Control, Influence & Power

What is the personal cost when heroic leadership is idealised?

by

What is the personal cost when heroic leadership is idealised?

“In our minds the idea of authority – which is what they represented – implied deeper insights and a more humane wisdom. But the first dead man that we saw shattered this conviction.” 

All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque writes about the loss of a generation during wartime – both physically and socially. The blunted writing style and flat characters contrast with the descriptions and experiences, asking us for listen to the trauma of the young men who must sacrifice themselves for the collective ideals of leadership and older generations. 

Literature One-liner

What does it mean to be young when the hands that shaped your future lead you to your death?

Leadership one-liner

Heroic leadership can inspire, but at what cost to those it demands sacrifice from?

SHould a book be compulsory reading?

Absolutely. Yet at the same time, never.

From the one-star reviews I browsed, All Quiet on the Western Front seems to have been compulsory reading for many English classes. I went through many one-star reviews to try to understand the critiques, and it helped to frame my own understanding of the story even further. 

This is not a defence of the book, or an attack on the one-star reviews. It is intended as a challenge to revisit the novel. 

When the social narrative is broken 

It is a reoccurring theme in our lives and stories that each situation attracts a different type of leader and perceived need for leadership. One type of leadership that saturates our social narratives and stories is that of heroic leadership, and this need for hero has persisted throughout history and shows no sign of diminishing.

For those who are sacrificed and silenced in order to build and protect this image of a heroic leader, it can break apart the social narratives that hold their lives in place.

Hypnotic heroes

Characterised by a charismatic and visionary individual, heroic leadership focuses on a saviour-type of figure with centralised, top-down decision-making. Seeking an authoritative figure with the answers is compelling when the world is dark, and we see hero leadership in corporate jobs, politics and throughout our media. The hero leader offers us a future that is blindingly bright with hope and direction, ultimately creating a unified group guided by pride, aligned norms and high expectations. It is also propaganda and describes an idealised image rather than reality.

For those in the shadow

All Quiet on the Western Front is set during a time of heroic leadership, with authoritative saviour figures who are supported by authoritative figures. Wartime is a situation that attracts people to heroic political and military leaders, creating a forceful current of unity and behaviour that are guided by the hero. For those who experience the social ideals turn to personal experience, there is a division that emerges between those who continue to look directly into the bright shininess of the hero, and those who have seen what lies in the shadows. 

In All Quiet on the Western Front, we are taken into the experiences of a generation silenced by what lies in the shadows. Their experiences were inexplicable, creating a division between those who had been at their side, and families and friends who often rejected the experiences of those at the front.

A generation that never found their voice

Paul is the narrator of the novel. A 19-year-old German at the front during World War I. Early in the story he recounts how the boys of his class were marched out of school by their form-master, led into the recruiting office and encouraged to enlist. He tells of the ideals and expectations of those who would remain at home and the threat of rejection and derision if they stayed. Persuaded by their belief in elders and the ideals of authority figures, the final nail in the coffin is the fear of rejection by those they love and respect. 

“It wasn’t easy to stay out of it because at that time even our parents used the word ‘coward’ at the drop of a hat.” 

– Paul describing the beginning of a social narrative breaking apart as their generation realise their own homes and communities are no longer a refuge from the world (Chapter 1)
The personal cost

The most reluctant of the boys who enlists, the boy’s death as the first of the group is recounted in simple yet harrowing sentences. It is easy to skim these lines and miss the guilt and grief that echoes in the matter-of-fact words. The writing style of this book shows us the narrative of one who has learnt to blunt the wounds of memories. Would we be more sympathetic to the writing style and the story if it has been written autobiographical rather than semi-autobiographical? Do we need deep scars to be accompanied by harrowing and emotional recollections? 

Trauma as entertainment 

There is a blurred line between dramatised entertainment and documented trauma. All Quiet on the Western Front is a difficult book to read. Never have I felt the need to put down a book at the end of each chapter to sit with the words, but each chapter of this book created a painful papercut in my mind that demanded time. For those who were handed the book as compulsory reading, there were those who considered the topic boring or “a downer”. I would suggest it is our generation’s privilege to distance ourselves from what is depressing or “a downer”, but not to the point that we require documented trauma to be elevated to dramatised entertainment. Instead, I would say that a book like this is not here with us in mind – instead it is a voice that needs to be heard. For those who want to listen, All Quiet on the Western Front waits with the expectation that it will not be received with sympathy. 

