E,
This is an unhappy accusation to more than just one generation: forgetting is the first step in forgiving, and some things are simply beyond forgiveness. A step farther: forgetting is tantamount acquitting, and thence to abetting. So, the story asks us, what crime do we commit by recording?
The dreariness of the main character is unforgivingly set by your bleak setting. One can feel the dampness, the cloying chill. Even in the Archives, the wet cold of stone is felt. Pervasiveness is represented clearly and palpably, symbolizing the even more chilling pervasiveness of the subject matter of crimes against humanity.
The implied microcosm of those crimes—sketched memories of the characters family—remind the reader that we are not detached from tragedy; we are simply waiting our turn. This principle is sickeningly applicable it today's society, maybe even more applicable than the timeframe of the story. We don't hold anyone accountable, we just watch and document and wait for the next breath of poison gas to be breathed by parliaments and presidents and dictators (as though there’s a difference between any of them). Your use of negative space is absolutely instrumental here, leaving the reader to interpolate what might or might not have happened.
You mention banality more than once. As I read, I have to face the fact that I, too, am culpable. "Yep, there's another murder in Indianapolis. Thirteen this year, but who's keeping score? Speaking which, how did the Colts do this week?" It's all just another boring part of living. And that is terrifying! The level to which we are willing to accept catastrophe and evil is staggering and seemingly irreversible. Stories like this remind us, for a moment, that we have a responsibility to stand up and scream...but the moment passes, and read the rest of the sports page.
"Hatred is created when people gather." Holy hell. That's so true. Through Liebert, you put your finger directly on the sickened pulse of the matter. I've felt this way for a long time, but never have I been able to distill it this well. It's the central problem, the reason I'm an introverted near-hermit. We see it every day, read it every day—when we can be torn away from TikTok and sports scores. "Generals gathered in their masses" sang Black Sabbath. True. And aren't we all the generals of our own wars against time and fate. And so we create hatred in our "black masses."
The futility of shame and accountability is clearly demonstrated throughout. Tommy logs the notes, the daily journals, the feelings. But time and banality and cheerful young clerks wash it all away, whitewash it with rationalizations, blur it through lenses of time. "Washing. Always washing away." This action of washing, we must interpret, is not to clean wounds but to erode responsibility and accountability. To creepingly dislodge and carry away guilt and memory, seeping like mist into our hearts make the gall of iniquity into watercolor representations, the flares of pain just faint halos in our hearts until there is nothing left for us to choke on.
Would I suggest doing anything differently in this story?
~ Perhaps giving paragraph spacing between the one- and two-line punches toward the end.
~ The font difference in the journal's written section might be managed a little better, the unwritten part placed in the same mono-spaced font. That part is thought, true, so it could go either way.
Just an observation.
~ If I might be so bold, I will note that the description of the scenes might be a little too much, maybe by a sentence or two. The brushstrokes are already heavy. I recognize the necessity of emphasizing the seepage and the dirt, but there is enough of it that it almost obscures the accusation within the storyline itself.
This is another incredibly delivered indictment of humanity at its worst. In the darkest of times, the human monster demonstrates how much darker it actually become.
Bravo, sir. Bravo.
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