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2013 Group Read #3: The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks

GROUP READ DETAILS
Reading starts: As soon as you're able
Discussion Starts: 1 May 2013
*On the day, I'll add a note to the title of this thread to let people know the discussion's started. In the meantime, people can stop by this thread to chat, and maybe post some bonus material about the book- but no spoilers until discussion opens please.

FACTS & TRIVIA
*Length: Approx. 184 pages
*First published: 16 Feb 1984
*Author: Iain Banks (Scotland)
*Banks writes mainstream fiction under the name Iain Banks, and science fiction as Iain M. Banks, including the initial of his adopted middle name, Menzies.
*Banks decided to become a writer at the age of 11 and completed his first novel The Hungarian Lift-Jet at the age of 16.
*The Wasp Factory was Banks' first published novel, written at age 30.
*A 1997 poll of over 25,000 readers listed The Wasp Factory as one of the top 100 books of the 20th century, but as a first novel by an unknown author, the book was initially greeted with a mixture of acclaim and controversy, due to its gruesome depiction of violence. The Irish Times called it "a work of unparalleled depravity."



BONUS MATERIAL
This is a piece Banks wrote for The Guardian Book Club on The Wasp Factory.
First time readers may wish to wait until after reading the book before clicking the link. It does tell you a lot about what Banks was trying to say with the book - but I think it's interesting to see what people pick up without having these expectations in mind.

Just finished. Wow. Have to let it percolate.

Oh wow. There's a Wasp Factory opera opening in Germany & the UK later this year:

I've been wanting to read this FOREVER but apparently my library doesn't have it. Ugh.

My copy finally showed up last night, so hopefully I can get around to reading it soon.

Well it is a quick read, so hopefully you'll both get chance to read it soon & be able to jump into the discussion while it's still fresh. I'm just thinking that if it gets much later, I'll have forgotten everything in the meantime!

It's technically 1 May here now, but I'll give it a few more hours before I open the thread..

Woohoo!
Discussion for this one is finally open!

What did everyone think? I'm going to hold off on my opinion for now, for the sake of being an objective moderator, but I'm keen to know what people thought about some particular points:

*GENDER ISSUES - Where do we think Frank's hatred toward women stemmed from really? Did he know deep down that he was girl? Was he influenced by his father's attitudes? His family history of being betrayed/abandoned by women? The sudden way that he went from being dressed as a girl (which is about all he remembers) and being treated wholly as a boy (if a disfigured one)?
[Related: How did he not EVER notice he had a vagina??]

*DOGS - What do we think dogs represented? Particularly to Eric? Why did he despise them so very much?

*WASPS - Why wasps for the wasp factory? I didn't catch any references to them in Frank's personal history, but they must have been hugely symbolic to him for them to play such a role in his personal mythology.

*MADNESS - What do we think caused Eric to fall into "madness"? Obviously the wormy baby brain was horrendous, but do we think it was that alone? Stressful life events don't generally cause profound mental illness, (unless we're talking about PTSD, which doesn't usually prompt people to torture animals). Life events tend more to trigger episodes or the initial onset of a pre-existing mental illness. Then there's the family history - they all seem to be a little eccentric..

*RESOLUTION - What did we think of the ending? Was it what you expected? Was it satisfying? Was everything resolved?

So many questions!

Just finished it. My brain is broken. (maggots?)

I need to shelf this story and breath clean air for a while before I start thinking about it again...

I'll be back. :)

Wow. Nothing but stunned silence. That's a first for this group!

Did we finally succeed in breaking some brains? :)

Oh, that was crazy book. But it is extremely sad to hear from mr.Banks, that he has terminal illness and has left so little to live.

Hello,

I didn't re-read, but a lot of it's still fresh in my mind :)

*GENDER ISSUES - All of these are excellent points which I think contributed. As to never knowing about the vagina, I imagine Frank was deliberately poorly educated about the birds and bees + a healthy dose of black comedic license!

*DOGS - I think it's the feral urges that Eric himself couldn't overcome that he hated, an external manifestation of the attempt to eliminate the urges in his head, especially since he was once so clever and sorted :(

*WASPS - I'm not sure, but "Ant Factory" sounds a lot less threatening!

*MADNESS - That he mentioned he had learned how not to sleep sounded to me like a false victory masking chronic insomnia. The eventual incident that lead to his madness I agree was probably the last straw and not the single reason for it. It seems representative of life being thrown in the face of people who think that there's ever any order...

*RESOLUTION - I thought it was genius when I was fifteen, now I think it's genius-ly over the top :-)

Leo wrote: "....[A lot of good stuff] ..."

Yay! Someone's stepping up! I was wondering if this was ever going to kick off!

Leo wrote: " *MADNESS - That he mentioned he had learned how not to sleep sounded to me like a false victory masking chronic insomnia. ..."