There are no prizes for judgement or criticism 

A book invites us to reflect on the response it generates in us. To consider the story in All Quiet on the Western Front as ‘flat’ is an understandable observation about the writing. It was not an impression I had, instead I felt the impact of violence that was stripped down and laid bare. It is matter-of-fact, and if we perceive a lack of connection with the characters, I would challenge that it is an opportunity to see the dehumanisation of war. 

“We’ve been melted down, and now we have all been restruck so that we are all the same… only as an afterthought and in a strange and shamefaced way are we still individual human beings.” 

– Paul reflecting on how dehumanised they have become at the front (Chapter 11)
So, why this book?

Writing this novel cost the author, Erich Maria Remarque, his citizenship and he was exiled from Germany. The book has been burned and banned, criticised and challenged for its unpatriotic themes and anti-war promotion. Why? Is it not ironic that the book lays out the danger of authoritative decisions to an individual’s freedom and life – yet burning and banning is a dismissive and authoritative control of an individual’s freedom to listen and learn from others?

“They were supposed to be the ones who would help us eighteen-year-olds to make the transition, who would guide us into adult life, into a world of work, of responsibilities, of civilized behaviour and progress – into the future.” 

– The first part of a quote raging against the generation who pushed them into war (Chapter 1)
when we look to others to guide us in our lives

In All Quiet on the Western Front, Paul opens up to the reader while on the front line. Young as he is, he takes the reader from the shelter of school and home as the boys are marched through the rigid structure of the military and out into the trenches of the Western Front. The reflections and observations he narrates describe a natural adherence to the system relative to their youth and limited experiences in life. At 19-years-old they find themselves distanced from their childhood and parents, yet without roots in their own independent lives. 

 “In our minds the idea of authority – which is what they represented – implied deeper insights and a more humane wisdom. But the first dead man that we saw shattered this conviction.” 

– The second part of the quote that rages against the generation who pushed them into war (Chapter 1)

The front line is an abyss – where the boys see their expectations and lives torn apart. The atrocities of war are horrific but there is an unsettling voice that reoccurs through the pages. The one that points at the self-serving and brutal disregard of authority for the lives of individuals. The young, expectant boys on the brink of stepping into their lives, who instead realise they are disposable and interchangeable. Disregarded by the decision-makers and dismissed by their loved ones, their worth measured by how they face death before they have had a chance to live. 

 “While they went on writing and making speeches, we saw field hospitals and men dying: while they preached the service of the state as the greatest thing, we already knew that the fear of death is even greater.” 

– The third part of the quote that rages against the generation who pushed them into war (Chapter 1)
Banned? Burned? Compulsory? Recommended?

Are these expressed experiences to be interpreted as anti-war? Perhaps, if the position of this criticism is from a pro-war perspective, or an authoritarian desire to control the narrative. From a more neutral perspective, it is a story of life’s unfulfilled promise. Is it boring or flat? Lacking connection with characters? It is difficult to connect with people who have been disillusioned and numbed, who feel disconnected from the lives they had and the lives hoped for and expected. 

“All at once our eyes had been opened. And we saw that there was nothing left of their world. Suddenly we found ourselves horribly alone – and we had to come to terms with it alone as well.” 

– The last part of the quote, and the point where the social narrative breaks apart (Chapter 1)

All Quiet on the Western Front should not be compulsory reading, or a book universally accepted or loved. That would be too authoritarian. Instead, consider it a voice of a silenced generation. Boys who were raised to worry about test scores and futures, before being put to death and swept aside by a society shadowed by hero leadership.

Why do we become led astray by a voice that stakes authority?

by

Why do we become led astray by a voice that stakes authority?

“You see, she had absolutely nowhere else to go.” 

Book image by me. I could not find a cover to match the rawness and sensitivity of the story.
I later read in a CNN article that Vladimir Nabokov had written: 
“… let us settle for an immaculate white jacket (rough texture paper instead of the usual glossy kind), with LOLITA in bold black lettering.” 
I agree.

Lolita is a novel that examines the manipulative power of storytelling, showing how our response to authority, charm and rhetoric can distort morality and perception.

Literature one-liner

It is in this story that we find how deception can be masked through our own insecurities and prejudices, and how narrative can seduce us away from truth.

