Art is found in an ambiguous world. This gives it greater utility for everyday life. Three narratives in Specimen Days are written by Michael Cunningham. They lack detail to bring more attention to the ideas and individuality of the stories. Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We is a dystopian tale. Character motivations are rarely addressed and details of the society are rarely given. Heavy use of ambiguity within Specimen Days, and We, serves to draw attention to the characters, their interactions, and the greater commentary within each of these texts.
The text’s three-part structure draws attention away form the actual society and setting of Specimen Days and instead focuses it on the characters, motifs, and storylines. The book can be divided into three parts, “In the Machine”, the Children’s Crusade, and “Like Beauty”, which are all set in the future, present, or past. Each storyline is different, with one being a ghost story and another a mystery. The last being a dystopian futuristic retelling. Cunningham breaks down the storylines and settings by contrasting them so strongly. Cunningham distracts from the natural flow and jumps into other texts, focusing instead on the shared characters and aspects. Each text supports the character’s growth by allowing them to be unsure of the end of each story and the place where it will start. There is also ambiguity about the setting and how each world functions. This is particularly evident in “Like Beauty”, which focuses on the character’s growth and function. The uncertainty of when each story arc will end and where the next one will begin, as well as the ambiguity surrounding each setting and functioning of each world helps draw attention to their interactions and feelings and not to details about a fictional society. The One State’s functioning can only be described in detail when it is relevant to the plots. Although some information is provided about the functioning, the system is not completely transparent. The slight ambiguity regarding the functioning and ciphers of the one State allows us to concentrate on the revolution as well as the decision D-503 has to make when choosing comfort in a familiar setting or joy in a new. The text is ambiguous because it does not explain the motifs or why certain characters are repeated in Specimen Days. This adds to the confusion and helps to focus on the commentary about the common ties between humanity. The china cup is found in all three sections. A loved one will always receive a gift of the china bowl. Although it’s not clear how one bowl appears in all three sections of Specimen Days, they each carry one of its major ideas. It is often gifted to a loved-one in every subsection. This demonstrates the universality love and care. Its appearance in each of the three stories is ambiguous, which makes it more important to consider its significance as a motif in the text. The need to blurt out Walt Whitman’s poetry at random is a common motif in all subsections. In “In the Machine”, Lucas cannot stop blurting it out. In the Children’s Crusade, Cat struggles with poetry and Leaves of Grass plays a crucial part in the mystery. Simon is the one who can’t resist the urge to read poetry aloud. It is not clear how it happens, but the Leaves of Grass excerpts show a shared wonder about the world.
It is because the subsections are not clear around the tying pieces that they become more noticeable and easier to understand. Specimen days and We ambiguity in each text draws more attention towards the main ideas and commentary within the text. Specimen days and We use ambiguity in order to highlight more important aspects of the work. Although each text may be ambiguous, the author can use ambiguity to expand the reach of their works.
