Adventure fiction has a long and varied lineage. The 20th century saw pulp fiction thrillers like those starring Ka-Zar and Doc Savage. Novels such as Treasure Island, King Solomon’s Mines, and Around the World in Eighty Days all date from the 1800s, as do those from Horatio Alger. The 16th century’s Saint Thomas More and the 17th century’s Sir Francis Bacon used adventure narratives as a way of enticing readers to consider their philosophical and theological claims in Utopia and The New Atlantis. Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur centers on the fantastic quests of King Arthur’s knights. Indeed, the history of adventure fiction can be traced as far back as the foundational Western poet, Homer, who tells us of the wanderings of Odysseus.
But this list of titles alone makes it clear that telling tales of adventures and discoveries can make for anything from titillating but shallow novels to great works of literature. The most interesting and formative works of adventure fiction are, in my view, those that not only take readers to distant lands but also encourage us to delve into what Robert Frost calls “my own desert places.” To put it more simply, the best of these books are not just about adventures out in the world, but the adventure of self-discovery.
This is the aim of Robert Lazu Kmita’s newly translated novel The Island Without Seasons. First published in Romanian a few years ago, this is the first novel composed by Kmita, who is a noted Tolkien scholar. It is also the first novel published by Peter Kwasniewski’s Os Justi Press. Although at first glance the book is a classic adventure story about a man trying to discover whether there is any truth to Plato’s famous descriptions of the lost city of Atlantis, it is ultimately about how the man’s search allows him to better understand himself and the world in which he lives.
Set in the early 2000s, The Island Without Seasons tells (in the first-person) the story of Alexander Jacob Wills, a trained classicist who has abandoned academia in favor of a monotonous (but bill-paying) job sitting in front of a computer. Wills, the Italian-Scottish descendant of a great researcher, was raised Catholic and still practices his faith, but it has become a rather empty affair. The reader also gets the sense that, while the protagonist is clearly very well-read, it has been some time since reading held any profound, existential meaning for him.
However, one day, Wills receives a call to action: an invitation to meet with an eccentric duke. This duke was the man for whom Wills’ grandfather worked for the last years of his life. He happens to own a phenomenal library, one of the best in the world. There is one catch, though: the library is located on an isolated island in the middle of the ocean, and it has a mysterious connection to the lost city of Atlantis.
Saying much more would risk spoiling the novel’s plot. However, I can say a bit more about the protagonist. This is a novel with very few characters, and the book is really only interested in one of them, the protagonist, Alexander Jacob Wills. As previously mentioned, he earned a doctorate that he has not been using professionally. This is a cause of strife for him, as he is haunted by a sense that he is meant to do something more than simply show up to work each day and do his job. An unmarried man, he has little to tie him to his life in the city. In the entire novel, Wills does not once mention any kind of friendship. To put it bluntly, at the beginning of the story Wills feels like a man who is vocationally, professionally, socially, and religiously aimless.
Unsurprisingly for a novel released by Os Justi Press, The Island Without Seasons has some Catholic themes, though it is certainly approachable for a person not of that faith. The religious elements of the novel, though essential, are not all-consuming. The irreligious reader might need to Google a few things (such as the chanted Credo that becomes stuck in the protagonist’s head early in the novel), but the protagonist’s journey (exterior and interior) can be understood without much knowledge of Catholicism. For the religious reader, however, the experience of reading the novel is enriched by understanding of the spiritual elements of Wills’ story.
Given the protagonist’s excellent education and the intellectual labor involved in searching out the secrets of Atlantis, it is unsurprising that names like Proclus, Saint Albert the Great, and Christopher Dawson regularly appear in the novel. In some ways, the intellectual nature of the novel is more likely to serve as intimidating for a reader than the religious content. Thankfully, however, Kmita does a good job of placing these philosophers, theologians, and academics within the context of Wills’ search for Atlantis, so that even the reader unfamiliar with all the figures mentioned can enjoy the ride.
Reading a novel in translation always runs the risk of having to wrestle with torturous sentences. (When this happens, it is more often because of the idiosyncrasies of both languages than it is because of any failure on the part of the translator.) There are certainly moments when the prose feels a bit belabored in English, but the story can generally keep the reader engaged despite this.
The adventure story thrives on discovery, and The Island Without Seasons is no different. Being the author’s first novel, the pacing of these revelations is perhaps imperfect—there are a few pieces of information only revealed at the end that might have been more emotionally impactful if revealed earlier in the novel—but even so Kmita keeps you reading. The mysteries of Atlantis and Wills’ search for a vocation are engaging enough that one is hardly likely to mind.
These relatively minor quibbles aside, Os Justi Press has done a favor to the English-speaking world by releasing the English translation of The Island Without Seasons. Far too often, authors writing in languages other than English are not given the exposure they deserve because of the financial and logistical challenges of translation.
If you are intrigued by the idea of a contemporary adventure story that will help you ask some of the more important questions in life, this is the novel for you. Whether you’re looking for Atlantis, an adventure, or self-knowledge, consider taking a trip to The Island Without Seasons.