Leadership one-liner

The blueprints left by others in a position of authority can shape our behaviour, creating openings for those who would control or manipulate.

A murderer’s memoir 

Lolita opens with a foreword from a fictional psychiatrist presenting us with the memoir of a murderer, Humbert Humbert. A charming and intelligent man, Humbert seeks a connection with the reader as he describes his all-consuming love and desire for a young girl. Humbert’s unreliable narration is finely selected, presented to distract you from the “small matter-of-fact voice” which tries to be heard throughout the pages. 

It sounds like a storyline irresistible to Freud. The study of a fatherless and sexually promiscuous girl and a middle-aged man. Expect it is not. Freud’s thread of thought is the exact trap that Nabokov lays so skilfully for us with Humbert’s voice and narrative. 

Nabokov & FREUD

Nabokov despised Freud, calling him a ‘a comic writer’. Bringing the two of them together may risk being haunted by disgruntled ghosts for a week or two, but I am sure it will be worth it. It is powerful to read Nabokov’s writing alongside a concept attributed with Freud, and even more impactful for understanding a Freudian concept in leadership theory.

Transference. A concept proposing that each time a person meets and interacts with someone new, the new relationship is formed as a new version of previous relationships. Unconsciously, individuals project their experienced emotions and behaviours with others in their lives – particularly in the case of authority figures – onto any new relationship. To find the truth in Lolita, and to remain alert to unreliable narration in leadership, we need to understand transference.

Seen through different eyes

“She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita.”

– Humbert Humbert in the opening of the novel, Chapter 1

Lo, Lola, Dolly, Dolores, Lolita. Have you heard the saying ‘a loved child has many names’? An idiom that is entirely misleading in relation to this particular child.

“… (her mother) had underlined the following epithets, ten out of forty, under ‘Your Child’s Personality’: aggressive, boisterous, critical, distrustful, impatient, irritable, inquisitive, listless, negativistic (underlined twice) and obstinate. She had ignored the thirty remaining adjectives, among which were cheerful, co-operative, energetic and so forth.” 

– Humbert Humbert reading “Your Child’s Personality” questionnaire completed by Dolly’s mother, Chapter 10

I feel complicit with Humbert when I refer to her as ‘Lolita’. It is a name born from her sexual abuse. Although it can be read as a romance novel, the strength of Lolita is the power to reflect on separating out the threads of the story.

From here, I will refer to her as “his Lolita” when identifying with Humbert’s obsession with her, and “Dolly” when I refer to the echoes of her own story as a 12-year-old girl.

Lo, Lola, Dolores
The lost child 

Throughout the novel, Humbert uses the name Lo, Lola or Dolores whenever she amuses, annoys, exasperates and baffles him. The situations he uses these names are when he is conscious of his role of responsible adult, and this is a child developing in an environment of fault-finding, control, threats, bribes and abuse. 

Dolly
The hidden child 

In her own world, she is not Lo or Lolita. She calls herself ‘Dolly’. The childish name brings to mind a childish plaything, and it is the name used when she is with other children and their parents, teachers. Dolly is also a person Humbert must share with others, and one who requires him to take on a fatherly role. It is also the child who learns that adults are not dependable and that sex is transactional. 

Lolita
The fantasy child 

Lolita is a creation of Humbert’s and the name used during moments related to us as agonising desire and love. He creates a person who does not exist. Lolita can be considered the personification of his obsessive desire. 

Sexualising a 12-year-old for profit 

Did you know the book Lolita has over 210 different cover designs? Some designs tend towards painfully plain while many others are sexually provocative or suggestive. The author, Vladimir Nabokov, specifically requested no images of young girls on the cover and publishing houses doubled down on focusing on profit. The more provocative covers sold the most books, but it also helped to distort the message of Lolita.

Dirived & Distorted Messages

Dolores is a name with the meaning “sorrow” or “pain”, and Lolita is one of many derivatives or pet names. Since Nabokov’s novel the noun ‘Lolita’ has been reduced in popular culture to symbolise sexual promiscuity and young girls described with synonyms such as nymphet, vixen, seductress and vamp. Why? How can a story of a sexually abused 12-year-old girl be solidified into our language in that way? The noun ‘Lolita’ should mean obsession and abuse – a child controlled by person they idealise or see as an authority figure. 