Oh that's FAR too close to the bone for me! I have a migraine right now, caused by a long, sleepless night, caused by being hooked up to wires for a sleep study because of my chronic sleep issues & living on 4-6 hours per night of sleep for the last few months..... and I'm starting to feel rather stabby myself.

re - RESOLUTION: I was loving the book again on the second read, right up until the end. I think it felt like a bit of a let down. Then again, it did avoid the obvious "showdown" cliche, which is always a good thing. It did seem a little too neat and tidy though. Except for the vagina. Nothing neat and tidy about that. *boom boom tish*

I like the idea of "Ant Factory", BTW. But why not, "Bunny Factory"? or "Seagull Factory" or "Snake Factory"? And really, "Dog Factory" would make a lot more sense. Granted, the machine would have to pretty ingenious for some of these - I guess wasps are convenient if not symbolic.

Ruby wrote: "But why not, "Bunny Factory"? or "Seagull Factory" or "Snake Factory"? And really, "Dog Factory" would make a lot more sense. Granted, the machine would have to pretty ingenious for some of these - I guess wasps are convenient if not symbolic. "

We have a huge number of spiritual sequels on our hands haha! Best of luck with your sleeping issues. If it's any consolation, all these exams are turning me into a real life grumpy cat D:< don't be surprised if the book ratings get higher after May 22nd!

Just finished. Finally. Had to wait on delivery, then had a busy week. I'll try and join in the discussion, once I think on the novel a bit.

I will say though the ending was ruined for me from seeing the name of a Listopia group that included the book... Ugh.

Ben wrote: "I will say though the ending was ruined for me from seeing the name of a Listopia group that included the book... Ugh. "

Oh that sucks... But I just thought of so many funny titles for that list haha!

I was a bit confused most of the novel, that Frank was 16, because I felt he acted much younger. His whole war thing going on, and killing small animals made me think he was around the age of 12. This later made much more sense when we get the big reveal.

Maybe his father just isn't on top of his game anymore in medicine and was giving wrong doses of the hormones. The bromine used to curb Frank's sexual desires also explains why a 16 year old is more focused on childish games and not sex.

Now maybe Frank never really understood the difference with men and women, and can overlook having a vagina. We know the father fed him lots of disinformation, and some of it he disproved by researching at the library. But if he does not have the same sexual desires of others his age, he most likely isn't looking at porn or finding out about sex.

I'm not entirely sure why wasps were used for the factory. It could just be because "Wasp Factory" sounds really cool. Frank kills with a poisonous snake, kite, and a bomb; so this may be a stretch but wasps can fly and sting. (Not sure about the bomb death here, but I am trying to force a connection, just a bit).

What does everyone think of Frank's rituals?
He spends most of his day setting up sacrifice poles and the factory. He doesn't seem to hold too rigid to the rituals though (facing the factory with the same question twice) which seems to me like he is just making it up as he goes sometimes. I think most of what he does is just due to stunted social development and immaturity.

Other random questions: Why does the father measure everything? Is it just a quirk or mania? Why did the father never register Frank? Was this because of him experimenting with sex change?

Overall, I enjoyed the novel. Some of the events and character traits seem to be weird just for the sake of being weird,and the cause/effect a bit forced, but it makes me want to check out more of Iain Banks work.

I assumed that Frank behaved the way he did because of a combination of isolation and his screwed up upbringing (the genital mutilation and his family's eccentricities/mental illness).

That's a good point about the vagina. I suppose he was also embarrassed about his genitalia, so he probably never sought out anatomical information, or discussed the topic with his friend.

The rituals were the part I really liked. I actually think his personal symbology makes so much more sense than many popular spiritual practices. Everyone from wiccans to catholics use ritual and symbols to focus the mind on what they wish to ask or achieve. But I've always thought that unless you have a personal understanding and connection to the symbols.... how can that ever work? Objects hold no inherent power of their own - a rosary is just a string of beads unless it represents something to you - so surely the symbols that mean the most to the person are therefore the most powerful? That concept is actually one of the cornerstones of Chaos Magic too :)

That's a good question about the father's obsession with measuring things. I'm sure part of it is to test Frank, to wield some sort of power over him and keep him on his toes. But why measurement in particular? I wonder.

Excellent point about the role isolation played. The first words of The Wasp Factory transported me back to the island in Lord of the Flies. That feeling of human beings left to their own devices in an isolated environment continued for me throughout the book, but if Lord of the Flies is about ¡°normal,¡± albeit less-than-admirable, human characteristics allowed to run their course in a limited social environment, The Wasp Factory is about some of our more common aberrations; misogyny, sociopathy, narcissism, paranoia, etc., running amok in relative isolation. As Frank¡¯s father realized early on, the island is a perfect laboratory because there¡¯s no one around to challenge the various experiments with an emphatic ¡°WTF?!?!¡± To Ben's point, being ¡°off the grid¡± also allowed Frank to forego Society¡¯s traditional maturation schedule, leaving us scratching our heads at what one reader described as a mucked up Peter Pan complex.

