The List

Writing a novel about characters who are only allowed to use limited language is a challenge that Forde accepts, and which she executes well, as she is herself considered a wordsmith. She creates art and meaning through language and stories. Or, as Letta describes it: “All throughout history, wordsmiths had helped form the world. They were called other things—writers, journalists—but they had all worked with words and knew the power of language” (161). The third-person narration is as ornate as it needs to be, but when the characters are frustrated because of the limits of List, the reader can see the power of words that they may have taken for granted.

To an extent, it is only possible to think as well as someone can articulate in words. Consider this early scene when Letta sees a new group of boxes: “Her eyes scanned them thoughtfully, delight flooding her heart as she went through them. This is what it was all about. New words. Words they didn’t know. Words that could be saved” (88). Letta has the luxury, as Benjamin’s apprentice, to indulge in her delight for new words. Even as much as Letta trusts Noa’s vision for a limited language in the beginning, she ultimately covets her position that gives her greater access to words, and therefore knowledge.