Authority is not leadership 

Let me be very clear, Humbert Humbert is not a leader. This is not the perspective we are taking in this discussion – in any shape or form. He is a man driven by his own desires and need for control. As an adult, Humbert has a position of authority over a child and his influence grows in power when he steps into the role of guardian. Humbert’s presentation of himself as sophisticated, superior of intellect, and charming is a strategy that makes the most of transference.

Transference as a strategy

At the end of the novel, I asked myself how I could have let myself believe the story of a paedophile? And how I could I have so little compassion for a 12-year-old girl? It fascinated me to see how an unreliable narrator can influence our perceptions and emotions.

Humbert plays the reader by making it difficult to empathise with Dolly. His Lolita is described with such love and beauty, that the real life Dolly becomes vulgar and shallow in contrast. Despite seemingly sympathetic to her character weaknesses, Humbert merely reaffirms the negative traits within a sympathetic tone of an adult who knows better and is trying to help an ungrateful child. He assumes a role of authority – balancing his grandiose self-beliefs with self-deprecating insights to make him appear more humble. In addition, Humbert places his actions under the warm-tinted glow of romance, while others are left in the laboratory-white glare of scrutiny. As a reader, we respond to Humbert because of the filters we choose to apply.

How does transference become a filter 

It may be difficult to empathise with his Lolita or Dolly, but the concept of transference brings at least understanding to this difficult character. As mentioned earlier, transference is a term coined by Freud to suggest our past relationships and experiences – particularly those with early caregivers – are projected onto our subsequent relationships. The way you and I, the way Dolly and the adults around her have experienced authority, control, care and love – according to transference – creates a blueprint for our future relationships. Particularly when authority is involved.

blueprints can be used unethically by leaders

Research does consistently show that relationships are formative and impactful on a developing brain. When we consider how our brains continue developing until our early-20s, it is interesting to see questions raised about the ethics of corporate leadership development programmes for graduates. Graduate programmes often have strong elements of elitism and competition, and the observation or close mentoring of an authority/power figure. The threat of exclusion, removal, or disapproval by authority figures is stronger amongst young people who are still forming personal experiences with authority or power figures. The impact of these experiences on future decisions is what we see within Dolly’s storyline.

Lolita-ship 

In leadership, transference impacts people and results when individuals (sub-consciously) project past experiences onto those in authority. A person in a position of authority or control might not always be viewed through an objective lens, and the resulting behaviours and reactions can be filtered through idealisation or criticism rooted in the observer’s previous relationships (transference). This can affect the effectiveness of the leader. If we turn our eyes to Lolita, we will see adults responding to Humbert’s charm-filled presentation of authority and expressed intelligence. In a society that respects a person presenting themselves that way, the adults are primed to behave in a way Humbert expects.

You are impacted by transference

Humbert also uses transference is with you, dear reader. You and I have been primed through life to judge certain characteristics and behaviours as attractive or repellent. Dolly is illustrated in unlikeable while his Lolita is described as sexually promiscuous and spoiled. Instead of seeing it as a foil to offset his own repellent characteristics and behaviours, we believe the message. However, when we put the lens of transference on Dolly, Lolita becomes a completely different novel. 

First, Flip the narrative 

Dolly is a disappointing character. As a child she is shallow, and as she grows to womanhood, she reveals herself to be self-serving, emotionally flat and transactional in relationships. However, when we pick at the threads of Humbert’s story, small facts ooze through his words. A 12-year-old who lost her father young to suicide and her relationship with her mother complicated by criticism and disinterest. The combination of loneliness and innocence that leads her into situations with older teenagers and adults. When Humbert dwells on their passion and deep love, he also lets slip how she cries at night when she thinks he is asleep – remarking on her moodiness and his generosity in trying to keep her happy. Dolly is also described as being materialistic and demanding rewards for sex, while he reveals at the same time her reluctance to participate in his desire and her capitulation to pressure and bribery. She is greedy and shallow as she negotiates monetary bribes, sly and secretive for hiding the money for escape.

Second, Consider the impact of transference 

These glints of truth are scattered and sometimes lost amongst Humbert’s magniloquence, making it a treasure hunt for the truth. When you take those threads and weave them outside of Humbert’s version, you start to see how Dolly’s actions and decisions are tainted by what she has learned from adults who failed to protect and guide her. She is still disappointing and shallow, but when we consider what she has learned about relationships and authority in her young life, we can begin to mourn her childhood and understand her responses and reactions.