I read this last year....I still think about it. I think I need to re-read it, now that I know "everything" and maybe it will make more sense. I was just confused the entire time I was reading it.

I'm trying to avoid spoilers here - but how did people feel about the 'resolution' of the relationship between Frank and Eric at the end. Are there multiple interpretations here, or is there only one inescapable conclusion? I had to re-read the last chapter before I could make sense of Eric's denouement.

Spoilers are fine in this thread, Steve. There's a warning in the title, since it's really a discussion for people who've read the book.

What exactly were you thinking with regard to their relationship?

Bahaha! As soon as I said spoilers were okay, that scene HAD to be blurted out, huh? :)

Oddly, I have repeatedly forgotten that scene, whereas there's a particular scene in Tolkien's Two Towers that will stay with me forever. Likewise a particular scene in James Herbert's Domain. I think horror is such a personalised thing, particularly in literature.

OK - On my first read I thought "Huh, why the Scooby-Doo ending?" Neither Frank nor Eric seem to be in-character. Where's the sheep-burning nut-job that was on the phone gone? Then I re-read it, "Then he shifted, put his curly head on my lap, closed his eyes and went to sleep", then "I look down at Eric's head: quiet, dirty, asleep. His face is calm, He feels no pain." And, "I want to laugh or cry or both, as I sit here, thinking about my one life, my three deaths. Four deaths now, in a way, now that my fathers' truth has murdered what I was". Reading these specific, repeated references to Eric's head, the fact that he never answers back, and in the context of Frank's personality, I think she took the axe with her and beheaded Eric so they could remain together forever. Is the fourth death metaphorical or literal?

I didn't think that. I just thought the end was rushed, convenient and all too (as you say) Scooby Doo.

Another thought nagging at the edge of my mind is that Eric never existed in the first place, and was just another one of Frank's inventions. Setting sheep and dogs alight always seemed much more like things Frank would do. No other character in the story interacted directly with Eric. So now I've got three alternative endings. Are there other interpretations?

a) Scooby-Doo ending: Eric and Frank live happily ever after.
b) Franks kills Eric and adds him to her head collection.
c) Frank lays to rest an imaginary Eric.

Steve wrote: "Another thought nagging at the edge of my mind is that Eric never existed in the first place, and was just another one of Frank's inventions. Setting sheep and dogs alight always seemed much more l..."

Well, I admire your efforts. In reading some interviews with Iain Banks, though, about the writing of this book.... I think I have to go with a). Sometimes a Scooby-Doo ending is just a Scooby-Doo ending.

Just finished reading this recently and needed somewhere to scrape the exploded bunny parts off the inside of my skull cavity...

Eric certainly seems like less of a monster/threat after Frank finds out the truth about himself, so maybe not so much a "happily ever after" as a "dysfunctionally hand-in-hand"... ?

For as short a book as this was, I did not find it a quick read--it wasn't until about 100 pages in that the impending doom of Eric's eventual arrival kept me glued. Banks creates such a unique, isolated world on their island fortress. So much ritual and secrecy (the locked room; the loft and factory only Frank accesses; the lack of interaction with the locals for the most part; etc.).

I finished reading this and I felt like something had happened to me, like I had been made a part of this story (and not in a good way). Like recounting an event that scarred you: When I was 9, I got kidnapped...

I've read much more disturbing books, but it has an oddness all its own.

Other works by Banks you'd recommend (this was my first)?

Marc wrote: "Just finished reading this recently and needed somewhere to scrape the exploded bunny parts off the inside of my skull cavity...

Eric certainly seems like less of a monster/threat after Frank find..."

Did you get kidnapped when you were 9??

I read The Bridge and didn't get it- attempt at Alasdair Gray's far better literary trickery- The Steep Approach to Garbadale was good but forgettable- heard many good things about The Crow Road, his most famous family fuckery funbag and I think based on the street just near where I lived in Glasgow! I gave copies to my bosses at the ESL school I worked in in Gijon, so it would be nice to know if it was any good. Hey! Xmas is sorted! (along with Shark, The Peripheral, The Book of Strange New Things and This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate!!)

No, I have yet to be kidnapped. That was just an example, albeit a confusing one :D

Hmm... kinda mixed--sounds like I could leave him on the back burner for a while and not suffer as a reader. Thanks for breaking it down!

Marc wrote: "No, I have yet to be kidnapped. That was just an example, albeit a confusing one :D

Hmm... kinda mixed--sounds like I could leave him on the back burner for a while and not suffer as a reader. Tha..."

No problem, I so rarely get to break out the 4 Fs of Glasgow :D