever disillusioned boy meets clever chirpy girl, girl gets pregnant and due to emotional inadequacies of relationship travels to England for an abortion, boy suffers from dissociative depression and the relationship unravels in a sticky human mess. For all its conventionality, it manages to be poignant, and for all its self-conscious pop culture references, it avoids being smug.
The Negative Cutter is a dystopian vision of a future Ireland that has fallen into the clutches of extremist, racist, conservative forces, a system depicted as an Evil Empire of ‘Legionnaires’ and governed by a mysterious leader called Joseph Walker, ‘the Thalidomide Taoiseach’. At the centre is the story of Krista and Raimi, a young interracial couple attempting to survive in an ultra-violent yet pious totalitarian state. Chapman renders this state’s extremist religious authorities forcibly reminiscent of certain contemporary Irish pro-life organisations, and the story has some relevance in the context of the contemporary abortion debate in Ireland. While the work is vividly imagined and brutal, its dark, twisted dystopia at times lacks credibility for a simple lack of clarity, and key plot elements need further elaboration. Overall, however, both novellas intrigue; worth a read.
Words: Liza Cox