Why did you not just leave? 

In leadership, people’s subconscious transference can become as hidden and lost in the everyday as Dolly’s experience becomes in Lolita. If Freud is correct and our past relationships impact how we interact with authority figures, leadership theory suggests that the effectiveness of a leader can be affected by people’s projections of earlier relationships.

Why did you not see what they intended?

An individual with a blueprint of idealising and submitting to authority sets a pathway for a leader to build a dangerous ego. Humbert achieves power only through an increasing confidence in himself and his desires. Dolly observes a handsome stranger who treats her with friendliness and attention, his charm and appeal creating a power imbalance with her mother and other adults. If for years, Humbert manages the perceptions and influences of adults, it is understandable that 12-year-old Dolly would mirror adult reactions. In the void of healthy and supportive relationships, Dolly learns not to trust authority and to approach relationships in an emotionless and transactional manner.

Transference is a red flag

Transference serves us best when it is identified. Understanding transference allows us to better navigate the dynamics in our relationships that occur subconsciously. Lolita invites us to look beyond the surface, to question the narratives we are told and to be more mindful of the psychological forces at play in any relationship. Through the ‘simulation’ Nabokov offers us an understanding of transference, and with it, an opportunity to hold our past relationships accountable and to clearly see each new relationship we have the opportunity to build.

How to read Lolita 

Forget his Lolita, and look for Dolly. Take note of her the few times she manages to tear through Humbert’s grandiose and emotive language. Do not let Humbert distract you. Side-step his game of manipulation and take note of when you find yourself charmed or repulsed.

I was a young adult when I read this novel, and vividly remember the disgust I felt when I realised how astray Humbert had led me. It was alarming to find myself trying to rationalise his actions to better align with my morals. Fascinated, I put Lolita on the shelf but Dolly proved to be a restless ghost. The second time I read the novel, I was able to hold myself distant and hold onto the 12-year-old child as her story slipped into the foreground. 

This is how I recommend reading Lolita – with self-awareness of when (and how) Humbert triggers your empathy, dislike, judgement and forgiveness.

denied inspiration 

Beneath Nabokov’s Lolita are significant similarities to the case of Florence Sally Horner. Sally was an 11-year-old girl kidnapped and abused for 21 months by a man who presented himself in a position of authority. Nabokov denies the case inspired his novel, despite referencing it in Humbert’s words: 

“Had I done to Dolly, perhaps, what Frank Lasalle, a fifty-year-old mechanic, had done to eleven-year-old Sally Horner in 1948?” 

– Humbert Humbert at the end of the novel reflecting on his actions, Chapter 33

Lolita opens with a foreword by a fictional psychiatrist. He writes to the reader to explain the story is Humbert Humbert’s memoir after his death in prison. Nabokov and the fictional psychiatrist warn us in the first pages that we need to be alert to the awfulness of the story and the foreword ends with the sentence: 

“‘Lolita’ should make all of us – parents, social workers, educators – apply ourselves with still greater vigilance and vision to the task of bringing up a better generation in a safer world.” 

Despite the warning, we are swept along by Humbert’s influence. The first part of the story focuses on Humbert’s background as a child and youth and into adulthood. It describes his manipulation, charm and growing obsession as he navigates his desires for young and vulnerable girls. After moving into Dolly’s home as a boarding guest, his obsession focuses singularly on Dolly and we see his desperation to possess her. The first part of Lolita culminates with both intentional and chance events resulting in Humbert becoming her guardian, sealing her fate: 

“You see, she had absolutely nowhere else to go.” 

– Humbert Humbert describing Dolly’s vulnerability, Chapter 29
Inspiration to madness

The second part of the novel feels like a slow descent into madness. Here, Dolly’s reluctance to play the role of his Lolita is described by Humbert through accounts of her moodiness, coldness towards him and the bribes she begins to negotiate.

Humbert becomes increasingly suspicious and controlling. Despite his declarations of love he progresses from distress over schoolgirl bruises to cruelly backhanding her in his anger. There are heartbeat moments – short sentences tearing away his perception to show Dolly’s reality – tears, reluctance and seeking paths of escape. It is not the star-shattering love Humbert wants us to believe. She did have absolutely nowhere else to go.

It is our obligation to remember the physical and cognitive immaturity and development that is normal at her age, and to the authority and responsibility of adults to do protect a child during that development. And as Dolly grows up in the second part of the novel, to remember transference and how her painful experiences with authority figures form her future relationships and life. 

Madness to silence

Dolly’s story ends without her voice ever being heard. If Lolita was written from her perspective, how would the story unfold? How many unheard voices can we pay attention to? Can transference help us listen to find the true story running beneath the narrative we are offered?

Are our choices our own or the will of another?

by

Are our choices our own or the will of another?

“It is horrifyingly easy to make people perform as you wish, if they think they are in control.”

the bone people, by Keri Hulme, is a story of three broken individuals isolated in a rugged coastline town in New Zealand. Bound by dependence as much as desire, the events reveal how control can masquerade as connection.

Literature One-liner

To control another is to rewrite their choices until they mistake your will for their own.

Leadership one-liner

T“It is horrifyingly easy to make people perform as you wish, if they think they are in control.” — a reminder that manipulation thrives where power hides behind empathy.

The illusion of control 

Calvin & Hobbes - life lessons of the best kind

Calvin & Hobbes – the best of life’s lessons

Let us take rain as an example of the illusion of control. In Denmark, the Viking progeny obstinately insist “there is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing”. A foreigner may be initially submissive to inclement weather, exclaiming “there’s no way I am going out in that” before miserably realising they are powerless and, in fact, do have to go out in that. 
Danes hold stubbornly to the illusion that the weather does not control their decisions or activities. Instead, the country collectively claims the weather is powerless when one owns 87 combinable layers of varied waterproofing and breathability. Reluctance to submit to or obey the controlling forces of powerful weather gods are very much a part of the Danish psyche. 
I can merely offer you this wisdom. If you see an umbrella floating past in a minor flood, you may need to brace yourself and persist with that outdoors barbecue (true story).
Control is not a main theme of the bone people. As it often is with control, the lessons in this book are more subtle. I can promise you however, that you will enter the first page with a certain view of life and will leave the last page conflicted.

It is (horrifyingly) easy to make people perform as you wish

I learnt early. You learnt early. During the first year of life, a baby develops the ability to “manipulate” in order to fulfil survival needs while dependent on others. You may understand this as a form of communication rather than the definition that the word manipulation brings to mind. To manipulate is to control or shape an outcome – we colour the word with our experience of manipulation occurring in deceitful or unfair ways.

Fine-tuning our strategies

Our communication shapeshifts into more advanced forms of power, control, influence and persuasion through our experiences, interactions with others, and the discovery of subtlety. Humans are motivated to fulfil needs and wants, and will test as far as we believe we have power or control.
In the bone people, Kerewin uses isolation and estrangement as a form of control over people’s expectations of her and her words as an influence to discourage the behaviour of others. Joe swings between the influences of love in response to Simon’s needs and the power of inflicting pain in order to control his foster-sons behaviour. With our small one in the story, Simon, like most children, is unconscious of his own power. Instead, Simon uses his behaviour to leverage what he can to fulfil the basic needs of belonging and safety, and to respond to his experiences.

The fight for our rights… and nefarious plans 

Manipulation and influence are skills available to all, regardless of how much or how little power and/or control an individual has. The “horrifying” aspect of manipulation grows from the roots of entitlement and privilege. When we sense an inability to fulfil our needs and wants, we may respond in what leadership theory calls destructive methods. Subterfuge and rebellion (Simon), pulling away or voicing our dissent (Kerewin), or finding ourselves in a chaos of compliance and frustration (Joe).
The bone people shows us that being in a state of survival can keep us distracted, reactive and increasingly unfulfilled, despite thinking we are in control.

We need the whole to -vive

We need to be part of a whole in order to survive as individuals; and at the same time we need to be individual in order to for the whole to thrive. It is about a constant search for balance with respect for our different heritages.
Togetherness, aligned behaviours, collective purpose – these are some of the goals of leadership. It is expected a leader will use influence, persuasion, power and control as tools to redirect beliefs, decisions and actions. Yet it is an illusion. The goal of leadership at the end of the day is to achieve a result.

“It is horrifyingly easy to make people perform as you wish, if they think they are in control.”

Chapter 10 – The Kaumatua and the Broken Man


It is here that some will pay attention to the word “horrifyingly” while others accept the sentence as “easy”. The use of acceptable control creates obedience, compliance and consent while avoiding resistance and dissent. When control becomes excessive, resistance and dissent rise, along with dangerous levels of obedience, passive compliance and conformity.

Life is Brutal for some, routine for others 

In the bone people we are offered people on the outside of the system. Kerewin chooses isolation from her community and estrangement from her family, preferring to live alone and undisturbed by the needs and wants of others. For Joe, it is his upbringing which has left a void between him and his heritage, a gap that merely widens and sets him adrift after the death of his wife and child. The third focal person of the story is Simon, a boy of between 7-9 years of age who occupies a silent space somewhere between a child’s understanding of the world and the consequences of the adult world. 

The forces you live with

There are forces of influence, persuasion, power and control in the bone people which are also reality for all of us outside the page of a book. There is the ongoing influence and persuasion for Kerewin to develop a more open and pleasant approach to people despite the personal discomfort it causes her; for Joe to have better self-control over his foster-son despite limited support; and for Simon to go to school and behave as a child is expected to, while the adults around him discriminate, neglect and are self-absorbed, providing gentle understanding one moment and angry rejection the next. 
Although influence and persuasion are preferred methods to change behaviour, forms of resistance or dissent is considered destructive by the person being controlled, regardless of the personal cost of that influence or persuasion. If the required change of behaviour is perceived as necessary, efforts will graduate into the use of power and control. This is considered fundamental and necessary in leadership. 

Well, if it gets the job done… 

Arguably an acceptable strategy if you are the one in control (and at peace with having that control). The kaumatua (elder) is not at peace with holding control over others, identifying it as horrifying. He recognises control is vulnerable to the whims of the individual, adding he learned manipulation early in his life from “someone who was far too wise”. Manipulation, control, power, influence and persuasion stem from what is perceived to be of value to the controlling person – whether that value is personal or collective gain, or creates productive or destructive experiences and results to the person being controlled.
Perhaps you are aware of control and able to see through the influence and persuasion. Or it could be that you choose to comply (fully or camouflaged), or believe you are manipulating or controlling the situation to your own benefit. 

“… if they think they are in control.” 

It is the illusion which drives behaviour change. As long as you do not perceive the control, you can be made to perform as another person wishes.
And vice versa.
Do you find that horrifying?

What lies beneath? 

Beneath the persuasion, the influence and the control. Beneath our perception of what we want, or what we think is ours. 
As you come to the end of the final page of the bone people, stop a moment. Consider the extent of power available to some individuals, the potential for abuse of that power, and the dependence created by power imbalance. As the bone people shows us, the illusion of control can mislead us into a false sense of autonomy.
Kerewin, Joe and Simon all had a sense of disconnect, unease, unhappiness, or felt unfulfilled. These are all signs the balance of power has shifted too far and it is time to pay more attention to what lies beneath your decisions and actions.

A book and the weather 

As with Danish weather, the bone people will evoke different reactions and occasional suffering. It is a controversial book, which draws me in. When literature polarises us it is a gift to understanding more about one another.
Rewritten and rejected, there are those who consider it a messy and uncomfortable story, and those who see the beauty of the tangled and ambiguous people.
A judge for the Booker Prize said the bone people would win over her dead body. It won (and the judge is still alive 40 years later – she may have overestimated her influence and power).  

The title divides US

In the book the phrase “e nga iwi o nga iwi” is explained as a play on words – the bones of the people or the people of the bones. The Māori word iwi is more commonly recognised as one meaning a tribe of people (or nation), with a lesser known secondary meaning of bones (or strength). 
In Danish the book is titled Marvfolket (marv meaning marrow). I fell down several rabbit holes before emerging with the conclusion that for early settlements in Denmark, marrow was a nutritious source of calories in the bleak winter months. No connection to e nga iwi o nga iwi.
There was one source of mythology referencing marrow – that of Loki using manipulative and persuasive words to convince a boy into eating the marrow of one of Thor’s goats. Aha! A connection to control.
I am relatively certain that was not the intended connection when the title was translated. Instead, I have been left with the belief that even from the title we are taken into the story with different understandings of the world.
It is understandable that it is experienced so differently.

it really has nothing to do with leadership

Instead the bone people is about isolation, violence, love, colonial legacy and Māori heritage. I would argue, however, that both leadership and literature are in agreement about one common factor: An individual who stands alone and resists compliance (as the characters in the bone people) take us to the precipice of change.
Leadership aims to create change through compliance, while literature breaks out the rebellious spirits to explore a new way of being. 

INCOMPLEtE & BROKEN

“I don’t know whether my family is bane or meaning, but they have surely gone away and left a large hole in my heart.”

Chapter 6 – Ka Tata Te Po (Night is Near)

Leadership prefers obedience and order, while the bone people peel back layers to show the complexity and disorder of lives we often ignore.  
There is no evident hero or villain. People are good while doing bad things. Joe is a loving and compassionate father who explodes into extreme domestic violence towards the very one he loves. Kerewin’s eloquence with words both wound and soothe. Simon is punished and corrected for childish misdeeds, while the adults turn a blind eye as he is subjected to abuse and neglect.
Through the pages we hold the complexity of violent love, cruel comfort and concerned neglect, while at the same time our brains try to rationalise and understand the decisions and actions of Kerewin, Joe and Simon. It reminds us to be kind.

“Heaven and hell, you never knew what people had in their past.”

Chapter 5 – Spring Tide, Neap Tide, Ebb Tide, Flood
The bones of MY people and the PEOPLE OF YOUR BONES

I can understand how some of the impact of the bone people may be missed or difficult to relate to. Colonial legacy and native heritage are a critical part of this book, the merging of different cultures into a whole while retaining an identity that strengthens us.
It was confronting and abrasive for me to read, invoking shame and then curiosity. Shame I have learnt a language from a country on the other side of the world, yet never learned a language of my birthplace. And shame I took so long to learn to balance out inherited bias with my own exploration.
However, in choosing curiosity, it helps to break the frame through which I view the world. It allows me to understand more than judge, to see more than assume. To understand how the bones of my people influence me, and how the people of your bones influence you.

“E nga iwi o nga iwi” 

Simon imagines Joe saying this sentence as he reflects on their need to be together and to create a home together. The phrase is a play on words, meaning both our ancestors and relations (the bones of the people), and the people at the beginning of all things (the people of the bones). While our legacy and heritage – not necessarily cultural, but also personal – are what brought all of us to this particular day, it is how we choose to take it into tomorrow that matters the most. 
We may accept we are constantly being manipulated by the legacy and heritage of previous generations, the power and control of others, and the influence and persuasion in our environment. In turn we exert control over others, finding ways to make them perform as we wish. We may accept that it is easy, and turn away from looking too carefully. We may blind ourselves to only see what we perceive as our control. 
Or we may remember it is only an illusion of control, a way to satisfy entitlements and wants. Or maybe the Danish people actually do have the right idea – focus on what you can control. And remember to be… waterproof?

how to read the bone people 

You could swallow a dictionary, battle through the prose, and try to rationalise mythology line by line. In books like this, I prefer to practice allowing the story to ebb and flow. This means a consistent rhythm of moving forward and taking it as I feel it should be. Whether that means a paragraph or several chapters, slowly paying attention or lightly reading, it results in constant movement.
The bone people starts with a small boy of indeterminate years found half-drowned on a beach. He has been washed up with the detritus of the sea as well as the dead bodies of a man and a woman. The blonde-haired and blue-eyed child is fostered with a Māori family and given the name of Simon (Haimona in Māori). Half-wild and fey, mute and stubborn, he is raised in the home of Joe, his foster-father. 
When Simon breaks into the home of Kerewin – an artist estranged from her family and self-isolated from the community – an unlooked for relationship begins to form between the three of them.
Love and violence are inextricably entwined, making the bone people a story that flays each layer slowly away to reveal the bleached and bare reality of lives we may not easily understand. This story will set a hook in your mind about the vulnerability and complexities of relationships, love and belonging. 
The bone people will not allow you to mirror yourself as many books try to do. Instead you will be led into a world you are unlikely to fully understand or recognise, and to live alongside people you will likely never encounter in your life. 

“But all together, they have become the heart and muscles and mind of something perilous and new, something strange and growing and great. Together, all together, they are the instruments of change.” 

Chapter 10 – The Kaumatua and the Broken Man

Te mutunga – ranai te take
The end – or the beginning